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This evening's music features "The Queen of the Blues," Koko Taylor. Enjoy!

"Their final objective toward which all their deceit is directed is to capture political power so that, using the power of the state and the power of the market simultaneously, they may keep the common man in eternal subjection."

-- Henry A. Wallace

News and Opinion

For The Record, NPR Absolutely Is US State Propaganda

American liberals are in an uproar over Twitter’s recent labeling of National Public Radio as “US state-affiliated media”, a designation typically reserved for state media from governments the US is trying to topple like Russia’s RT, China’s CGTN, and Iran’s Press TV.

In an article titled “Twitter labels NPR’s account as ‘state-affiliated media,’ which is untrue,” NPR’s Bill Chappell attempts to argue that his outlet does not deserve to have the same labels affixed to it as state media from naughty governments like Russia and China:

“Noting the millions of listeners who support and rely upon NPR for ‘independent, fact-based journalism,’ NPR CEO John Lansing stated, ‘NPR stands for freedom of speech and holding the powerful accountable. It is unacceptable for Twitter to label us this way. A vigorous, vibrant free press is essential to the health of our democracy.'”

It is an interesting choice to spotlight NPR’s CEO John Lansing while trying to argue that NPR is not state-affiliated, given that Lansing spent his pre-NPR years as the CEO of the US Agency for Global Media (USAGM). USAGM is the US government narrative management umbrella which runs overt US state propaganda outlets like Radio Free Asia, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, and Voice of America.

In a 1977 article titled “Worldwide Propaganda Network Built by the C.I.A.,” The New York Times explicitly names Radio Liberty, Radio Free Europe, and Radio Free Asia as part of the network constructed by the Central Intelligence Agency to circulate  propaganda. As Fair.org’s Bryce Greene recently noted, USAGM received $810 million in US federal funding in 2022, which is more than twice the amount RT received from Russia for its global operations in 2021.

Lansing’s history is not an anomaly; NPR is regularly overseen by executives who came directly from senior positions in Washington’s official propaganda network. From 1998 to 2008 NPR’s president was a man named Kevin Klose, who previously ran Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and then returned to that job after his decade-long NPR stint. A man named Ken Stern became NPR’s executive vice president in 1999 and was appointed CEO in 2006; prior to that he was the senior advisor to the director of the USAGM’s International Broadcasting Bureau.

So it is a bit funny that John Lansing is now cited complaining about NPR being labeled “state-affiliated media” on Twitter, given that he has devoted his life to promulgating US state-affiliated media. NPR receives funding from the US government, consistently advances the information interests of the US government, and is routinely run by professional propagandists of the US government. You could spend hours of your life just reading through Fair.org’s “NPR” section to see the many, many ways that platform has exhibited wild biases to grease the wheels of the US empire. If NPR is not state-affiliated media, then nobody is.

In his efforts to argue that his outlet is not state-affiliated media, Bill Chappell also hilariously points out that White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre defended NPR as a wonderful exemplar of journalistic integrity:

When asked about Twitter’s decision during the White House’s daily briefing, press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre declined to address Twitter’s content rules specifically. But she also defended NPR’s journalism.

“There is no doubt of the independence of NPR journalists,” Jean-Pierre said. “If you’ve ever been on the receiving end of their questions, you know this.”

Yeah great argument Bill, “The White House says we’re good so we can’t possibly be US state-affiliated media.”

Defenders of NPR try to argue that the label is inaccurate because NPR only receives a small amount of its funding from the US government (between one percent and 15 percent depending on whose talking points they’re reciting), but this claim is undercut by NPR’s own claim that “Federal funding is essential to public radio’s service to the American public and its continuation is critical for both stations and program producers, including NPR [emphasis theirs].”

It’s probably also worth saying that if I was receiving between one and 15 percent of my funding from the government of Russia or China, I feel quite confident that Twitter would slap me with the “state-affiliated” label immediately, as it has so many others. If you’ve conceded that you receive government funding to any extent, it’s hard to then argue that you are in no way “affiliated” with that government.

