The Evening Blues - 11-11-15
Hey! Good Evening!
This evening's music features blues singer, harmonica and guitar player Lazy Lester. Enjoy!
Lazy Lester - They Call Me Lazy
"This legislation specifically impeded our ability to close Guantanamo in a way that I have repeatedly argued is counterproductive to our efforts to defeat terrorism around the world. Guantanamo is one of the premiere mechanisms for jihadists to recruit. It’s time for us to close it. It is outdated; it’s expensive; it’s been there for years. And we can do better in terms of keeping our people safe while making sure that we are consistent with our values."-- Barack Obama at veto signing session for the 2015 NDAA
News and Opinion
Congress Overwhelmingly Votes to Block Guantánamo Closure
The Senate, by a veto-proof 91-3 margin, passed a revamped defense spending bill on Tuesday that still contains provisions intended to prevent President Obama from closing Guantánamo Bay prison.
The bill already passed the House 370-58, also more than enough votes to override a veto, should it come to that.
Obama vetoed the bill last month, citing both funding disagreements and language intended to ban all transfers of Guantánamo prisoners to the United States, heighten the barrier to shift them overseas, and prohibit moves to specific countries.
Since then, lawmakers essentially acceded to his budget demands, cutting funding for sweetheart programs and authorizing $715 million to help Iraqi forces fight Islamic State rebels, among other changes.
But the Guantánamo provisions remain.
'Tying His Own Hands' on Gitmo, Obama Agrees to Sign Bloated Pentagon Budget
The White House has announced that President Barack Obama will sign the $607 billion "defense" bill overwhelmingly passed by the Senate on Tuesday, even though critics say he is tying his own hands and betraying repeated promises to close the U.S. military's offshore prison in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba before he leaves office in 2017.
The chamber approved the latest version of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which includes a prohibition on relocating those held in the prison to the United States and imposes restrictions on transfers to other countries. ...
"By signing the NDAA with new restrictions on transferring detainees out of Guantánamo, President Obama will be making his job of closing the prison and ending indefinite detention harder," Christopher Anders, ACLU senior legislative counsel, told Common Dreams over email.
"If he truly wants a chance of closing Guantánamo, he has to order his administration to use all of the power he has now—that means charging in federal court any detainee who the government can prove committed a crime, and transferring abroad the vast majority of detainees who have never been charged with any crime," Anders continued. "The president is tying his own hands by agreeing to the NDAA, and it is now up to him to work harder to achieve this important goal."
An Ex-CIA Officer Speaks Out: The Italian Job
Turkish President Ignores ISIS, Stokes Civil War with Kurds
“Since beginning a ‘two-pronged’ assault on both the Islamic State and Kurdish PKK separatists on July 24, Turkey has fired roughly 100 times more strikes at the PKK than the Islamists,” Metin Gurcan, a military analyst following the developments and former Turkish forces member, stated in a recent report for IRIN news agency.
For many, Turkey’s war on the PKK is also a war on the country’s Kurdish minority. They argue that Erdogan views the Islamic State — which has advanced on heavily Kurdish areas inside of Syria such as Rojava and Kobane — as a tool, rather than a threat, as ISIS continues to focus its attacks on Kurdish targets.
“Every single ISIS attack has targeted Kurdish people — or people showing solidarity with Kurdish people,” Ali Enid Esen, a 20-year-old survivor of both the Suruc and recent Ankara bombings, told The Intercept.
While the Suruc and Ankara bombings are the best-known — and most deadly — recent attacks, the Islamic State first targeted Kurds inside Turkey in the beginning of the summer, when People’s Democratic Party (HDP) offices were targeted in the southern cities of Mersin and Adana. A few weeks later, an HDP rally was bombed in the Kurdish-majority city of Diyarbakir. By the time bombs exploded in Suruc and two months later in Ankara, both times targeting groups of Kurdish and pro-Kurdish activists — and intimidating voters in the weeks leading up to the elections — many HDP supporters began to feel that, in addition to being under attack by the Islamic State, they were also being threatened by the Turkish government.
“Whether or not you believe they are working together, one is helping the other,” Esen continued, voicing his suspicion that Turkey’s negligence toward the Islamic State is actually a calculated foreign policy decision meant to use ISIS to intimidate the country’s Kurdish population.
Erdogan: Allies Warming to Idea of Syria ‘Safe Zone’
Speaking to CNN today, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan claimed that his allies are “warming” to the idea of imposing a safe zone in northern Syria, a plan that his government had advocated for years as an alternative to Turkey accepting massive numbers of refugees.
Erdogan didn’t specify who the allies are, but the claim is likely not true, as only last week the State Department declared that an initially agree to program for creating a safe zone was being abandoned outright. ...
Erdogan also talked up the idea of a no-fly zone across northern Syria. ... With Russia carrying out airstrikes against ISIS across northern Iraq, trying to keep Russian warplanes out of the area appears a herculean task.
Assad forces regain control of key airbase
Syria army breaks through year-long Isis siege of key Aleppo air base
Kweyris military base east of Aleppo may now be used by Russian planes in their battle against rebels fighting the regime of Bashar al-Assad, experts say
Syria’s army broke a more than year-long jihadist siege of a military air base in the country’s north on Tuesday, its first major breakthrough since Russia’s air campaign began.
Troops, backed by pro-government militia, broke through the siege by Islamic State of the Kweyris military airport in northern Aleppo province, a photographer working with AFP said.
A group of soldiers penetrated Isis lines west of the airport and reached government troops inside the base, firing into the air in celebration.
Experts said the base could be used by Russian planes in their air war against rebels fighting the regime of the president, Bashar al-Assad, aiding their efforts to re-take Syria’s second city of Aleppo.
Russia launched airstrikes in Syria in support of Assad at the end of September, but the regime has still struggled to advance against opposition forces and securing Kweyris would mark its first major victory in the province.
Looks like the US and UK are looking for ways to protect their moderate terrorists on the battlefield from Russia, Iran and Assad's Syrian forces...
Global ‘terrorist’ list for Syria could see allies left behind
The world powers trying to end the civil war in Syria are drawing up a list of “terrorist” groups, Britain said Tuesday, warning that some countries may have to drop support for allies on the ground. ...
