The Evening Blues - 11-10-23
Hey! Good Evening!
This evening's music features Los Angeles blues band The Red Devils. Enjoy!
The Red Devils - Shake Your Hips / Who Do You Love
"You can’t run a fully-fledged democracy and a colonial war; one aspires to decency, the other is a form of fascism, regardless of its pretensions."
-- John Pilger
News and Opinion
Gaza War Crimes Make a Mockery of Western "Democracy"
The term “free world” was a mainstay of the cold war lexicon for decades. Although the United States and its NATO allies still portray themselves as paragons of free thought and action and declare anyone they don’t like as laggards in regard to human rights. They make quite a show of bragging about being democracies but their actions prove otherwise.
The U.S. and Israel continue their killing spree in Gaza which now totals 11,000 fatalities of men, women, and children. While the President of the United States claimed to have seen confirmation that Hamas beheaded children, Palestinians in their sorrow display the broken bodies of their children, some of them headless or limbless as Israel bombs homes, hospitals, and ambulances. The U.S. and the European Union are steadfast in their support of the bloodletting.
Of course most of the world has unambiguously condemned the ongoing crime. Millions of people have protested on every continent to express their outrage and revulsion as the sick plot to kill Palestinians en masse and force the survivors to leave their homes intensifies by the day. Eight nations, including South Africa, Bolivia, and Colombia have cut diplomatic ties with Israel. In Washington DC, headquarters of the aiders and abettors of the genocide, an estimated 300,000 people took to the streets in just one protest. Similar numbers were seen in London and other European capitals.
But these displays of empathy and solidarity pose a problem for the nations known as the collective west. The U.S. and its friends in NATO are committed to imposing their will on the rest of the world and they don’t want to hear from pesky citizens who point out their wrongdoing.
France and Germany both banned pro-Palestinian demonstrations and yet thousands marched anyway. The United Kingdom actually charged two young women with a terrorism offense for wearing images of a Hamas hang glider on their jackets as they marched in London. In the U.S., doxing, job termination, and even the censure of a member of Congress, Representative Rashida Tlaib, are all used to silence anyone who strays from official narratives.
Palestinian Groups Ask ICC to Arrest Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu for War Crimes & Genocide in Gaza
Israel plays down US reports of four-hour 'pauses' in northern Gaza
Israel appeared to play down US claims that it would begin implementing four-hour "humanitarian pauses" in northern Gaza, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office and Israeli military officials casting doubt over Washington's announcement.
Earlier on Thursday, White House spokesperson John Kirby told reporters that there would be two "humanitarian corridors" for Palestinians to flee northern Gaza to the south and that Israel would not carry out military operations in those areas for periods lasting four hours. ...
However, an hour later, a statement from Netanyahu's office said the fighting in Gaza would "continue and there will not be a ceasefire before the hostages are released".
Later, Israeli army spokesman Richard Hecht told reporters that the four-hour windows were "not a shift" in Israeli policy. ...
On Sunday, Israel said it opened a corridor along the main road connecting the north and south of Gaza. It remains open for four hours a day but Israeli air strikes have continued unabated in both parts of the territory.
Prof. Jeffrey Sachs: The dangers of unbridled war.
Netanyahu rejected ceasefire-for-hostages deal in Gaza
Benjamin Netanyahu rejected a deal for a five-day ceasefire with Palestinian militant groups in Gaza in return for the release of some of the hostages held in the territory early in the war, according to sources familiar with the negotiations.
The sources said the Israeli prime minister rejected the deal outright in negotiations soon after Hamas militants staged an unprecedented incursion into Israeli territory on 7 October, killing an estimated 1,400 people.
Negotiations resumed after the launch of the Israeli ground offensive on 27 October, but the same sources said Netanyahu had continued to take a tough line on proposals involving ceasefires of different durations in exchange for a varying number of hostages.
Others indicated that negotiations which took place prior to the ground invasion involved a far larger number of hostages, with Hamas proposing the release of dozens of foreign nationals captive in Gaza. ...
According to three sources familiar with the talks, the original deal on the table involved freeing children, women and elderly and sick people in exchange for a five-day ceasefire, but the Israeli government turned this down and demonstrated its rejection with the launch of the ground offensive.
Alastair Crooke : Israel vs Gaza: The elephant in the room.