It’s probably additionally worth noting that NPR receives a massive amount of funding from oligarchs like Bill Gates. When you live in an oligarchy like the US, receiving funding from oligarchs is not meaningfully distinct from receiving funding from the state.

But what’s especially revealing is the reasons people are giving for why the “state-affiliated media” label is detrimental to NPR.

“Twitter has labeled National Public Radio as ‘state-affiliated media, a move some worried could undermine public confidence in the news organization,” reads a tweet by AP. The tweet paraphrases a quote from PEN America’s Liz Woolery, “For Twitter to unilaterally label NPR as state-affiliated media, on par with Russia Today, is a dangerous move that could further undermine public confidence in reliable news sources.”

Think about what they’re admitting here, and what they’re not saying. They’re acknowledging that this label that’s been getting slapped on the media from nations which disobey the US government “undermines public confidence” in those outlets, which means they know Twitter has been using that label to undermine public confidence in the media from nations which disobey their government. They’re just not taking that understanding to the obvious conclusion: that this means Twitter has been functioning as a propaganda arm of the US government.

Indeed, the problem with the “state-affiliated media” label hasn’t so much been that it exists, but that it will always be unevenly applied. The label gets pinned to outlets like RT and China Daily while left off of known US propaganda outlets like Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Radio Free Asia, and Voice of America. This designation is also nowhere to be seen on other outlets which receive a far greater share of their funding from the state than NPR does, like the UK’s BBC, Australia’s ABC, Canada’s CBC, and the Saudi Press Agency.

There is no valid reason why NPR should carry the label of “state-affiliated media” while those outlets I just listed should not. So while NPR is unquestionably state-affiliated, the fact that it is the sole anomaly in Twitter’s otherwise consistent policy of pro-US, pro-western bias is a pretty clear sign that this designation did not come about because of an interest in truth or facts.

The explanation could be as simple as the fact that NPR published something that Twitter’s new CEO didn’t like, such as its recent article “Dogecoin price spikes after Elon Musk changes Twitter logo to the Shiba Inu dog.” Or it could be something even simpler, like the fact that NPR doesn’t support the same politics as Musk.

In any case, the “state-affiliated media” label is plainly a propaganda construct designed to suppress unauthorized speech in facilitation of the information interests of the US empire. If it was being used to promote truth and critical thinking it would be applied to every mainstream outlet in the western world, because those all serve as propaganda organs for the US empire today. While the official job of outlets like Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and Radio Free Asia is to administer US propaganda, their unofficial job is to give people the impression that they are the only kinds of institutions which administer US propaganda.

All this bickering and squabbling about whose voice should be uplifted as trustworthy and whose voice should be squelched as untrustworthy is just a manifestation of the fact that powerful people understand something most ordinary members of the public do not: that whoever controls the narrative controls the world. If you can exert control over the way people perceive reality, then you can control reality itself.

Until the public becomes more aware of this fact, our lives will be subject to the whims of oligarchs, government agencies, and mass media propagandists. Not until then will we be able to awaken from our propaganda-induced coma enough to shake off the psychological manipulations which keep us marching to the tune of oligarchy and empire, and use the power of our numbers to force the emergence of a healthy world that benefits us all.

Ukraine classified war plans in "disturbing" leak

Ukrainian Official Says Kicking Russia Out of Crimea Is Still the Plan

A Ukrainian official said Thursday that Kyiv’s goal of kicking Russia out of Crimea hasn’t changed after an aide to President Volodymyr Zelensky suggested Ukraine might be open to negotiating the issue.

“Ukraine will choose the way to bring Crimea back, using political and military means,” Tamila Tasheva, Zelensky’s envoy for Crimea, told POLITICO. ...