As part of this, Hammond said, the countries backing various factions within the country would have to decide which are moderate enough to be included in the political process and which would be excluded. ...
Russia and Iran, both party to the Vienna negotiations, are supporting Assad against US and Saudi backed rebels, but Hammond denied that the “terrorist list” would give them more leeway to strike the opposition.
“The Russians are already bombing anybody who poses any kind of threat to the regime,” he said. “When we talk about terrorist groups, what we’re tying to do is narrow the Russians’ target set.”
Russia Proposes 18-Month Syrian Reform Plan, Leading to Vote
Reports from Reuters today suggest that Russia is preparing a broad proposal for the next round of Vienna talks on Syria, looking to launch an 18-month reform program in the nation, including broad revisions to the constitution, and leading to a free election.
The document is said to envision a president with full control of the military and special forces, as well as foreign policy in the nation. The Russian government has denied the authenticity of the document, but did not deny that a reform plan was in the works. ...
British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond was already lashing the reform plan based merely on reports of what would be proposed, saying that there was no way to end the civil war without guarantees that President Bashar al-Assad would not be allowed to participate in future elections.
Radio reports say Germany spied on FBI, UN bodies and French foreign minister
Germany’s foreign intelligence service spied on targets including the French foreign minister, Laurent Fabius, the FBI and the UN Children’s Fund, a media report alleges.
The latest news report on the BND spy service will fuel a debate in Germany about state surveillance kicked off by the revelations of the US whistleblower Edward Snowden.
The claims are awkward for the chancellor, Angela Merkel, whose office oversees Germany’s intelligence activities. She told Washington in 2013 that “spying among friends isn’t on” following reports that the US National Security Agency (NSA) had bugged her mobile phone.
The latest report, by Berlin public radio, adds to the list of targets the BND has allegedly spied on. According to RBB Inforadio, which did not name its sources, the service spied on Fabius, the international court of justice in The Hague, the US FBI and the United Nations bodies Unicef and the World Health Organisation.
The report also claims the service monitored Hansjörg Haber, a German citizen who from 2008 to 2011 was head of the EU’s observer mission in Georgia and then a senior diplomat in Brussels. He is now head of the EU’s mission in Turkey and married to a state secretary in the interior ministry.
German citizens are protected by the country’s constitution and not allowed to be spied on. ...
Also on the list, according to the RBB report, were “many European and American companies, including weapons makers such as Lockheed of the United States.”
US: Sinai Plane Bomb Likely Used Military-Grade Explosives
US officials, carrying out their own investigation into the bombing of a Russian Metrojet in the Sinai Peninsula despite not having access to the crash site or any of the direct evidence, say that they believe bringing down the plane would’ve required a “military-grade” explosive, likely something along the lines of C4. ...
ISIS in the Sinai Peninsula is known to have used C4 in previous bombing attacks, and the Egyptian military has at times recovered caches of the explosive in raids against militant compounds. C4 is described as readily available to buy across the Sinai Peninsula, and ISIS has shown some capacity of making their own.
America's new, more 'usable', nuclear bomb in Europe
The B61 bomb, 180 of which are stockpiled in Europe, is getting an upgrade which will make it more “usable” in the eyes of some in the American military
The $8 billion upgrade to the US B61 nuclear bomb has been widely condemned as an awful lot of money to spend on an obsolete weapon. As an old fashioned ‘dumb’ bomb it has no role in US or NATO nuclear doctrine, but the upgrade has gone ahead anyway, in large part as a result of lobbying by the nuclear weapons laboratories.
In non-proliferation terms however the only thing worse than a useless bomb is a ‘usable’ bomb. Apart from the stratospheric price, the most controversial element of the B61 upgrade is the replacement of the existing rigid tail with one that has moving fins that will make the bomb smarter and allow it to be guided more accurately to a target. Furthermore, the yield can be adjusted before launch, according to the target. ...
Referring to the B61-12’s enhanced accuracy on a recent PBS Newshour television programme, the former head of US Strategic Command, General James Cartwright, made this striking remark:
If I can drive down the yield, drive down, therefore, the likelihood of fallout, etc, does that make it more usable in the eyes of some — some president or national security decision-making process? And the answer is, it likely could be more usable.
In general, it is not a good thing to see the words ‘nuclear bomb’ and ‘usable’ anywhere near each other. Yet they seem to share space in the minds of some of America’s military leaders, as Hans Kristensen of the Federation of American Scientists, points out.
Cartwright’s confirmation follows General Norton Schwartz, the former U.S. Air Force Chief of Staff, who in 2014 assessed that the increased accuracy would have implications for how the military thinks about using the B61. “Without a doubt. Improved accuracy and lower yield is a desired military capability. Without a question,” he said.
The great thing about nuclear weapons was that their use was supposed to be unthinkable and they were therefore a deterrent to contemplation of a new world war. Once they become ‘thinkable’ we are in a different, and much more dangerous, universe.
Pentagon Pushing for More Ground Troops in Eastern Europe
Ongoing US announcements of military build-ups in Eastern Europe, nominally in response to “Russian aggression in Ukraine,” are continuing apace, despite the Ukrainian Civil War remaining in a state of ceasefire for virtually the entirety of 2015. The latest reports have the Pentagon seeking to send multiple new brigades. ...
New overseas deployments and new programs are a great way for the Pentagon to continue to grow its budget, and Russia seems to increasingly be the go-to excuse for all things military. While the claims aren’t credible, they seem to be successful, as there seems to be little serious debate on whether hostile actions toward Russia are necessary.
Leaving EU would be a 'disaster', British universities warn
A British exit from the EU would be catastrophic for universities and scientific research, leading academics and scientists say, warning it would cost tens of millions of pounds in funding and leave prestigious UK institutions struggling to compete on the world stage.
Vice-chancellors warned of inevitable damage to centres of learning and teaching, arguing that EU membership was a critical factor in British universities’ global reputation for excellence.
Scientists from fields as diverse as neuroscience, astronomy, robotics, immunology, particle physics, sustainable agriculture, molecular biology, nanotechnology, cancer and photon therapy say a “Brexit” would lead to funding cuts, make recruiting and retaining top academic talent harder, and – crucially – cripple the cross-border collaboration on which research thrives.