Contradicting Biden, US Official Says Gaza Death Toll May Be 'Even Higher' Than Reported
Contradicting her bosses in the Biden administration who have rejected official Palestinian casualty reports, a high-ranking U.S. State Department official on Wednesday said the death toll from Israel's war on Gaza may be "even higher" than reported—an assessment that came during a congressional hearing interrupted by peace activists.
"In this period of conflict and conditions of war, it is very difficult for any of us to assess what the rate of casualties are," U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Barbara Leaf told members of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. "We think they're very high, frankly, and it could be that they're even higher than are being cited. We'll know only after the guns fall silent."
"We take in sourcing from a variety of folks who are on the ground," she added. "I can't stipulate to one figure or another, it's very possible they're even higher than is being reported."
“We think they’re very high, and it could be they’re even higher than are being cited."
US assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs, Barbara Leaf has said that the Gaza death toll may be higher than the near-11,000 figure reported by the Palestinian health ministry pic.twitter.com/iDe1kyxBjg
— Middle East Eye (@MiddleEastEye) November 9, 2023
Leaf's remarks stood in stark contrast with those of President Joe Biden, who was accused of "genocide denial" last month after he expressed "no confidence" in Palestinian health officials' Gaza casualty reports—figures deemed reliable by United Nations agencies, human rights groups, and Israeli and international media. ...
Members of the women-led peace group CodePink confronted Leaf and Deputy Assistant Defense Secretary for the Middle East Dana Stroul during Wednesday's hearing.
When Leaf and Stroul responded affirmatively to House Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Michael McCaul's (R-Texas) question of whether Hamas committed genocide by killing over 1,400 Israeli civilians and soldiers during an October 7 surprise attack on Israel, one CodePink activist shouted, "What about Israel?"
BREAKING: Our activist Leslie Angeline just disrupted @HouseForeignGOP as State Department officials spread lies to justify the US-backed #GazaGenocide.@APWAUSA's Amal Garada followed her tears. She's recently lost family in Gaza. pic.twitter.com/EdhA6sJyfv
— CODEPINK (@codepink) November 8, 2023
CodePink's Leslie Angeline—who is currently on a hunger strike for a Gaza cease-fire—yelled out, "It's a genocide!"
Gaza suffers most air strikes in a month in Middle East since 2020
The Gaza Strip has experienced the highest number of air strikes recorded within a single month for any country or territory in the Middle East going back to 2020, according to a data analytics firm tracking Israel’s assault.
“The scale of Israel’s air campaign in Gaza is unprecedented,” the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (Acled) said in a post on the social media platform X.
Acled recorded more than 600 air strike events across more than 50 locations in Gaza in October alone.
“Despite Gaza’s small size of just 360 square kilometers, this represents the highest number of air strike events recorded within a single month for any country or territory in the Middle East since 2020,” the group said.
More than 10,300 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli bombardment over the past month, including over 4,000 children.
The scale of Israel’s air campaign in Gaza is unprecedented. ACLED records over 600 airstrike events across more than 50 locations in October, marking the highest number of airstrike events recorded within a single month for any country or territory in the Middle East in years. pic.twitter.com/jF2dBj8Dpx
— Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (@ACLEDINFO) November 7, 2023
Arab world warns Biden
Yemen Houthi rebels say they launched 'a barrage of ballistic missiles' at southern Israel
Yemen’s Houthi forces have said they launched “a barrage of ballistic missiles” targeting “various sensitive targets” in southern Israel on Thursday.
Houthi military spokesperson Yahya Sare’e said some of those missiles were heading for the Red Sea city of Eilat. He described the operation as “successful” and claimed “direct hits”.
Israel’s military said a drone hit a building in Eilat. It later said the drone crashed into a school and that no physical injuries were reported.
Israel Demands ELIMINATION Of Oct 7th Photojournalists
Ladies and Gentiles, I give you "the only democracy in the Middle East" :
Israel Accused of 'Thought Policing' as Legislation Criminalizes Viewing Pro-Palestinian Media
Human rights and free speech advocates on Thursday decried Israeli lawmakers' passage of legislation criminalizing the viewing of social and other media supportive of the Palestinian resistance struggle.
Knesset lawmakers voted 13-4 to amend Article 24 of Israel's Counterterrorism Law—which prohibits "demonstrating identification with a terrorist organization and incitement to terrorism"—to include a temporary two-year ban on "systematic and continuous consumption of publications of a terrorist organization under circumstances that indicate identification with the terrorist organization."