Tasheva said Russia will only be given two options: leave or be driven out. “To minimize Ukrainian military losses, minimize threats to civilians who live in occupied territories, as well as the destruction of civilian infrastructure, Ukraine plans to give Russia a choice on how to leave Crimea. If they don’t agree to leave voluntarily, Ukraine will continue to liberate its land by military means,” she said.

Searching Europe for ammo. Blinken, counteroffensive in coming weeks

Dennis Kucinich: The Bombing of Nord Stream — This Act of War Against Europe Requires Congressional Investigation

As a former chair of a Government Oversight congressional investigative subcommittee, I am calling on Congress to investigate whether or not the Biden Administration initiated the destruction of the Nord Stream pipeline, near Denmark’s Bornholm Island, on September 26, 2022. Veteran investigative journalist Seymour Hersh’s comprehensive account of the Biden Administration’s role in the bombing of Nord Stream has provided a road map for a series of congressional inquiries necessary to confirm or disconfirm Administration culpability.

President Biden’s own statements predicting the end of Nord Stream, preliminary to the devastating attack on its infrastructure, point to the necessity of determining whether or not the president was speaking from his singularly informed position of the Chief Executive, as Hersh indicated. A deconstruction of Hersh’s detailed narrative, (published two months ago on Substack), makes possible the development of a stream of subpoenas to determine the details of the planning and execution of the dismantling of Nord Stream by explosives.

This is a proper subject for a investigation, under Congress’ Article One, Section 8, Clause 18, constitutional powers to gather information, including to inquire on the administrative conduct of office.

The bombing of Nord Stream was an unconstitutional Act of War, involving the destruction of billions of dollars of energy infrastructure and wreaking havoc on the energy markets of Europe. The destruction of this major energy pipeline has affected over 80 million people, threatened the viability of continent’s manufacturing base and its overall economic stability.

The Administration did not have congressional approval, required under Article I, Section 8; nor did they consult with congressional leaders regarding the use of military assets for an attack on Nord Stream. ...

The American people have a right to know if their government, as has been reported, was involved in secretly perpetrating an Act of War, using US military personnel and the expenditure of US tax dollars, without the people’s knowledge and without the assent of their elected representatives.

UN Human Rights Council Condemns Impact of Sanctions

The United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) adopted a resolution this week that condemns the “negative impact of unilateral coercive measures on the enjoyment of human rights.”

Azerbaijan presented the text titled A/HRC/52/L.18 on behalf of the Movement of Non-Aligned Countries.

Emphasizing that unilateral coercive measures, legislation and secondary sanctions were a violation of international law, norms and principles as well as the U.N. Charter, the text expressed “grave concern” over the negative impact of sanctions on human rights, including the right to development, which is recognized as a “universal and inalienable right” integral to all human rights.

[The U.N. charter permits multilateral sanctions approved by the U.N. Security Council.

The U.S. has imposed unilateral sanctions on Cuba, Venezuela, Iran, North Korea, Libya, Belarus and other nations. The vote by the Human Rights Council can be seen as part of the accelerating trend of the developing world moving away from the West after it rejected Western sanctions on Russia over Ukraine. ]

The resolution called upon all states to “stop adopting, maintaining, implementing, or complying with unilateral coercive measures…in particular those of a coercive nature with extraterritorial effects.”

The draft resolution was approved with 33 votes in favor, 13 against, and one abstention. Among the countries that rejected the text were, predictably, the United States and several of its NATO allies including the United Kingdom, Belgium, France, Finland, Germany, alongside Ukraine.

Palestinian Poet Mohammed El-Kurd on Israeli Apartheid, Growing Tension in Region & Raid on Al-Aqsa

Al-Aqsa raid: Arab countries condemn 'extremist' Israeli attack on worshippers

The brutal attack by Israeli forces on Palestinian worshippers at Al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied East Jerusalem has been strongly denounced by Arab countries, and has raised questions about the prospects for further normalisation of ties with Israel.