Though it is far from clear what relationship Britain could maintain with the EU were it to leave, an overwhelming majority of academics who contacted the Guardian feared the worst. Many pointed to the example of Switzerland, a non-member whose EU research funding was slashed last year after it voted to restrict free movement of European citizens.
Portugal govt falls amid austerity backlash
Portugal Rejoices as Anti-Austerity Left Coalition Forms to Oust Right Wing
Socialists, Communists, and Left Bloc unite in 'unprecedented' coalition to end years of punishing cuts
In a surprising development for Europe's anti-austerity movement, Portugal's three reigning leftist parties on Tuesday formed an unexpected coalition to oust the country's center-right government from power and end years of punishing cuts and economic hardship.
The moderate Socialist Party forged what is being called "an unprecedented alliance" with the Communist Party and the radical Left Bloc—which is affiliated with Greece's Syriza party—to secure a 122-seat majority in the 230-seat Parliament and vote down a series of austerity proposals. The defeat brought the government's automatic resignation.
Socialist leader António Costa is now expected to become prime minister with "a broad, leftwing coalition government, which hopes to ease austerity while still adhering to European Union rules," the Guardian reports.
During last month's election, the center-right party lost its four-year parliamentary majority because of public backlash against punishing austerity measures imposed following the 2011 financial crisis and bailout. Under outgoing Prime Minister Pedro Passos Coehlo, the government cut salaries and pensions, slashed public services, and introduced significant tax hikes. In the beginning of this year, 55 percent of the population was either unemployed or held a precarious work situation.
Appeals Court Blocks Judge’s Order to Halt NSA Surveillance
Justice Dept: Not Spying on One Person Means Whole Program Goes
Yesterday, US District Court Judge Richard Leon ordered an end to NSA surveillance of Americans’ domestic phone records, saying the program was almost certainly unconstitutional and has to halt. He in particular ordered a halt to the spying on one specific complainant, which the Justice Department argues would require scrapping the whole program.
This isn’t the first time a judge has panned the NSA program, and once again nothing will come of it, as an Appeals Court today announced that they are going to allow the NSA to keep the system in place through November 29, when it shifts to a nominally different format which itself wasn’t a subject of the ruling.
Netanyahu to Meet With Obama, Appear at Center for American Progress
Netanyahu meets with a bunch of fake progressives. Apparently the Center for American Progress has neither shame nor decency.
Netanyahu reaches out to Democrats in Washington appearance
After months of cultivating President Barack Obama’s Republican foes in Congress, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appeared before a decidedly liberal audience on Tuesday and tried to undo what damage his unconstrained opposition to the Iran nuclear deal might have done to Israel’s position with progressive Democrats. ...
In the audience were Democratic luminaries, including David Axelrod, the onetime Obama political adviser, and Jane Harman, the former California member of Congress who now is president of the Woodrow Wilson Center think tank. In a format billed as a conversation, Netanyahu responded to questions from CAP’s current president, Neera Tanden, Obama’s domestic policy adviser during his 2008 presidential campaign. ...
Netanyahu made no news in the next hour of gentle questioning. He described his meeting with Obama on Monday as “very good,” and he praised the president for having met more times with Netanyahu than with any other world leader. “I appreciate that,” he said.
Black Student Revolt Against Racism Ousts 2 Top Officials at University of Missouri
University of Missouri police arrest suspect as racist threats rock campus
University of Missouri police say the department has arrested a suspect accused of making online threats against black students and faculty.
A post early on Wednesday on the university’s emergency alert website said the suspect was in university police custody and was not on or near the university campus when the threats were made. A dispatcher at the university’s police department said more information would be released later on Wednesday.
The university said it had increased security and was investigating online threats on Tuesday, after weeks of protests over racial tensions on campus culminated in the departure of two senior university officials.
A post on Tuesday night on the college’s website said campus police were “aware of social media threats” and were investigating. The university’s statement did not offer any further detail, but it came after at least two users posted threats on the anonymous location-based messaging app Yik Yak.
One user threatened to “shoot every black person I see”.
It's so dangerous to be a black American, I've sought asylum in Canada
Black people or people of African descent living in the United States should consider seeking asylum in other countries. That’s what I did. On 24 September, I applied for asylum in Canada. We were brought to America as slaves, and the country hasn’t changed its ways at all since then.
Throughout my life, police departments have harassed me and made me fear for my life – this is something many other people of color will have experienced too.
If you’re black in the US you will always have to go through persecution and discrimination at some point in your life. Black Americans are killed in large numbers by the police, regularly denied the same education and access to housing as white Americans and face hurdles when trying to vote. All these forms of discrimination are racist – yet they continue nonetheless.
Applying for asylum has been in the back of my mind for a long time, especially since I started reflecting on my experiences in the United States of America and educating myself on black history. ...
In Vancouver, at the Department of Citizenship and Immigration Canada, I handed in my asylum application, which is now under consideration. I had my first a hearing at the immigration court on 23 September 2015. The judge didn’t give me any specific time or day that he would make his decision. ...
The United States has always been a terrible country to live in. The United States government is always murdering, undermining and underestimating its black citizens – and I have no intention of going back.
Shootings involving Los Angeles police officers have doubled this year
Shootings involving Los Angeles police department officers have doubled this year, a statistic that the new head of the agency’s civilian oversight board said was alarming.
So far this year, there have been 45 officer-involved shootings in Los Angeles, compared to 23 through the same time period last year, Matthew Johnson, the president of the Los Angeles Police Commission, said Tuesday.
Nineteen of this year’s shootings have been fatal, compared to 18 last year and 14 the year before. In 2012, there were 17 fatal officer-involved shootings, and 26 in 2011.
Johnson’s comments come as a report by KPCC found that officers in departments throughout sprawling Los Angeles county, including the LAPD, shot at least 375 people, 187 fatally, between 2010 and 2014.
Of the 148 people shot after they dropped their hands out of sight or “reached for” their waistbands, 47 turned out to be unarmed, according to the report, based on district attorney records, other public documents and interviews.
In all, 97 unarmed people were shot. Black people were shot at triple the rate of whites and Latinos.
