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“There is no flag large enough to cover the shame of killing innocent people.”

-- Howard Zinn

News and Opinion

Senators Look to End Yemen War With First-Ever War Powers Challenge

A bipartisan effort by four senators is looking to end the US military’s involvement in the Saudi-led war in Yemen, with the introduction of the first ever War Powers Act vote to come out of the Senate. Senators Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Rand Paul (R-KY), Mike Lee (R-UT), and Chris Murphy (D-CT) are forwarding the bill, which notes that Congress has never authorized the use of military force in Yemen. This should allow Congress to oblige the administration to end US involvement in the war. ...

Efforts in the House late last year to challenge the Yemen war under the War Powers Act were blocked by the leadership, which replaced it with a non-binding resolution confirming that Congress never authorized a war on Yemen’s Shi’ite Houthi movement, which passed 366-30. These same senators tried to push a bill last summer to block arms sales to Saudi Arabia, though this narrowly failed.

Imagine that. The UN has created a report that neatly ties together reasons why the U.S. might want to attack two of its favorite targets. Go figure.

U.N. Links North Korea to Syria’s Chemical Weapons Program

North Korea has been shipping supplies to the Syrian government that could be used in the production of chemical weapons, United Nations experts contend. The evidence of a North Korean connection comes as the United States and other countries have accused the Syrian government of using chemical weapons on civilians, including recent attacks on civilians in the Damascus suburb of eastern Ghouta using what appears to have been chlorine gas.

The supplies from North Korea include acid-resistant tiles, valves and thermometers, according to a report by United Nations investigators. North Korean missile technicians have also been spotted working at known chemical weapons and missile facilities inside Syria, according to the report, which was written by a panel of experts who looked at North Korea’s compliance with United Nations sanctions.

The report highlights the potential danger posed by any such trade between Syria and North Korea, which could allow Syria to maintain its chemical weapons while also providing North Korea with cash for its nuclear and missile programs. The possible chemical weapons components were part of at least 40 previously unreported shipments by North Korea to Syria between 2012 and 2017 of prohibited ballistic missile parts and materials that could be used for both military and civilian purposes, according to the report, which has not been publicly released but which was reviewed by The New York Times.

Neither the report’s authors nor members of the United Nations Security Council who have seen it would comment, and neither would the United States’ mission to the international agency. It is unclear when, or even whether, the report will be released. ...

Though experts who viewed the report said the evidence it cited did not prove definitively that there was current, continuing collaboration between North Korea and Syria on chemical weapons, they said it did provide the most detailed account to date of efforts to circumvent sanctions intended to curtail the military advancement of both countries.

Resisting Calls to ‘Do Something’ About Syria

Arguing that the Western war machine is a good way to bring about peace and justice is like arguing that a bulldozer is a useful tool for brain surgery. Arguing that the Western war machine is a good way to bring about peace and justice in Syria is like arguing that the gasoline which was used to start a house fire can also be used to extinguish it. The cutesy fairy tale you will hear from empire loyalists is that what started out as peaceful protests slowly morphed into a battle between the Syrian government and various terrorist factions, with the West only backing the terrorists later on in the conflict. This is false.

Last October, former Qatari Prime Minister Hamad bin Jassim bin Jaber al-Thani admitted on television that the U.S. and its allies were actively involved in shipping weapons to violent extremist groups in Syria from the very beginning of the war there in 2011. In an article titled “The day before Deraa,” the American Herald Tribune’s Steven Sahiounie documents how CIA-backed foreign mercenaries/terrorists were already in place ready to go prior to the outbreak of violence in Deraa in March 2011. It is now an openly admitted fact that the CIA and U.S. allies have been arming known terrorist factions in Syria. If you know anything about the CIA and the Western war machine, none of this will surprise you. The violence in Syria that you see today is the direct result of a deliberate and ongoing destabilization campaign by the Western empire against a nation it has had marked for regime change for a very long time. The war machine that ignited this fire is working to manufacture public support for hosing it down with gasoline.

I am not an isolationist. I do not oppose NATO interventionism in Syria from any kind of right-wing paleocon perspective that nation-building and interventionist wars ought to be avoided because they are expensive and create refugee crises. I oppose US-led regime change interventionism in Syria because the empire started the Syrian war and is now using lies and propaganda to manufacture support for additional use of military force with the goal of preventing Syria and its allies from restoring stability to the nation. These hand-wringing “won’t someone think of the children” intervention advocates are calling for even more killing and destruction by the very empire which ignited and perpetuated the killing and destruction in the first place. ...