Dozens of heavily armed officers stormed the site late on Tuesday night, using stun grenades and firing teargas into Al-Qibli prayer hall, where hundreds of men, women, elderly people and children were staying overnight to pray. 

Officers beat worshippers with batons and riot guns, wounding many, before arresting them. Some eyewitnesses said rubber-coated steel bullets were also fired.

The Arab League condemned the attack and warned of an ensuing escalation.

"The extremist approaches that control the policy of the Israeli government will lead to widespread confrontations with the Palestinians if they are not put to an end," Arab League Secretary-General Ahmed Aboul Gheit said in a statement.

The League said it would hold a meeting on Wednesday afternoon, after Jordan called for an emergency meeting in coordination with Palestinian and Egyptian officials.

Jordan's foreign ministry said Arab efforts were ongoing to stop "Israeli violations that are a flagrant violation of international humanitarian law", adding that such practices aimed to "alter the historical and legal status of Jerusalem".

Israel launches airstrikes in Gaza Strip after ‘biggest rocket salvo since 2006’

The Israeli military has launched airstrikes in the Gaza Strip after a day of rocket fire from Gaza and Lebanon and a second Israeli police raid on Jerusalem’s al-Aqsa mosque stoked fears of further escalation during overlapping religious holidays.

Two explosions were heard in Gaza late on Thursday. It was not immediately clear what had been targeted but Israel said its jets hit targets including tunnels and weapons manufacturing sites of Hamas, the Islamist group that controls the blockaded southern coastal strip.

“Israel’s response, tonight and later, will exact a significant price from our enemies,” prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said following a security cabinet meeting to discuss what the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) described as the biggest rocket salvo since the 2006 war into northern Israel. Most of the 34 projectiles were intercepted, but there were two minor injuries and a fire.

As the Israeli jets struck in Gaza, salvoes of rockets were fired in response and sirens sounded in Israeli towns and cities in bordering areas. “We hold the Zionist occupation fully responsible for the grave escalation and the flagrant aggression against the Gaza Strip and for the consequences that will bring onto the region,” Hamas said in a statement.

The marked uptick in violence during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan and the beginning of the Jewish Passover holiday comes after a year of increasing bloodshed in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It also carried echoes of 2021, when clashes at al-Aqsa during Ramadan helped start an 11-day war between Israel and Hamas. Thursday’s events have led to fears of a wider conflagration around the region.

Saudis Defy U.S. & Boost Russia’s Oil Prices!

Paris brasserie favoured by Macron set alight as pension protests continue

Hundreds of thousands of people have continued to demonstrate across France against Emmanuel Macron’s plans to raise the pension age to 64, with clashes breaking out between demonstrators and police on the edges of protests in cities including Lyon, Nantes and Paris.

In the capital, protesters briefly set fire to the awning of the Left Bank brasserie La Rotonde, well known for hosting Macron’s controversial evening of celebrations when he led the first-round vote in the 2017 presidential election. Police said several hundred of what they described as “radical elements” set bins alight and threw projectiles at officers near the restaurant. In Lyon, police fired teargas after some shops were looted and bank windows were smashed. In Rennes, police fired teargas and protesters threw projectiles at officers. ...

Every week, trade unions have led one day of national strikes and peaceful street demonstrations, although clashes between police and protesters on the edges of demonstrations have begun occurring since mid-March. But while turnout has slightly decreased in recent weeks, unions have insisted French people would keep mobilising, demanding the change be scrapped. ...

A poll on Wednesday found that Le Pen would beat Macron today if the presidential election of last spring were repeated. The survey, from the Elabe group for BFMTV, indicated Le Pen would score 55% and Macron 45% if they faced each other in a runoff vote now. “Either trade unions win this, or it will be the far right,” Fabien Villedieu, a representative of Sud-Rail trade union, told France Info radio. “If you sicken people – and that is what’s happening – the danger is the arrival of the far right”

New Zealand loses appeal to rich foreigners as investor visa numbers plunge

Geographic isolation and perceived political tranquility has given New Zealand a reputation as an attractive sanctuary for the uber-rich – but with investor visa applications plummeting to just 15 in six months, some are questioning whether the country has lost its appeal to the global elite.