Of 279 people shot because police said they had ignored their commands, 120 showed signs of mental illness or impairment from drugs or alcohol, the report said.
What falling copper prices say about the world economy
Copper futures are plumbing the depths. The base metal is hovering around its worst levels since 2009, and that may be a telling sign about the state of the global economy, specifically China.
As the world’s No. 2 economy, China is one of the biggest importers of metals, like copper Financial blogger Wolf Richter says China represents 40% of global demand. Copper is a key component in manufacturing everything from electronics to cars and other industrial goods, but signs of a slowdown in China are starting to play out in some of the commodities most associated with its decades-long growth path. On Wednesday, China reported a slowdown in its breakneck gains in industrial output.
Copper has sunk by about 22% so far this year, and it doesn’t look as if that slump is abating. ...
As a base metal, copper represents a fundamental supply/demand dynamic. Greater demand for copper pushes prices up and higher prices support the efforts of companies to mine for copper. When supplies have outstripped demand, the price has fallen.
Underlying this is that strong demand usually points to an economy that is firing on all cylinders, which seems to be the opposite of what copper is telling us now.
Pfizer's Tax Rate 'Fiction' Exposed: Pays Less Than Everyone You Know
Undermining the company's rationale for a Big Pharma mega-merger that would allow it to dodge paying what it owes in taxes, a new report shows that, in fact, Pfizer has "dramatically overstated its corporate tax rates" and is already enjoying a significant competitive advantage over those who pay their fair share.
The world's largest pharmaceutical company, which manufactures Viagra among other drugs, has cited high U.S. corporate tax rates as an argument in favor of a merger with Irish corporation Allergan. The business deal would likely take the form of what's known as a "corporate inversion," allowing Pfizer to renounce its U.S. tax citizenship while retaining its current U.S. headquarters, management structure, and facilities.
But the report from the coalition Americans for Tax Fairness—entitled Pfizer's Tax Dodging Rx: Stash Profits Offshore (pdf)—indicates that Pfizer's effective tax rate on its worldwide income was just 7.5 percent in 2014, compared with the 25.5 percent rate the company reported in its Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filings. ...
Pfizer had as much as $148 billion in profits parked offshore at the end of 2014, on which it has paid no U.S. income taxes. But given that Pfizer alone controls whether, when, and how much of its foreign earnings might actually be repatriated and therefore taxed, the chances of that tax bill being paid are slim.
Lobbyists Use GOP Debate Ads to Smear Agency Investigating Their Client
Viewers of the Fox Business Network-hosted Republican presidential debate this evening will repeatedly see an advertisement that casts a relatively obscure consumer protection agency as a power-hungry government office “controlling your decisions” and denying “those who need help the most.”
The advertisement portrays the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau as a roomful of bureaucratic automatons mercilessly stamping “DENIED” on loan applications, beneath Soviet-style banners depicting CFPB’s director, Richard Cordray, and its principal architect, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass.
But the ad does not disclose that the group sponsoring it is led by lobbyists for Navient, a student loan company that the CFPB is currently investigating for allegedly cheating student loan borrowers.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is the independent agency created by the Dodd-Frank financial reform law and tasked with enforcing consumer protection rules. After targeting subprime lenders and abusive debt collection practices, the bureau has recently stepped up action on issues relating to the student loan industry. ...
Navient processes federal student loans and works to collect on student debt. Formerly known as Sallie Mae, Navient spun off as a separate company in 2014. The company says it is responsible for managing $300 billion in student loans.
'Fifteen Bucks and a Union': Bernie Sanders Marches With Striking Workers
As thousands of low-paid workers staged demonstrations across the U.S. on Tuesday, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) spoke to a Fight for $15 rally in Washington, D.C. to credit their movement with recent victories and reiterate his support for a $15 federal minimum wage.
"Thank you all for coming out and standing up for justice, standing up for dignity, and for saying loudly and clearly that people in this country that work 40 hours a week deserve a living wage," Sanders, who is running for president as a Democrat, told the crowd as they marched in the rain on Capitol Hill.
Among those who walked off the job on Tuesday to demand a livable wage and the right to unionize were U.S. Senate cafeteria workers, who are employed as federal contractors—which means they get few benefits and no bargaining rights.
Hillary Clinton Is No Friend of Israel
The Democratic presidential candidate’s love letter to Israel last week was simply embarrassing, and proves she is an obstacle to what is best for the Israeli state.
Hillary Clinton's election as U.S. president would ensure Israel’s continued decline and degeneration. And so she is not a friend, but an enemy. She must not be allowed to deceive and present herself as a friend of Israel, as she tried so ingratiatingly to do in an article published in The Forward (“How I would reaffirm unbreakable bond with Israel — and Benjamin Netanyahu”) last week. The tear ducts were targeted as she wrote of how she assisted Magen David Adom in being accepted to the International Red Cross. But she and those like her – false friends of Israel – have been one of the curses on this country for years. Because of them, Israel can continue to act as wildly as it likes, thumbing its nose at the world and paying no price. Because of them, it can destroy itself unhindered.
Whether Clinton believes what she wrote or simply wanted once again to sell her soul for a fistful of dollars from Haim Saban and other Jewish donors, the result is extremely embarrassing. A love letter to Israel, the likes of which no U.S. statesman would ever write to another country. Americans believe “Israel is more than a country – it’s a dream,” she states. Most of the world calls it a nightmare, yet Clinton says a dream. What dream exactly? The dream of tyrannical control over another people? Racism? Nationalism? The killing of women and children in Gaza?
Did the former secretary of state not hear about the Israeli occupation? After all, she didn’t mention it once in her article. This is not the time or place to anger Saban. To Clinton, Israel is a “thriving democracy” and to hell with the violent and totalitarian regime in its backyard. And so Clinton is also an enemy of peace and justice. She doesn’t believe there has been the slightest damage to Palestinian rights. Israelis being stabbed in Jerusalem “appalls” Clinton. Palestinians being unjustifiably shot to death, meanwhile, fails to register with her. ... Most American Jews will support her, some because they think she is good for Israel. Well, dear brethren, she is not. A person who supports the continued occupation is like a person who continues to buy drugs for an addicted relative.