The amendment identifies Hamas and Islamic State as terrorist groups and allows the Ministry of Justice to add more organizations to the list.
Offenders face up to one year behind bars. Videos posted on social media Thursday showed Israeli police at the home of an Arab Israeli woman informing her she was being arrested for allegedly "sharing content that sympathizes with and encourages terrorist actions... and supporting content that incites violence and terrorism."
Adalah-The Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel said in a statement that "this law is one of the most intrusive and draconian legislative measures ever passed by the Israeli Knesset, since it makes thoughts subject to criminal punishment" and "violates the constitutional right to freedom of speech and is used to muzzle legitimate political expression."
Adalah continued:
At a time when Israeli authorities are ramping up their campaign to stifle the freedom of expression of Palestinian citizens of Israel, conducting extensive surveillance of their online communications, and making unprecedented arrests for alleged speech-related offenses, the Israeli Knesset has enacted legislation that criminalizes even passive social media use. This legislation encroaches upon the sacred realm of an individual's personal thoughts and beliefs and significantly amplifies state surveillance of social media use. Adalah will petition the Supreme Court to challenge this law.
The New Israel Fund (NIF), a U.S.-based progressive advocacy group, called the amendment "dangerous" and "driven by far-right extremists intent on taking Israel backward."
NIF warned that "at a time when dissent is being crushed all over Israel, this law seeks to further silence any internal critics."
The group said the Counterterrorism Law already "has a history of discriminatory use" and "includes extremely blurry concepts" that "if read broadly could include... the entirety of Palestinian society."
[More at the link. -js]
Staffer DISSENT At Biden State Department Over Israel-Palestine CEASEFIRE
American Postal Workers Union Becomes Largest US Union to Call for Gaza Cease-Fire
The American Postal Workers Union on Wednesday became the largest U.S. union to call for a cease-fire in the Gaza Strip, joining a growing labor movement mobilization against Israel's assault on the Palestinian enclave.
Leaders of the APWU, which represents more than 200,000 U.S. Postal Service employees and close to 2,000 mail workers in the private sector, said in a statement that their union is "shocked and saddened by the tragic and ongoing violence in Israel and Palestine."
"As a union that stands for equality, social justice, human and labor rights, and international solidarity, we unite with unions and people of goodwill around the world in calls for justice and peace," the APWU said. "We unreservedly condemn the Hamas violence of October 7, which killed over 1,000 Israeli civilians and saw the kidnapping of more than 200 people."
"However, Israel's response has made the prospects for peace more remote," the union added. "Over 10,000 innocent civilians, including 4,000 children, have been killed by the relentless and indiscriminate bombing campaign on Gaza. Israel has shut off the flow of food, water, fuel, and medical supplies to the Gaza Strip, a war crime. A humanitarian catastrophe is unfolding every day in Gaza. Thousands more innocent civilians stand to die wholly preventable deaths."
To put an end to the bloodshed and begin confronting Gaza's appalling humanitarian crisis, APWU called on the Biden administration to "use all its power" as Israel's "primary foreign benefactor" to "help bring about peace in the region, and not use our tax dollars for more war."
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Marjorie Taylor Greene unite in push to free Julian Assange
Maga Republican and fierce Trump supporter Marjorie Taylor Greene and leftwing Democratic firebrand Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez have found common ground in freeing Australian WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.
The pair are among 16 members of the US Congress who have written directly to president Joe Biden urging the United States to drop its extradition attempts against Assange and halt any prosecutorial proceedings immediately.
The group warns continuing the pursuit of Assange risks America’s bilateral relationship with Australia.
“It is the duty of journalists to seek out sources, including documentary evidence, in order to report to the public on the activities of the government,” the letter to Biden, first reported by Nine newspapers, states.
“The United States must not pursue an unnecessary prosecution that risks criminalising common journalistic practices and thus chilling the work of the free press. We urge you to ensure that this case be brought to a close in as timely a manner as possible.”