The fact that the U.S. and its allies are now openly admitting to having armed known terrorist factions in Syria and are still somehow asking you to trust them should elicit nothing other than a full belly laugh right in their face. Anyone in a NATO-allied country saying “we need to do something in Syria” should receive the same instant recoil as a known child rapist asking you to let him babysit your kids. No, Western empire, you do not need to “do something” in Syria.

This is not a movie, this is fake: Syria war photos go viral, but they are NOT from Syria

Kosovo: Top war crimes prosecutor forced to leave amid US state department inertia

The chief prosecutor of a war crimes court for Kosovo has said he is being made to leave the job at a critical stage of the tribunal’s work with no designated successor – largely due to inertia in the US state department. David Schwendiman said he had been asking the state department for more than a year to make a decision about the future of the position at the Hague-based court. But he heard only a fortnight ago that he had to leave by April, leaving virtually no time to find a replacement. ...

Schwendiman’s experience echoes frequent reports of indecision and paralysis in a state department facing deep budget cuts and riddled with vacancies in its top ranks. Forty ambassador positions remain vacant without a nominee and seven of the nine top jobs at headquarters. One after another, former diplomats have warned that the US is consequently haemorrhaging influence around the world.

The impending vacuum at the top of the Kosovo tribunal also comes at a precarious time in the region. Ten years after Kosovo declared independence from Serbia after an uprising, a brutal counter-insurgency and Nato intervention, the country’s future has not been resolved. Belgrade, Moscow and their allies refuse to recognise its independence and ethnic Serb enclaves on Kosovo territory remain potential flashpoints.

Adm. Michael Rogers, NSA chief, warns Senate panel: Kremlin cyberwar is hard to counter

The Kremlin has succeeded in using cyberwar tactics to “stir discord in the West” and threatened the foundations of democracy in confusing ways that are hard to counter, the head of the National Security Agency and U.S. Cyber Command told a congressional panel Tuesday.

“The idea is to make Western electorates distrust all news outlets and ultimately one another,” NSA Director Adm. Michael Rogers told the Senate Armed Services Committee. “This threatens the foundations of democracy, making it difficult to discern Moscow’s intentions and to craft common measures for countering Russia’s aggressive actions.” ...

The hearing took on a personal tone when Sen. Tim Kaine, who was Hillary Clinton’s running mate in the 2016 presidential race, dropped his voice, shook his head slowly and said: “We have lost the first real cyberwar that our country has been in. The U.S. government failed to protect the U.S. democracy.” Mr. Kaine then wondered aloud about the source of the failure. “Was it imagination, will, policy, structural, personal, leadership, investment?” the Virginia Democrat asked.

Adm. Rogers responded somewhat philosophically that what the U.S. faced was a failure to shift from the industrial age to the digital age in terms of protecting critical infrastructure. He also noted that Washington “underestimated the adversary [Russia].” “We did not anticipate the sustained level of aggressive behavior we have seen,” he said, adding that for the country to better address future cyberthreats, it would have think in new ways that “cut across more lines” than the government is used to considering.

Key U.S. lawmakers want to boost Israel's $38 billion defense aid package

U.S. senators who just returned from a trip to Israel called on Tuesday for an increase in the $38 billion in military aid the United States is currently providing Israel, signaling support for more funds for Israeli missile systems.

Senators Lindsey Graham, a leading Republican foreign policy voice, and Chris Coons, a Democratic member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said they considered the provision of $38 billion over 10 years, “a floor.”

Graham said during a meeting with reporters that he thought provisions in the agreement phasing out an arrangement in which Israel could spend U.S. funds on its own defense industry and the provision of just $500 million in missile defense funding were “short-sighted.”

Blackwater is getting paid millions by the Canadian government

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government dramatically increased spending on services from the notorious company formerly known as Blackwater, which was widely considered a shadowy mercenary force and accused of war crimes.

In the 2016-2017 fiscal year the government purchased two million dollars in services from Academi, the third iteration and name of the private defence contractor linked to mass killings and abuses, according to spending reports from the Department of National Defence (DND).

In the 2015-2016 fiscal year, the first year of Trudeau’s mandate, the government paid Academi over $2 million. In the first two years of the Liberal government, payments to the company were more than double what the Conservatives spent on Academi in their last two years in office. ...

The contracts continue more than a decadelong connection between Blackwater and its subsequent iterations and the Department of National Defence, first established as far back as 2006 under the Conservatives at the beginning of the combat mission in Afghanistan.

Heh, the moon will probably get cell service decades before some parts of West Virginia...