Here's an article worth reading in full:
The Progressives’ Green Party Dilemma
The dream of a successful Green Party sounds great and it is heartening that there is actually a political party out there with the courage and wisdom to take a stand for international law, peace and justice. But, given the present political state of things, Jill Stein may run for office, but she really cannot win.
And, that sets up the progressive’s dilemma – the question whether, under these circumstances, progressives should actually vote for the Green Party’s national ticket candidates. ...
Actually, I cannot resolve this dilemma, but I can tell you that it begs the question of why the most reasonable and rational political party, the one with positions that actually deal with both the nation’s and the planet’s worsening problems, remains at best a marginal player here in the United States.
The answer to this question probably has to do with the way most Americans, confined as they are within their local venues, have been acculturated to see the world – a range of perception that, over the decades, has melded with the range of propaganda put out by the two major parties.
This has left the more rational positions expressed by the Green Party vulnerable to the charge of naive idealism. In other words, most Americans, at least those who bother to vote, see the world through indoctrinated eyes and this makes it psychologically comfortable to vote for Democrats or Republicans even though doing so perpetuates old and deepening problems.
Heading off in new directions means going beyond politically conditioned perceptual views. And, even if it is demonstrably more reasonable and promising to do so, such a change causes a lot of discomfort.
Is the Paris Climate Conference Designed to Fail?
The last time this much public attention was focused on the climate talks was in the lead-up to the Copenhagen conference in 2009. At that time, the first “commitment period” of the Kyoto Protocol was about to expire shortly, and Copenhagen was seen as a make-or-break opportunity to move the process forward. Even as close observers decried the increasing corporate influence over the preparations for the 15th Conference of Parties (COP) to the UN climate convention, most observers held onto a shred of hope that something meaningful and significant would emerge from the negotiations. There was a huge public lobbying effort by Greenpeace and other groups urging President Obama to attend, and China put forward its first public commitment to reduce the rate of increase in their greenhouse gas emissions. While the Kyoto Protocol’s primary implementation mechanisms – tradable emissions allowances and questionable “carbon offset” projects in remote areas of the world – had proven inadequate at best, the Copenhagen meeting was seen as the key to sustaining Kyoto’s legacy of legally binding emissions reductions. Perhaps, activists hoped, the negotiators would agree on a meaningful plan to prevent increasingly uncontrollable disruptions of the climate. It soon became clear, however, that Copenhagen instead set the stage for a massive derailment of the ongoing negotiation process, and unleashed a new set of elite strategies that now render the Paris talks as virtually designed to fail. ...
In recent weeks, laudatory headlines have accompanied the news that formerly reluctant countries, especially China, India and Brazil, have now announced their intended climate “contributions” for the decade of the 2020s. Unfortunately, despite some incremental progress, these quasi-pledges don’t really add up. Two independent analyses of all countries’ climate pledges to date were released in early October. The MIT-affiliated Climate Interactive projected that the existing pledges would result in 3.5 degrees Celsius (6.3 °F) of warming above pre-industrial levels by 2100, far short of the Copenhagen goal of a maximum of 2 degrees. The Climate Action Tracker, a project of four independent research organizations with support from international environmental groups and the World Bank, among others, put forward a more optimistic estimate, projecting a global temperature rise between 2.2 and 3.4 degrees C by 2100 if current pledges are fully implemented. These represent a significant improvement over the business-as-usual scenario of 4 to 5 degrees of average warming projected by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change last year, but not a huge step beyond the modest carbon-reduction policies that various countries already have in place. The Climate Action Tracker now projects a 92 percent probability of exceeding 2 degrees this century.
The West’s ‘Fail-Anthropy’
Three years after Rio (1992), the United Nations Leipzig Conference on Plant Genetic Resources assessed that 75 per cent of the world’s biodiversity had disappeared in agriculture because of the Green Revolution and industrial farming. The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations estimates that 70-90 per cent of global deforestation is due to industrial agriculture pushing its monocultures further and further into forests to grow commodities for export — not for food.
As I wrote in Soil Not Oil, chemical agriculture and a globalised food system are responsible for 40 per cent of all greenhouse gas emissions. A grain.org report concluded that “the current global food system, propelled by an increasingly powerful transnational food industry, is responsible for about half of all human produced greenhouse gas emissions: anywhere between a low of 44 per cent to a high of 57 per cent”.
This is also where the Gates Foundation, along with the other biotech evangelists of our times, has it completely wrong. Climate-smart agriculture and “One Agriculture”, packaged in a PR bubble, will starve the world and worsen the refugee crisis. The Gates Foundation, pretending to feed the world, is propagating the very source of half the climate problem.
“One Agriculture”, for the profit of one company, is hardly a mitigation strategy. The Gates Foundation is pushing industrial agriculture, instead of agroecology which is already helping check climate change by converting fossilised carbon to green carbon. The accurate word for Bill Gates’ faux philanthropy would be “fail anthropy”. ...
What needs to be done is clear. In the case of climate change, the key strategy should be reduction of emissions and strategies for adaptation. We must move away from industrial, chemical-intensive agriculture, away from a centralised, global commodity-based food system that exacerbates emissions. Biodiversity conservation will be central to adaptation. In place of the biodiversity-destroying industrial monocultures, including those based on GMO seeds, we need a shift to agroecological practices that conserve biodiversity and ensure biosafety.
Growing Resistance in California’s Climate Crisis
VW diesel emissions investigation widened to include other brands
German regulators to run tests on possible ‘unusual pollutants emissions’ on other models including BMW, Mercedes and Ford
German car regulators are expanding their investigation into suspected diesel emissions manipulation beyond Volkswagen to more than 50 models from brands including BMW, Mercedes, Ford, Volvo, Nissan and Jaguar Land Rover.
The Kraftfahrt-Bundesamt (KBA) regulator said on Wednesday it would run tests on models made by 23 German and foreign car brands on suspicion of further manipulation of nitrogen oxides emissions.
KBA said the tests were triggered by Volkswagen’s admission it had rigged such tests but also cited “verified indications from third parties regarding unusual pollutants emissions“.
Also of Interest
Here are some articles of interest, some which defied fair-use abstraction.