Both before and during the Covid-19 pandemic, a number of billionaires targeted New Zealand for “boltholes” – applying for visas or citizenship, parking up their mega yachts, and attempting – at times unsuccessfully – to build enormous bunkers in the isolated foothills of the South Island.

Their arrival in New Zealand was often controversial, particularly when it appeared that rich foreigners were leveraging wealth and power to gain entry. ... Over the past six months, however, just a handful of people have applied for the new foreign investor visa which forms the easiest pathway to residency for the extremely wealthy.

According to the Ministry of Business, Immigration and Employment (MBIE), just 15 people have applied for the new investor visa since it was launched six months ago. That compares with 492, according to BusinessDesk, who applied in 2021 under the previous criteria, which was in place until mid-2022.

Matt Taibbi THROWS DOWN With MSNBC's Mehdi Hasan

US Media Cheer as France Forces Old People to Work

“The Party Is Ending for French Retirees.” That’s the headline the Wall Street Journal (3/14/23) went with just days before French President Emmanuel Macron invoked a special article of the constitution to bypass the National Assembly and enshrine an increase in the retirement age in national law. The Journal proclaimed:

The golden age of French pensions is coming to an end, one way or another, in an extreme example of the demographic stress afflicting the retirement systems of advanced economies throughout the world.

The possibility that this “golden age” could be extended is not even entertained. Due to previous “reforms” (CounterSpin, 9/17/10), the pension of the average French person is already facing cuts over the coming decades. So preserving the current level of benefits would require strengthening the system. For the Journal, this is out of the question. Stingier pensions, on the other hand, are portrayed as the inevitable result of “demographic stress,” not policy choices.

The French people, by contrast, recognize that a less generous pension system is far from an inevitability. Protesters quickly took to the streets this January after the government unveiled plans to raise the retirement age from 62 to 64; one poll from that month found 80% of the country opposed to such a change. And as the government pushed the reform through in March, protests grew especially rowdy, with monuments of refuse lining the city’s streets and fires illuminating the Parisian landscape.

But that’s just how the French are, you know? They’re a peculiar people, much different from us Americans.

As the New York Times’ Paris bureau chief Roger Cohen put it in a recent episode of the Daily (3/16/23), protesters have been “talking about how life begins when work ends, which is a deeply held French conviction, very different from the American view that life is enriched and enhanced by work.”

Left unmentioned is the fact that, for decades, Americans have consistently opposed increases to the Social Security retirement age, usually by a large margin (CounterSpin, 10/26/18). Moreover, two-thirds of the American public support a four-day workweek, and half say Americans work too much. How French of them.

US media (Extra!, 3–4/96) have taken to covering the uprising against pension “reform” in the same way the narrator of a nature documentary might describe the wilderness:

Now, we come to a Frenchman in his natural habitat. His behavior may give the impression of idleness, but don’t let that fool you. If prodded enough with the prospect of labor, he will not hesitate before lighting the local pastry shop ablaze.

The New York Times (2/24/23), for instance, ran an article in the midst of the protests headlined “The French Like Protesting, but This Frenchman May Like It the Most,” about a man who has “become a personal embodiment of France’s enduring passion for demonstration.” It followed that up with a piece (3/7/23) presenting French opposition to an increase in the retirement age as some exotic reflection of the French’s French-ness. A source attested to the country’s uniqueness: “In France, we believe that there is a time for work and then a time for personal development.”

Meanwhile, while the Washington Post has mostly been content to outsource coverage of the protests to Associated Press wires, it did run a piece (3/15/23) by one of its own reporters titled: “City of … Garbage? Paris, Amid Strikes, Is Drowning in Trash.”