Complaints against NYPD hit 11-year high under pro-police mayor Adams
Misconduct complaints against New York City police officers have risen to their highest levels since 2012, prompting some to put the blame on Mayor Eric Adams’s extremely pro-police mayorship and claim it is deteriorating “the NYPD’s relationship with the community”. The latest monthly report from the civilian complaint review board (CCRB), the city’s independent police watchdog, tallied 4,262 misconduct complaints filed against NYPD personnel as of the end of September 2023. This is the highest year-to-date tally since 2012, when the CCRB fielded 4,546 allegations of abuse when Michael Bloomberg was mayor and the NYPD conducted hundreds of thousands of unconstitutional stop-and-frisk encounters in communities of color under the then police commissioner, Ray Kelly. ...
The rise in complaints comes as Adams enters the second year of his unabashedly pro-police, anti-crime mayoralty. Under Adams, policing in NYC has reverted to “broken windows”, 1990s-style quality of life enforcement for “anti-social behavior”, with a major uptick in stop-and-frisk encounters as well as dangerous vehicle pursuits. Crime rates have dropped in New York City in the past year, mirroring a national trend three years after the outbreak of Covid-19 and its associated social upheaval.
There are also concerns about the increasing impunity officers now enjoy within the NYPD’s internal affairs process. Adams’s pro-police mayoralty is directly affecting police discipline: his police commissioners have overturned or reduced discipline in half of the cases where misconduct has been found. Adams’ first police commissioner, Keechant Sewell, reversed IAD rulings at a record rate, reducing or even annulling penalties for more than half of all cops found to have committed misconduct at an administrative trial during her term.
Jennvine Wong, a staff attorney with the Legal Aid Society’s special litigation unit, suggested that the NYPD’s increasing tendency to reduce or overturn even minor discipline for officers is problematic. “When [the] NYPD doesn’t issue any discipline whatsoever, what does that signal to the officer – that they don’t take constitutional violations seriously?” Wong said, adding that the increase in stops and complaints was a reflection of Adams’ insistence on quality-of-life enforcement that is reflected by a doubling of criminal summonses for low-level offenses such as public urination and open-container violations.
Feelings of schadenfreude are rampant in Baltimore:
Former top Baltimore prosecutor Marilyn Mosby convicted of perjury
A former top prosecutor for the city of Baltimore was convicted on Thursday of charges that she lied about the finances of a side business to improperly access retirement funds during the Covid pandemic, using the money to buy two Florida homes.
A federal jury convicted former Baltimore state’s attorney Marilyn Mosby of two counts of perjury after a trial that started on Monday. ...
Mosby gained a national profile for prosecuting Baltimore police officers after Freddie Gray, a Black man, died in police custody in 2015, which was Mosby’s first year in office. His death led to riots and protests in the city. None of the officers were convicted. ...
Mosby also faces separate charges of mortgage fraud. A trial date for those charges has not been set.
JILL STEIN Announces Presidential Green Party Candidacy, DECRIES Failed 'Wall Street' Parties
US faces almost daily hazardous chemical accidents
Hazardous chemical accidents are occurring almost daily, on average, in the United States, exposing people to dangerous toxins through fires, explosions, leaks, spills and other releases, according to a new analysis by non-profit researchers.
The report, prepared by Coming Clean, in conjunction with a network of environmental and economic justice organizations in the Coalition to Prevent Chemical Disasters, documents what it calls an “alarming frequency” of accidents, and comes a month before US regulators are expected to release final rules aimed at preventing such incidents.
The research is based on capturing incidents of chemical spills via monitoring news sources; researchers say the figures should be regarded as conservative because not all of them are reported in the news media. ...
The new report shows 829 hazardous chemical incidents from 1 January 2021, through 15 October of this year, or roughly one every 1.2 days. The report includes revised higher numbers for 2021 not included in the February analysis that reflect incidents at a number of Texas facilities amid extreme cold temperatures in February of that year.
The majority of the incidents tallied are connected to the fossil fuel industry, including the use, transport, production and disposal of fossil fuels and fossil fuel products, according to the report, which is accompanied by a searchable database of chemical incidents.
Political blame game begins as ‘pollution season’ shrouds Delhi
As soon as the smog descended, the political mudslinging began. For over a week, pollution levels in Delhi have consistently remained in the “severe” category and its 33 million residents have been forced to breathe toxic air that exceeded healthy limits of pollutants by more than 100 times. “Pollution season” as it is now darkly referred to by those living in India’s capital, has become an annual event as the weather turns colder and pollutants get trapped over the Indo-Gangetic plain, which is cocooned by the Himalayan mountains.