Interview with Charlie Savage on Obama’s War on Terror Legacy
The Re-Enserfment of Western Peoples
Progressive Except on Palestine: Activists Target Center for American Progress
How Pursuing “Competitiveness” Crushes Labor and Lowers Growth
Casting of white actor as Martin Luther King prompts outrage from playwright
Homeland Goes Rogue Against the Espionage Act
A Little Night Music
Lazy Lester, Jimmy Vaughan & John Nicholas - Blues Stop Knockin' At My Door
Lazy Lester w/Sonny Landreth- I Hear You Knockin'
Lazy Lester - Sugar Coated Love
Lazy Lester - I'm Your Breadmaker, Baby
Lazy Lester - I'm A Lover Not A Fighter
Lazy Lester - Rainin' In My Heart
Slim Harpo & Lazy Lester - My Home Is a Prison
Lazy Lester - I'm A Man
Lazy Lester - If You Think I Lost You
Lazy Lester - Courtroom Blues
Lightnin' Slim & Lazy Lester - Hoodoo Man
Lazy Lester - Pondarosa Stomp
Lazy Lester - Scratch My Back
Lazy Lester - You're Gonna Ruin Me Baby
Lazy Lester - Rooster Blues
Lazy Lester - They Call Me Lazy
Lazy Lester - Blues Stop Knockin'
Comments
Great line up of links. US as military empire
and not doing well
playing with fire all over the world
hard to tell what is the worst place, but Yemen would be on that list
Turkey using ISIS to go after the Kurds so that Erdogan can be the authoritarian ruler
and .....
afternoon don...
sometimes late at night when i can't sleep, i debate whether the us is primarily a corporate empire or a military empire.
My vote
is both with the corporations driving the military adventures.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
evening gg...
i usually decide that it is a symbiotic relationship where both are complementary parasitic blood-suckers attached to the host.
Greetings, Bluesters! Just a quick (friendly) drive-by, Joe,
to say thanks for another excellent EB!
It will probably be next week before I have to to resume posting on the recent Social Security (SSDI and Old Age) "reforms,' but I thought that I'd point out that one of our CFPs (Certified Financial Planners) showed me an article that lays out not two, but three tiers, or categories, of Social Security beneficiaries--relating to the "file and suspend" loophole--as a result of the bill signed last week.
The CFP gave me some advice--mostly check out articles from business/financial news services--as opposed to NYT, WaPo, etc.--since many of their reporters are not really business reporters, and probably don't fully understand what they are reporting. (IOW, I reported exactly what was reported--so, the reporter must have missed the finer policy delineation(s) when he filed his piece.)
I'll swing back to watch several of the videos, later this p.m. I missed most of the story on the Missouri debacle, so I'll have to catch up on it.
Have a great evening, Everyone!
Mollie
"The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart."--Helen Keller
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
evening mollie...
happy motoring!
i don't know a lot about social security strategies yet (though i probably should start paying attention). marketwatch had what seems to be a fairly informative piece on the file and suspend reforms.
That's one of the recommended sources, Joe. Thanks! I've
added the MarketWatch app to my cell phone last week. Mr M already had it on his phone, since it has a stock watcher gizmo, as well.
I'm not certain, but I 'think' that the piece with the 'tier' clarification [mentioned previously] may have also been a MarketWatch article. And, I've yet to have time to check out what The Financial Times says about these 'loophole' closings, because I failed to bring the login info with me, so that I can access the online PDF version of the paper.
(The only reason I subscribed to FT, was because they are usually very detailed in their reporting--especially regarding so-called entitlement reform. So, if I find that they have done reporting on this topic, I'll copy and paste from their articles, when we return.)
It's a bummer, since "file and suspend," used in conjunction with filing on one's spouse's work record/benefits--was one of the better Social Security filing strategies, in terms of total pension (Social Security) dollars gained.
But, it's really not a total surprise -
- since I've seen this idea kicked around in neoliberal--both right- and left-leaning--think tanks, for several years. I was just a bit shocked that there was no public discussion and/or debate of this idea.
OTOH, I guess it was stupid (of me) to expect that politicians would do that, considering that they would be shooting themselves in their own foot, in regards to igniting the ire of many of their constituents.
*Sigh*
Anyhoo, thanks for posting the link. From now on, I intend to follow the MarketWatch site, along with several other Financial News sites/channels, pretty closely.
Mollie
"The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart."--Helen Keller
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
Good Evening, Joe, and bluesters
I can't understand, while reading the "Progressives Dilemma with the Green Party" article, why the author does not relate the utter impossibility for a candidate like Jill Stein and the Green Party to win, to the failing US electoral system?
I find the explanations given by the author in this article weak.
These words don't convince me much:
What is it supposed to mean: "given the present political state of things" and what does he mean by "being confined as they are within their local venues, have been acculturated to see the world" and "see the world through indoctrinated eyes and this makes it psychologically comfortable to vote for Democrats or Republicans".
The present political state of things to me is the fact that NO candidate or party is seriously concerned to change the electoral system, even Sanders just talks about the fact that the money of the oligarchs and billionaires buys Congress, but he doesn't talk seriously about the systemic failures of the features of electoral college and the unproportional representation of the voters, which just is a horrible shame to be frank.
"People are confined in their local venues" because NO party, NO Democrat is fighting for changes or a complete rewrite of your elector system. I don't know, why even Sanders is not more aggressive and talks only about "cleaning out Congress, fighting against Citizen United etc" but does not advocate strongly enough to "reconstruct / rewrite / constitutionally amend" the electoral system. There should be a huge movement for that.
It makes simply no sense to vote here anymore. The people who would represent my political views are unelectable due to your system. There are enough people out there, who are not indoctrinated, but imprisoned into the shenanigans of the electoral college. In Europe at least you could struggle as a third or "fringe" party (hate that expression fringe) and can be elected, but were those European parties over here in the US, they would never be able to win over here in the US and that has nothing to do with the so-called indoctrinated views of American voters, but with the electoral college.
If American citizens just had the chance of a proportional representation with all votes having equal weight and get rid of the fucking winner take all regulations, or better yet throw the whole electoral college system out, (it's nothing worth, damnit), third parties could be electable and could win and the could build coalition governments.