This fairly unserious reporting on the protests contrasts sharply with the grave rhetoric deployed by the editorial boards of major newspapers in opposing the protesters’ demands. The Wall Street Journal (3/16/23), which has implored the French to face “the cold reality” of spending cuts, is not alone in its crusade against French workers. The boards of the Washington Post, Bloomberg and the Financial Times have all run similarly dour editorials promoting pension reform over the past few months.

Among these, only the Financial Times (3/19/23) opposed the French government’s remarkably anti-democratic decision to raise the retirement age without a vote in the National Assembly, opining that Macron’s tactics have both “weakened” him and left “France with a democratic deficit.”

The Washington Post (3/17/23), by contrast, suggested democratic means would have been preferable, but gave no indication of opposition to Macron’s move. (As FAIR has pointed out—3/9/23—the Post’s supposed concern for democracy doesn’t extend far beyond its slogan.) And the Wall Street Journal (3/16/23) actually saluted the move, remarking, “Give Mr. Macron credit for persistence—and political brass.”

The editorial boards’ case for pension reform is based on a simple conviction—French pensions are unsustainable—for which there are three main pieces of evidence.

First, the ratio of workers to retirees. ... This trend is referenced more or less directly in editorials by the Journal (3/16/23, 1/31/23, 1/13/23), the Washington Post (3/17/23) and the Financial Times (3/19/23).

The declining worker-to-retiree ratio is meant to inspire fear, but in and of itself, it’s not necessarily a problem. After all, the increased costs associated with a rising number of retirees could very well be offset by other factors. It is therefore much more useful to look directly at how much of a nation’s wealth is used to support retirees.

Which brings us to the second commonly cited piece of evidence: pensions as a percentage of GDP. This is mentioned in editorials by the Journal (3/16/23, 1/31/23, 1/13/23), Post (3/17/23) and Bloomberg (1/16/23).

As it turns out, there’s no problem to be found here. In its 2021 Aging Report, the European Commission estimates that, even without a rise in the minimum retirement age to 64, public pension spending in France would actually decline over the next several decades, dropping to 12.6% of GDP in 2070, down from 14.8% in 2019. Cost-saving factors, primarily the deterioration in benefit levels, would more than cancel out the increase in the number of retirees. In other words, there is no affordability crisis. It doesn’t exist.

The only actual evidence for the unsustainability of France’s pension system is the system’s deficit, which is projected to reach around €14 billion by 2030. This piece of evidence is cited in editorials by the Journal (1/31/23, 1/13/23) and the Financial Times (3/19/23, 1/10/23).

One solution to the deficit is raising the retirement age. Another is raising taxes. Oddly enough, the editorials cited above almost universally fail to mention the second option.

The only editorial board to bring up the possibility of raising taxes is the Financial Times’ (1/10/23), which comments, “Macron has rightly ruled out raising taxes or rescinding tax breaks since France’s tax share of GDP is already 45%, the second-highest in the OECD after Denmark.”

This statement says much more about the Times than it does about the reasonableness of raising taxes. Oxfam France (1/18/23) has estimated that a mere 2% tax on the wealth of French billionaires could eliminate the projected pension deficit. Rescinding three tax cuts that Macron’s government passed and that largely benefit the wealthy could free up €16 billion each year. That would plug the pension system’s projected deficit with money left over.

Which option you pick—increasing taxes on the wealthy or raising the retirement age—depends entirely on who you want to bear the costs of shoring up the pension system. Do you want the wealthy to sacrifice a little? Or do you want to ratchet up the suffering of lower-income folks a bit? Are you on the side of the rich, or the poor and working class? The editorial boards of these major newspapers have made their allegiance clear.