Cars, factories, construction and power plants are all to blame but so too is the seasonal wheat stubble burning in the neighbouring states of Punjab and Haryana, when farmers set fire to their fields to quickly make way for new crops, despite the practice being outlawed. According to the Centre for Science and Environment, stubble burning has accounted for up to 38% of the pollution levels in Delhi over the past week.
Yet though the murky grey skies arrive every year without fail and a recent study found that pollution was shortening the lives of Delhi residents by almost 12 years, still no one among the state and central governments has been willing to take responsibility. Instead, over the past week, a familiar political blame game has ensued, as politicians from opposing parties, state governments and the ruling Bharatiya Janata party (BJP) government have attempted to shift responsibility on to each other.
Shell sues Greenpeace for $2.1m in damages over fossil fuel protest in North Sea
Shell is suing Greenpeace for $2.1m in damages in one of the biggest ever legal threats against the group after its campaigners occupied a moving oil platform earlier this year. The lawsuit calls for an indefinite block on all protests at Shell infrastructure at sea or in port anywhere in the world, or the company will make claims that could reach $8.6m (£7m) if contracting companies also pursue damages. ...
Four Greenpeace protesters boarded the platform just north of the Canary Islands, while it was being transported to the Shetland Islands, with signs demanding that the fossil fuel company “stop drilling – start paying”.
The legal threat is the latest blow traded between the oil conglomerate and climate protesters, after a failed attempt by environmental lawyers at ClientEarth to sue 11 of Shell’s directors at the high court in London to hold them personally responsible for the company’s “fundamentally flawed” climate strategy.
Shell has also been ordered by a Dutch court to cut emissions from its oil and gas by 45% by 2030 in an unprecedented ruling after Friends of the Earth took the company to court alongside more than 17,000 co-plaintiffs.
Greenpeace has accused Shell of using “aggressive legal tactics” in an attempt to “silence growing dissent over chief executive Wael Sawan’s moves to double down on fossil fuel investment”.
Also of Interest
Here are some articles of interest, some which defied fair-use abstraction.
Illegal Settlers’ Reign of Terror in the West Bank
Disease, Thirst and Hunger Spread In Gaza / How Erdogan Could Help
Photos: More Israeli attacks, more death and destruction in Gaza
Rashida Tlaib censure vote sets precedent for criminalizing opposition to Gaza genocide
Abortion rights across the US: we track where laws stand in every state
After a record year of wildfires, will Canada ever be the same again?
Microplastic-eating plankton may be worsening crisis in oceans, say scientists
Scientists learn secret to hummingbirds’ remarkable agility
"Clear Intention of Ethnic Cleansing": Holocaust Scholar Omer Bartov Warns of Genocide in Gaza
"From the River to the Sea": Omer Bartov on Contested Slogan & Why Two-State Solution Is Not Viable
South Africa Takes Bold Stand! | Calls ICC to Arrest Netanyahu
NYT Lobby OCCUPIED By Journalists OUTRAGED By Biased Israel-Gaza Coverage
Joe Manchin WON'T RUN For Reelection, Staging CENTRIST COUP Against Biden?!
Tulsi Gabbard Switches Anti-War Stance To Justify Israeli War Crimes!
RFK Jr. Saber Rattles w/Russia, China & Iran Over OIL!
Max Blumenthal confronts State Dept on Gaza double standards
A Little Night Music
The Red Devils - Tail Dragger
The Red Devils - Time To Cry
The Red Devils - No Fightin'
The Red Devils - I've Been Wrong
The Red Devils - Quarter To Twelve
Mick Jagger & The Red Devils - Checkin' Up On My Baby
The Red Devils - Cut That Out
The Red Devils - Devil Woman
The Red Devils - Mr. Highway Man
Lester Butler, Red Devils Live Moulin Blues Ospel 1998
Comments
How profane is that word “enough”?
.
Powerful article by Pilger.
Jonathan Cook’s article compliments Pilger's.
Condemn if you wish, but Palestinians will pay a heavy price
Biden has used his wife and daughter’s deaths his entire career and yet where is his sympathy for the thousands of moms who have seen their children killed by his bombs and permission? I’d love to see a brave journalist about this. If any exists.
Here’s one.
Thanks for another week of news. Just absolutely disgusted with the leaders who are justifying this slaughter of civilians and especially the children. Actually disgusted isn’t a strong enough word, but I’m holding on to my belief that hell is real and every one of them will have to explain why they did. Catholic Joe might have a nasty surprise in store for him soon.