I get upset, if people blame themselves as being too indoctrinated. All I know is that most people, if they can see a chance to fight for their ideas, do so. No indoctrination is lasting for ever. Even communist indoctrination crumbled.
Sanders should have a much more aggressive stance against the electoral college's dramatically undemocratic features.
Sorry that article made me mad. The only paragraph in that article I agree with is the last one and that is actually quite horrible.
Yes, that goes together with my belief that substantial constitutional amendments or rewriting only take place after a country collapses. I really would not like that to happen and I do not believe that the majority of Americans would not support a complete change of the system, if someone would actually fight for it. Sanders could do it. And people would follow, if he started talking tough on that.
Wow that was a rant I didn't even intended to write. But once I get upset, it pours. Sorry.
evening mimi...
heh, the constitution was set up by an elite group that wanted a representative government... one that represented their class and protected their minority rights, especially their property rights.
the last time i remember public discussion of electoral issues was when bill clinton nominated lani guinier for assistant attorney general for civil rights. she had advocated some alternative voting schemes in her academic work and it triggered some public discussion of things like proportional representation. after all of the outrageous screaming about "quota queens" and other racist crap were muted by clinton caving and withdrawing her nomination, the discussion went away.
Wow. That's a long rant.
But, Mimi, I think everyone hits that wall at some point and ponders the strangeness of it all. What you read, I think, was a pretty convoluted explanation or rationalization.
Very few countries have a binary polarized political structure like the US, with just two parties. That has nothing to do with the constitution, however. (Electoral votes is a different matter.) Early on, the folks with the money and influence saw that the two party system allowed them to divide the nation into black and white polar opposites of thought, without any nuances. That way, the people are easily manipulated by hate-talk and well orchestrated propaganda. (In the US it is perfectly legal for news sources and candidates to lie to Americans about facts, reality, false data, and threats that do not actually exist in the real world. This is not so other developed nations, where public campaign finance is withdrawn and media is sanctioned for misinforming the electorate.)
At the same time, nothing prevents the formation of a Third party. I think of the Green Party as a political placeholder that exists in the event that American thinking evolves and the people come to understand that they are a single-body society. Until then, Federal elections are a winner-take-all event in most states. Each state can decide if their electoral votes are divided between parties, although they are generally not. There is no political mechanism for coalitions.
The constitution does not really cover most of this. In fact, no American has a constitutional right to vote for President in a Federal election. That's entirely up to each state. (This is pretty unique among the world's constitutions. It's an artifact of slavery.)
Anyway, this is the sentence you wrote that made me want to respond:
Nations rewrite their constitutions all the time — almost always to confer more human rights directly upon the people and update election procedures to make them more accessible, fair, and transparent. That's why they are so easily ratified. Canada just did so not so long ago. The evolving world demands relevant constitutions and a rich environment for amendments. Otherwise, if a constitution becomes entrenched and antiquated or irrelevant, the people lose the generational sovereignty of their own time in history. When that happens, the nation generally descends into a repressive system, where the people don't even bother to vote.
The US is the only major nation that has an entrenched constitution, at this point in history. It is no longer possible to amend it, and the emotional violence of the two party system also makes it impossible to discuss a modern constitution. Ownership of the nation has shifted from the people to an oligarchy that is served best by a captive population and an ersatz democracy.
But a nation does not have to descend into crisis to trigger a change. Nations generally learn from one another how social and legal transitions are accomplished and codified. Unfortunately, the US is completely isolated from the rest of the world by two vast oceans. It has no neighbors that it respects and has actually attacked, invaded, or stolen from most of them. Xenophobia is encouraged among the people by the government. Thus, the American people have no exposure to how the world works as a group of nations, interconnected across land masses. If you look at a globe, you can see the problem — which is a tremendous advantage for the corporations that own the American people and their commonwealth.
The people who brought us forward over the past 100,000 years to this time and place followed a simple rule that made survival possible: Either adapt to the situation in place or migrate elsewhere. I think it's a good rule. Life is too short to fight over a mound of dirt.
____________________
The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato
Hear, hear, Mimi, Joe, and Pluto!!!!! ;-) N/T
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
you see here is my problem
I don't understand if the laws that regulate the electoral college is part of the consitution or not. I thought it is and Wiki says so too. You have "electors", people vote for their "electors." The way they are elected is different from state to state, but most have still the winner take all method. First of all I can't understand how you can allow the states to have different voting methods, I consider that as undemocratic and unfair. Second, why do you have to vote indirectly over an "elector", who then has to pledge for a candidate. What's a pledge worth? It's as much worth as if you hubby tells you he will always be loyal to you ... It's just a bit like as up to his own likeing, right? And that is allowed in a voting system? Why? And of course you allow Third Party to be formed, you can't be too obviously undemocratic and not allow it, but the electoral college just makes the whole democratic value of having a third party a kabuki theatre. They never can win in that electoral college system. Otherwise they would have at least some times. So, it's a con artist democracy.
From Wikipedia:
Great system. Totally unreasonable, complicated for nothing and I don't know what's the reason to have the state's political parties to nominate an elector.
Just don't get it what it's for.
Great so you vote for an elector, but don't know even his name?
Beats me. Let's say I were allowed to vote (obviously you understand that I can't and therefore banging my head against the wall and allowing myself to hang my anger out). So, I write in Jill Stein for example, how am I supposed to know who I should write in as elector? And why do you need to have electors?
Wonderful, great. Looks perfect.
How lovely. I don't see why it's useful, but heh, traditions, I guess.
So, why is there a need for the procedures to vary slightly from state to state? Why are not all states requested to follow exactly the same procedures?
So, our votes are based on our trust into the faithfulness of our electors. How lovely. I mean, it gives me the willies, that I don't even want to continue to learn the basics of your electoral college system. I really think it is ... from Mars.
The reason I always get so upset over the electoral college is that I have not the right words, nor the knowledge and understanding of the legal texts that govern in each state the electors etc. I ran into that non-understanding for the electoral college I think the first time on dailykos, when I followed the elections consciously and couldn't believe what I saw. Some rather timid questions were met with an arrogant put down of my ignorance. So, I did shut up. I also really don't have any appetite to learn the ins and outs of a dinosaur electoral system. That was before Citizens United. I can't just comprehend how people think that their votes have all equal weight and how their votes reflects proportionality. And when I hear that US advisers go regularly into other countries to watch over their elections to be fair and democratic, my heart beats a little bit too fast.