The moon will soon have better cell service than some parts of Earth

We’re still struggling to get decent cell phone coverage in many places here on Earth, but for anyone planning to go to the moon in the near future, there’s no need to worry about posting the perfect Earth selfie on Instagram.

That’s right, the moon is getting a 4G cell phone network in 2019, thanks to a partnership between Vodafone, Nokia, Audi, and Berlin-based space exploration company PTScientist. ...

The cell phone network is being established to facilitate live video streams sent directly from the moon’s surface back to earth for the first time.

Cruel & Unconstitutional: ACLU Denounces SCOTUS Ruling Approving Indefinite Immigrant Detention

Georgia police take teacher into custody after shots fired at school

Police in Georgia have taken a high school teacher into custody after being called to an incident where they say he fired a gun in a classroom and then barricaded himself in.

The Dalton police department tweeted that no children were hurt or in danger during the incident, which lasted for about an hour on Wednesday and caused the school to be evacuated. They provided no information about the teacher’s identity or what caused the situation.

People are super excited about Dick’s

A lot of people are very happy about Dick’s.

We’re, of course, referring to the massive sporting goods retailer that announced Wednesday, in the wake of the high school shooting in Parkland, Florida, that it will no longer sell assault-style rifles, high-capacity magazines, or bump stocks. Dick’s will also no longer sell firearms to people under the age of 21. ...

Dick's is stirring a lot of passion on both sides of the gun issue. As of midday, "Dick's Sporting Goods" was a No. 2 trending topic on Twitter in the U.S. and No. 5 worldwide.

West Virginia Teachers Strike Redefines Teacher Unionism

South Dakota lawmakers just passed an unprecedented abortion restriction

South Dakota is set to become the first state to not only tell abortion providers what they can say to patients but also to dictate what they can’t say.

Providers who work at the state’s only abortion clinic, in Sioux Falls, are legally required by the state to tell patients certain information, such as, “Abortion will terminate the life of a whole, separate, unique, living human being.” But under a first-of-its-kind law passed Monday by the state Legislature, providers can no longer preface that information with the phrase “politicians in the state of South Dakota require us to tell you that” — even though state lawmakers acknowledge that the phrase is true.

Elizabeth Nash, senior state issues manager at the Guttmacher Institute, says she’s never even seen a state legislature propose such a requirement, much less pass it. But South Dakota has historically had some of the country's most restrictive abortion laws.

“Medical ethics require that patients receive full and relevant information about their condition and treatment, and by limiting the kinds of information that the patient can receive, you really have undercut medical ethics,” Nash said. “We’re always concerned around new intrusions into the doctor-patient relationship, and it wouldn’t be surprising to see other states try to do this.”

How Lenders Are Turning Low-Level Courts Into Dickensian “Debt Collection Mills”

[Debt] collectors ranging from federal student lenders, to third-party debt buyers, to utility and ambulance services routinely wield the threat of arrest to intimidate people into paying up. Federal law outlawed debt prisons in 1833, but lenders, landlords and even gyms and other businesses have found a way to resurrect the Dickensian practice. With the aid of private collection agencies, they file millions of lawsuits in state and local courts each year, winning 95 percent of the time. If a defendant fails to appear at post-judgement hearings known as “debtors’ examinations,” collectors can seek a warrant for contempt of court — even if the debtor didn’t realize they were being sued.

In one case documented by the Baltimore Sun, an affiliate of Kushner Cos. — the firm run by the family of Jared Kushner — secured a warrant for a Baltimore bus driver and mother of three who had moved out of her apartment early after receiving a federal housing voucher. She said she never received a notice to appear, and eventually declared bankruptcy to avoid arrest.

“A Pound of Flesh: the Criminalization of Private Debt,” the ACLU report, sheds light for the first time on the frequency of modern-day debt imprisonment, estimating that courts are issuing tens of thousands of arrest warrants each year for debtors owing as little as $30. Forty-four states permit judges to issue these warrants, often known as “body attachments,” in civil cases. “This has been a largely invisible problem, because the people it’s happening to typically don’t have lawyers and aren’t speaking out,” says Jennifer Turner, a human rights researcher at ACLU. “Many low-level courts have essentially become debt-collection mills.”

One in three Americans has a debt that’s been turned over to a private collection agency, and the ACLU found cases of warrants being issued over almost every kind of consumer debt—payday and auto loans, utility bills, even daycare fees. Many cases begin with an emergency expense that someone is unable to pay, sending them into a spiral of debt and imprisonment. The use of cash bail often compounds the problem; debtors languish in jail for up to two weeks, according to the report. In some jurisdictions, judges routinely set bail at the exact amount of the debt owed, then surrender it to the collector once paid. ...