“When out of fear you twist the lesser evil into the lie that it is something good, you eventually rob people of the capacity to distinguish between good and evil.”
~ Hannah Arendt
evening snoopy...
yeah, the scale of their crimes is beyond the ability of either retributive or reparative justice to address. hell it is for them.
"they don’t want to hear from pesky citizens"
that spells trouble for the elites
as the noise from us peskies
becomes louder ..
thanks for the blues joe!
truth is considered foreign influence, world peace is a threat to national security
evening qms...
yep, they are going to a great deal of effort to crush the dissent, but i think that they have crossed a line with the larger public this time. we'll see how it turns out i guess.
call it for what it is: International war crimes day
https://matthewhoh.substack.com/p/armistice-day-and-the-empire
truth is considered foreign influence, world peace is a threat to national security
yep...
they already had "memorial day," formerly "decoration day" as a day to commemorate the service of soldiers.
Yes the suppression of dissent is the order of the day.
This is a new thing.
Never thought it would come to this.
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
evening otc...
i don't think that the students themselves were suspended, i think that it was just their group which was suspended, i.e., it would lose whatever is provided for it by the student government - offices, operating expenses, use of campus facilities, etc.
Hope so, joe
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
Another example and I am sure that there are many more.
Democracy is great!
We need to raise taxes, on the middle class, and fund them more so they can teach more kids to shut up and fall in line!
They will be better adults for it!
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
I am not a fan of Trump or Republicans and I suppose you
could include most Democrats also but this seems like a reasonable complaint.
https://thehill.com/regulation/court-battles/4304049-elise-stefanik-ethi...
evening humphrey...
it seems reasonable to me, too. when the judge first ruled that mar-a-lago was only worth $18 million, i figured that he was just in over his head and his errors would be worked out in later proceedings, but his behavior since has demonstrated bias. that trial is a sham.
That judge and the whole setup reminds me of something …
… some kind of court — hold on, it’ll come to me in a moment…
Israel is just following in America’s footsteps
.
The countries that America bombed since the end of the Great War. America has always had no problem killing civilians and the count is now up to 40 million . No wonder the government has no problem with Israel’s genocide of the Palestinians. What’s 2.3 million compared to 40 million? And apparently most Americans have had no problems with our murderous military. But boy have a lot of people become rich by making the bombs, ect that have killed those 40 million. That is what counts right?
“When out of fear you twist the lesser evil into the lie that it is something good, you eventually rob people of the capacity to distinguish between good and evil.”
~ Hannah Arendt
well...
you never know, after all, what happens after israel liquidates the palestinians and finds that it still needs more lebensraum and starts eying the neighbors? their numbers could skyrocket!
Any comments on Jill Stein?
I'd think she's an honorary member here.
Trolls gotta troll NT
evening ban nock...
i am personally delighted that jill stein is running. it is like democracy is sort of happening, isn't it?
She isn't a member of either wing of the uniparty, which
is a very good thing. It is difficult to imagine that she could be a worse screw up than any of the recent crop have been. She has never held a political office and therefore won't necessarily lie about absolutely everything right off the bat. I haven't noticed runaway dementia like sleepy Joe and she isn't out of work TV reality show clown like Drumpf. All in all, a welcome addition to the mix.
be well and have a good one
That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --
It is kind of a catchy chant. LOL
heh...
very catchy, and it has a nice ring to it.
i have always admired the rhythm section of the palestinian marchers when i've been down in dc for an answer coalition march.
Good evening Joe, thanks for the EBs.
So Manchin isn't running. Sinema no longer claims to be among the much vaunted lesser evildoers. This meansthat the Democratisists are going to be terribly short of fall guys should they somehow wind up in a position where they could maybe do something good for the people.
Have a great weekend, be well and have a good one
That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --
evening el...
good to have the bastard out of the senate. i hope that he goes directly to his rocking chair and stays there.
the democrats specialize in excuses, they'll either create a new one or rotate in some more villains should
fortunea corrupt election system smile on their sorry asses.have a great weekend!
Hi bluesters
Hi all, Hey Joe!
I come to this place for the great blues and bad news. Guaranteed to satisfy. Or yer money back.