Add all the other shenanigans of redistricting, tricky regulations for voter registration (why do you have to register for a party? It's none of your business for which party's candidate I will vote, so why do you I have to register as anything at all? Why does a voter have to be registered? If you are eighteen or 21 years old you should automatically have the right to vote. Show your ID and that's it. Get a national ID card implemented with the least amount of data on it (don't put any ethnic or race or relgion related data on the ID card) and you have the whole state based messy stuff out of the way.
Ok, I guess you get the picture. I know that nations amend their constitutions all the time, but these are very tiny amendments. And they take for ever to get through. The reason why I said that I believe most nations rewrite their constitutions (as a whole) only after a major collapse, is because in Germany it happened that way twice, each time after the world wars. I always wanted to find out how that is in other countries. My hunch is, it is pretty much the same. Once you have a stable country with a democratic constitution, you keep it. Once it is changed into less democratic one, because some Ubermensch of a leader thinks he can do so, you have a civil war coming your way. At least it looks like that to me in many countries.
Ok, you are lucky, you all have taken political science and are well knowledgeable of your system, well read and articulate. I am not. I am getting cranky when it comes to the electoral college and I don't forgive the lawyer types on dailykos to never address and explain in easy terms the undemocratic disadvantages this system represents. I think all people in the know, just know, they can't change it. And there is nothing democratic in that and there is not a sign of "one man/woman/ one equal vote" for all citizens in it. At least I don't see it and I don't believe it.
I on purpose exaggerated my language. I can't get over this issue and it's rare that I say something that "in your face and mean it".
So, your last sentence is: If you can't fight it, join it or something if you don't like it, leave and go somewhere else? You know when I heard Germans react like that with foreigners in Germany, I felt that was a very bad attitude. So, forgive me. The most you can ask a person is, if he/she doesn't like a condition, is to accept it as a rule she can't fight, but certainly can't ask to have to join or ask a migrant to migrate again ... well, after you, would be my response. Of course I wouldn't tell you, but certainly think so.
afternoon mimi, regarding your electoral college questions...
i'll try to answer some of them for you as best i can.
yes, it is a system that is dictated by the constitution. it is found in article 2 section 1. it is modified by the 12th amendment, section 3 of the 20th amendment and the 25th amendment.
it is the way it is because the framers of the constitution did not want to entrust the choice of the chief executive to the people and arranged the electoral college as a check on the power of the people to elect someone who might not be amenable to the ruling class, its privileges and most important, its need for the protection of its property interests.
by choosing electors, the same logic that is found in federalist 10 applies (which is more laid out more explicitly in this letter from madison to jefferson) and explained more plainly here. [note: all of the links to this point except the last are to source documents save the last which i think you will find the most useful.]
it's because the us was designed as a federal system. when the nation was formed the states were sovereign and they were loath to give up their sovereignty at the time when the constitution was formed. conditions to assuage the fears of a tyrannical central government were incorporated.
things which seem to be out of place now, did not seem so out of place 200+ years ago. for example, now the idea of people other than white, male, landowning individuals being able to vote seems a no-brainer as does the concept that black people are more than 3/5ths of a person. things were different then and many of the things that strike us as ludicrously unfair today led to the creation of a process which has elements of unfairness now.
to keep the rich people in control. the electors were chosen under the same terms as the people's "representatives" meaning that they were likely to be elite individuals who were known by large numbers of people.
the biggest obstacles to third party success are more local. a third party would choose its own electors and presumably would find individuals whose fealty to the party was solid. in terms of strategy, it seems to me that it is unlikely that a third party could successfully run only as a "presidential party" (having little state/local infrastructure and officeholders). it would be best if the third party had success at the state level in electing officeholders to congress, if only in case the presidential election got thrown into congress.
anyway, i hope that helps.
oh wow, thank you kindly,
you see I can't get used to the idea that the
are still accepted today. I had a little bit of understanding for some of the historical reasons, but I can't understand why people still cling to the way the electoral college regulates the voting process nowadays. Germany is a Republic, we have another electoral process. Looks fairer to me. Most Western countries have their own unique system, but none seem to have that many elements of unfairness than the US electoral college has, at least it looks like that to me and I believe the low voter turn out is related to it. I remember trying to research that a little bit may be six years ago and I gave up. It gets very mathematical if you try to compare how countries set up their voting systems.
Of course, as it's so hard to learn the details of it and for each US state it is differently, I never did study it for the US states. So, I shouldn't make judgements, but it's just one thing that puts me off, because the unfairness is so easily to grasp.
This means, you vote for Green Party state candidates for Congress or Senate? Are there any in Maryland? I guess the US is just too big a country for my little brain. It's easy to get lost and isolated here. Thank you so much for taking the time to write this comment and include the links. I will try to dig into them.
the green party is active in maryland and other states...
the maryland greens are active, though the democratic party (mostly) has been quite successful in tamping down the green party with an assortment of rules and regulations.
Ooooh, thanks, their website makes
me cringe and makes me want to get active for them. That looks so much like a David against Goliath battle. As the doggies I love most are the underdogs, that would be the right thing to do. Thanks Joe. May be I learn how to get involved.
My friend in South America
…told me see saw the Republican debates. Her boyfriend accessed a video feed.
Since she doesn't really follow politics anywhere, I asked her if she had any questions.
She wanted to know if just any Republican can run for president, "or do they have to be country western singers?"
That was it. Don't know how she made that leap. She watches a lot of American movies, but still….
After some deliberation, I confirmed that only hicks and hillbillies can run in that Party.
____________________
The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato
evening pluto...
heh, i've been wondering what the rest of the world was thinking about america when there are so many clowns, yahoos and bloodthirsty warmongers running for our highest office.
some of the rethugs almost make dubya look moderately sane by comparison.
I don't think many watch it and even know about it
they only pay attention when they see the military running around in their neighborhood or the war ships floating in the mediterranean.