Rightwing legal activist accused of misusing $73m from non-profit groups

Leonard Leo, a rightwing legal activist, has raked in more than $73m over six years from non-profit groups that may be diverting money illegally to his businesses, according to a watchdog complaint seen by the Guardian.

Leo is a hugely influential figure said to have been the chief curator of supreme court nominees when Donald Trump was US president. The devout Catholic is a staunch opponent of abortion rights.

The Campaign for Accountability, a non-profit watchdog organisation based in Washington, has called for an investigation into seven non-profit groups linked to Leo that it said may be misusing millions of dollars for the personal benefit of insiders – a violation of their tax-exempt status.

On Wednesday, the watchdog filed an Internal Revenue Service (IRS) complaint dissecting six years of filings from the Leo-affiliated organisations and presenting an accounting of more than $73m paid to his for-profit businesses.

The document concludes that Leo “caused” several recently formed non-profits “to pay him (directly or indirectly) more than $73m over a six-year period from 2016 through 2021”.It adds that there is some evidence to suggest Leo’s for-profit businesses, BH Group and CRC Advisors, which received millions of dollars for alleged consulting, research or public relations services, “may have either not have provided those services at all or may have provided services at a level not commensurate with the payments received”.

Should Clarence Thomas Be Impeached? GOP Megadonor Gave Justice Free Luxury Vacations for 20 Years

Clarence Thomas faces impeachment calls after reports of undisclosed gifts

Clarence Thomas, the most conservative justice on the US supreme court, is facing renewed calls for impeachment after it was reported that for two decades he has accepted undisclosed luxury gifts from a Republican mega-donor.

Thomas may have violated financial disclosure rules when he failed to disclose travel on yachts and jets and other gifts funded by the property billionaire Harlan Crow and uncovered by ProPublica.

It found that Thomas flies on Crow’s Bombardier Global 5000 jet and holidays on Crow’s 162ft super-yacht. He has enjoyed holidays at Crow’s ranch in Texas and joined him at an exclusive all-male California retreat. The justice usually spends about a week each summer at Crow’s private resort in the Adirondack mountains in New York.

The revelations prompted sharp criticism by Democrats of Thomas, who after 31 years is the longest-serving justice and an influential voice in the rightwing majority that last year ended the right to abortion.

Dick Durbin, a Democrat from Illinois and chair of the Senate judiciary committee, said: “This behavior is simply inconsistent with the ethical standards the American people expect of any public servant, let alone a justice on the supreme court.

Trump Prosecution Is A Distraction From Looming Economic Crisis

Harvard professor lobbied SEC on behalf of oil firm that pays her lavishly, emails show

The Harvard environmental law professor at the centre of a conflict-of-interest row lobbied the regulator on behalf of the oil and gas company that pays her more than $350,000 a year, a new investigation can reveal.

Emails seen by the Guardian and the Bureau of Investigative Journalism (TBIJ) show that Jody Freeman facilitated a meeting between a director at the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and ConocoPhillips, one of the world’s worst polluters that is pushing to weaken forthcoming climate regulations. The company’s Willow drilling project in Alaska was recently approved by the Biden administration, despite scientists warning it will be catastrophic for global heating.

Freeman, who has served on the ConocoPhillips board since 2012, vouched for two of the fossil-fuel company’s executives in emails in 2021, which she signed off as a Harvard law professor. Failing to disclose her position at the company appears to breach university policy.

Freeman told the Guardian that she requested the meeting on behalf of a Harvard colleague, another law professor who was also an SEC director at the time, and that her intervention did not violate conflict-of-interest rules. She insisted her role as director of the oil and gas company was “common knowledge”.

But disclosure of the emails has triggered fresh calls for Freeman to cut ties with ConocoPhillips amid mounting anger at the corrupting influence of the fossil-fuel industry on US university campuses.

Greenhouse gas emissions rose at ‘alarming’ rate last year, US data shows

Record temperatures, devastating floods and superstorms are causing death and destruction across the planet but humans are failing to cut greenhouse gas emissions fueling the climate emergency, new US data shows.

Atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide (CO2), methane and nitrous oxide – the greenhouse gases emitted by human activity that are the most significant contributors to global heating – continued to increase rapidly during 2022, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa). Carbon dioxide levels rose by more than two parts per million (ppm) for the 11th consecutive year: the highest sustained rate of CO2 increases since monitoring began 65 years ago. Before 2013, scientists had never recorded three consecutive years of such high CO2 growth.

Atmospheric CO2 is now 50% higher than pre-industrial levels.

The 2022 methane rise was the fourth-largest since records began in 1983, following record growth in 2021 and 2022, and now stands at an average of 1,912 parts per billion (ppb). Methane is a potent greenhouse gas less abundant than CO₂ but which warms the Earth’s atmosphere much faster, and today is responsible for about 25% of the heat trapped by all greenhouse gases.

Methane levels in the atmosphere are now more than two and a half times their pre-industrial level. The oil and gas sector is the largest industrial source of methane, which can also cause medical complications, fires and even engine failure leading helicopters to fall out of the sky.

Levels of nitrous oxide, the third-most significant anthropogenic greenhouse gas, are now 24% higher than pre–industrial levels, following a 1.25ppb rise last year.

A US city received $500,000 to remove lead pipes – and still hasn’t spent it

In 2018, almost 30 cities across New York state received federal money to carry out a specific, urgent task: removing lead service lines that poison drinking water. The city of Troy – which sits across the Hudson River and just north of Albany – was among them, receiving $500,000. But five years later, city leaders have failed to spend a single dollar of that money, and have yet to remove a single lead pipe.

The revelation blew up at a city council meeting this winter, raising all sorts of questions. Chief among them is why the city hasn’t spent the money. ...

For almost five years, hardly anyone in Troy knew that there was $516,565 languishing in the city’s coffers, when it could have been funding crucial public health work. That was until late last year, when a Troy mother, Jona Favreau, started asking questions. She found out that her child had elevated levels of lead in his blood, due to what she discovered were lead pipes in her home. Lead is a toxin that can stunt neurological development in children and cause a host of brain, kidney, and heart problems in adults. She contacted the city, and managed to find out about the grant funding, but couldn’t understand why it hadn’t been spent.

She eventually connected with the non-profit Environmental Advocates NY (EANY), which dug into the matter and realized Troy was the sole outlier among the other grant recipients that had long since leveraged the funds. “There was no good reason not to spend this money,” said Rob Hayes, director of clean water with EANY. Hayes submitted a report to the Troy city council on 2 February, outlining the non-profit’s findings. The public outcry was swift; soon, concerned Troy residents rallied outside city hall, demanding bold action from the administration.

At first, the only thing that Troy’s mayor, Patrick Madden, offered were excuses. At a city council meeting in early February, the mayor claimed the city was still setting up criteria to decide who would get the money first, and working on an inventory of the lead pipes. (At issue are not the city-owned water mains, which do not contain lead, but the service lines that connect homes to the city system.) ...

After the acrimony in February, the Troy city council approved a new plan in March to remove lead pipes. ... Troy officials have now committed to replacing every lead service line in the city, at no cost to residents or homeowners.

Also of Interest

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

Waiting for that Too-Much-Discussed Ukraine Counteroffensive

Is Netanyahoo (Again) Looking For War?

Australian opposition refuses to back constitutional recognition of Indigenous people

A Little Night Music

Koko Taylor - Queen Bee

Koko Taylor - I' m a Woman

Koko Taylor - Honky Tonky

Muddy Waters & Koko Taylor - I Got What It Takes (Live)

Koko Taylor - The Blues Never Die

Koko Taylor - Spoonful

Koko Taylor - Black Nights

Koko Taylor - Twenty Nine Ways

Koko Taylor - Let The Good Times Roll