I see the guardian piece about how hummingbirds go through tight openings. A little birdwatching would have figured this out for them. But nice they got the high speed shots of it. If you watch accipiters like Cooper's or Sharp-shinned Hawk (oft called Chickenhawks, the small bird eaters) dive through trees and shrubs at very high speeds you will see various methods used, virtually always impressive, getting through amazingly tight complex tangles without impaling themselves. Another example is Robin. A Robin has about a 17" wingspan. Hog fence is 6" squares. You can watch a Robin shoot through one of the squares at 20-25 mph! They used the closed wings against body method.
That Dr. John-Bloomfield was great last Saturday, as a bunch of the rest...!
Thanks for the great soundscapes! Have a great weekend!
Have good ones all!
We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.
Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better.
both - Albert Einstein
evening dystopian...
heh, well if you come for the bad news, this has been a banner couple of weeks.
there are a lot of hawks and owls in my area which are always impressive to watch, especially when diving at high speeds after prey. they are incredible acrobats.
have a great weekend!
600 airstrikes?
I know its hard to get accurate information during an ongoing war but I question this metric on bombing attacks. I saw a couple of other reports showing bombs dropped on GAZA by the ton, they are over a week out of date, and they said 18,000 tons of bombs were dropped. I think its safe to say at this point more than a week later, that over 20,000 tons of bombs have been dropped on Gaza. 600 strikes is a minimizing figure, and understates, believe it or not, the severity of Israel's air force bombing campaign on Gaza.
First of all how do define a bombing "strike?" In some conventional bombing tactics you could have as many as 30 bombers in one strike. On the other hand you could have a single strike aircraft loaded with bombs over target and call it a strike. Therefore the metric is meaningless. If I took the figure 20,000 tons as a conservative guess at this point for total tonnage of explosive ordnance dropped on Gaza, and divided it by a 5 ton load for a single aircraft mission, known as a sortie, that results in a conservative figure of 4000 individual strike missions. The figure is conservative because many modern tactical strike aircraft either don't carry that heavy a bomb load (5 tons), because they can't, or don't carry it because they are using guided ordnance of one type or another that occupies the entire weapons station on the wing rather than multiple ejector racks that permit a greater number of bombs per weapons station.
In any case, the 600 strikes figure is menacing enough for strikes which appear directed exclusively on urban infrastructure, but I think the figure understates the severe intensity of Israel's attacks on Gaza. For example if you use the 18,000 ton figure for bombs dropped on Gaza as of Nov. 1, that reveals an estimated minimum sortie count of 3600 missions, six times the given "600 strikes" reported above.
Happy Veterans day anyway. There is an expression in South Korea widely used popularized by the popular Kpop group BTS bangtan sonyun meaning bullet proof boys. Some Koreans say this isn't what BTS really stands for. I can't remember what they say it means. Wikipedia says this-
To me dan means group.
When I go out in public I usually wear my navy blue US Navy ballcap that I bought at a highway rest area a while back. I bought an Army one as well. They were only 5 dollars each. I dropped the Army one in puddle recently during a tug of war with my dog and couldn't get it clean. I found truck stops wanted 15 to 20 dollars for these same caps. Originally I wore these to cover my white/hair and protect my eyes from the sun. After a while, I realized it was useful in public places to "blend in." So politicians have bangtan, I have bangtan. It's my ball cap.
Next time I go to the VA hosp, I will buy another maybe two even if I have to pay 15-20 dollars. I shouldn't have been so fussy about the price considering the bangtan benefit but if I'm gonna pay 15 to 20 dollars for a cheap hat made in China it has fit and look exactly right.
語必忠信 行必正直
evening soryang...
i don't know how airstrikes compare to bombs dropped - do airstrikes refer to particular locations? anyway, i remember reading recently that israel said it had dropped 6000 bombs.
Yes that's what Israel claimed for
Israel says it dropped 6,000 bombs on Gaza in one week. That's almost as many as what the US dropped in Afghanistan in one year.
The news reports using the 18,000 ton figure came out of Turkey as of Nov. 1. I've heard the 18,000 ton figure bandied about in the social media.
Israel has dropped 18,000 tons of bombs on Gaza, 1.5 times more than bomb dropped on Hiroshima
This is a Turkish news source I believe.
Thanks for your news roundup Joe! I check it out every day even if I don't post anything.
(edited for typos and checked my numbers- it's getting late)
語必忠信 行必正直
Simplicius has a new sitrep up. I am off to read it now,