Debt collectors are well aware of the leverage a warrant gives them. According to Turner, one debt collection attorney in Washington files 20 to 30 warrants a week, largely against noncitizen Latino farmworkers who are often terrified to enter a courthouse in case immigration officials are present. Another attorney in Texas who teaches a “Collections 101” course for the State Bar of Texas has a section in his handbook entitled, “It’s Easier to Settle When the Debtor is Under Arrest.”

Seven states were hacked by Russians before the U.S. presidential election, report finds

U.S. intelligence officials knew that seven states had been hacked by Russia-backed operatives before the 2016 U.S. presidential election, but declined to actually inform any of them, NBC News reported Tuesday.

An intelligence report ordered by then-President Obama found that seven states — Alaska, Arizona, California, Florida, Illinois, Texas and Wisconsin — had their websites or voter registration databases compromised. The breaches ranged from entry into state websites to the more serious penetration of voter databases, state and federal officials told NBC News, though they emphasized that no votes were changed and no voters were removed from the rolls. ...

None of the seven states had been told that Russia was behind the hacking, according to officials who spoke to NBC, and six of the seven states still deny they were hacked, citing their own investigations. Intelligence officials tell the outlet that in some cases, state officials could not be briefed because they did not have the sufficient security clearance.

Mueller is using the “pee tape” dossier to investigate Trump’s Moscow links

FBI special counsel Robert Mueller is looking into Donald Trump’s business dealings in Russia and how they aligned with his decision to run for president — and he’s using the “pee tape” dossier as a guide, according to a report from CNN.

Mueller’s team is asking questions which echo claims made in the controversial document put together by ex-British spy Christopher Steele, and focus on the possibility that Kremlin operatives possessed “kompromat” about the U.S. president which could make him subject to blackmail, according to three sources speaking to CNN. ...

Investigators are seeking detailed information about Trump’s itinerary in Moscow during his trip, specifically about the hotel room he stayed in, who had access to it, who was in charge of security and who may have visited it — including business people or government officials. Trump has long denied all allegations made in the dossier, and his longtime bodyguard Keith Schiller told the House intelligence committee in November that he had rejected an offer by a Russian individual to send five prostitutes to Trump's hotel room, saying “he took the offer as a joke...and Trump laughed it off.”

Part of Mueller’s investigation is establishing when the president became serious about running for president and whether that was linked to any of his business dealings with Russia at the time. A source told CNN that “a witness told Mueller’s team his impression was that Trump was serious about running back in 2014.”

Trump attacks Jeff Sessions over inquiry into alleged surveillance abuses

Donald Trump has once again lashed out at his attorney general, tweeting that he found a plan by Jeff Sessions to use his department’s internal watchdog to review alleged surveillance abuses by intelligence teams “DISGRACEFUL!”

Sessions announced on Tuesday that the Department of Justice’s inspector general, its internal watchdog, would investigate allegations that the FBI and the Department of Justice abused Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (Fisa) procedures to spy on a Trump campaign adviser.

“We believe the Department of Justice must adhere to the highest standards in the Fisa court, and, yes, it will be investigated … The inspector general will take that as one of the matters he’ll deal with,” Sessions told reporters during a press briefing.

On Wednesday morning, Trump attacked Sessions with a convoluted tweet.

Why is A.G. Jeff Sessions asking the Inspector General to investigate potentially massive FISA abuse. Will take forever, has no prosecutorial power and already late with reports on Comey etc. Isn’t the I.G. an Obama guy? Why not use Justice Department lawyers? DISGRACEFUL!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 28, 2018

Robert Mueller drops many charges against ex-Trump aide cooperating in Russia inquiry

The special counsel investigating possible collusion between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin has dropped nearly two dozen criminal fraud charges against a key witness who has agreed to cooperate in the investigation.

A court filing on Tuesday showed that prosecutors working for Robert Mueller dropped some charges against Rick Gates, a former aide to the Trump campaign who previously worked as a lobbyist for pro-Russian interests, just days after he was indicted for participating in a conspiracy to hide millions of dollars in fees he was paid for lobbying work and evade US taxes.

Gates pleaded guilty last week to separate charges, filed against him in Washington DC, that he conspired against the US and lied to investigators over the course of their inquiry. The Virginia charges were dropped against him as part of a plea agreement in which Gates is being shown leniency by prosecutors in exchange for his full cooperation. ...

Gates’s guilty plea last week has put Manafort under intense pressure to cooperate with investigators or face a potentially long prison sentence, given Gates’s promise to testify against him. Manafort has vehemently denied all wrongdoing and promised to fight the case against him.

From Pushing 'Thoughts and Prayers' to Dissing Medicare for All, DCCC Called Out for Sabotaging Bold Demands

Progressives found new reason for dismay on Tuesday after internal documents revealed efforts by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) to squash support for Medicare for All and a separate attempt to curtail demands for stricter gun control following the mass shooting in Las Vegas last year.

"It's becoming evident that the DCCC—and the billionaire donors and revolving door consultants that make up the Democratic Party establishment—believe Democrats can only take back Congress by running on a watered down message...instead of the basic values of decency and fairness that voters demand," said Waleed Shahid of Justice Democrats in a statement.

Documents on healthcare messaging that were handed out to House Democrats in the wake of the 2016 election treated universal healthcare as a fringe issue, suggesting that lawmakers are not to entertain Medicare for All as a potential solution to the nation's high healthcare costs and poor outcomes. ... The messaging memo also included Republican talking points attacking a single-payer system like the Medicare for All plan proposed by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), without providing any rebuttals to the claims.

As the healthcare memo came to light, the Huffington Post reported that last October, in the immediate wake of the Las Vegas shooting, the DCCC warned House candidates to steer clear of "politicizing" the massacre that killed 58 people and injured hundreds. "You and your candidate will be understandably outraged and upset, as will your community. However, DO NOT POLITICIZE IT TODAY," DCCC regional press secretary Evan Lukaske wrote to candidates in an email just after the shooting. "There will be time for politics and policy discussion, but any message today should be on offering thoughts/prayers for victims and their families, and thanking first responders who saved lives." The email was "straight out of the NRA's talking points," Mark Glaze of the gun violence prevention group Guns Down told the Huffington Post.

Arctic warming: Scientists alarmed by ''crazy'' temperature rises

Despite Major Public Opposition, EU Reportedly Set to Approve Bayer-Monsanto #MergerFromHell

Despite widespread opposition among the residents of Europe, the European Union is set to grant anti-trust approval of a $62.5 billion merger between German chemical giant Bayer and the U.S-based Monsanto, according to reports on Wednesday.

Reuters reported that sources familiar with the review expect it to be approved soon. Bayer, which has agreed to sell off some assets to appease European regulators, would only say that it was continuing "a constructive dialogue with the EU competition watchdog" and "the regulatory process in Europe was further advanced than in the United States where the deal also requires clearance."

The Wall Street Journal also reported on the likelihood of imminent EU approval, citing anonymous sources, and noted that a review by the U.S. Justice Department is ongoing. Bayer chief executive Werner Baumann, who spoke with the Journal, "expressed optimism that the deal would ultimately win regulatory approval, with the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S., or CFIUS, and authorities in Brazil already giving the nod."

As the April 5 deadline nears for the European Commission—the EU's executive arm—to make a final decision, food, farming, and corporate accountability groups are working together to raise awareness about the concerns posed by what they are calling the #MergerFromHell.

Anne Isakowitsch, campaign manager at the global advocacy group SumOfUs, warned that "a merged Bayer-Monsanto would be relentless in its pursuit of putting corporate profits over the protection of small farms—eventually driving up prices for consumers."

Also of Interest

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

Intercepted Podcast: White Supremacy and the Church of the Second Amendment

Children of Color Already Face Violent Discipline in Schools. Arming Teachers Will Get Them Killed.

NYT Editor Insists the Paper Has No Ideology...Except Being 'Pro-Capitalism'

I am Colten Boushie. Canada is the all-white jury that acquitted his killer

A Little Night Music

Blue Lu Barker - Don't You Feel My Leg

Henry Red Allen, Blue Lu Barker. Buster Bailey + Danny Barker - Blue Deep Sea

Blue Lu Barker - Lu's Blues

Blue Lu Barker - A Little Bird told Me

Blue Lu Barker - Trombone Man Blues

Blue Lu Barker - I got ways like the devil

Blue Lu Barker - That Made Him Mad

Blue Lu Barker - Scat Skunk

Blue Lu Barker- Georgia Grind

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Blue Lu Barker- He Caught That B & O

Blue Lu Barker - I don't dig you, Jack

Blu Lu Barker - Buy Me Some Juice

Blue Lu Barker - New Orleans Blues

Blue Lu Barker with Danny Barker's Fly Cats - You're Going To Leave The Old Home Jim

Blue Lu Barker With Danny Barker's Band - Boogie Is The Thing To Do