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The Evening Blues - 5-28-26

Submitted by joe shikspack on Thu, 05/28/2026 - 4:17pm


eb1pt12

The day's news roundup + tonight's musical feature: Gil Scott-Heron

Hey! Good Evening!

This evening's music features blues poet Gil Scott-Heron. Enjoy!

Gil Scott Heron – "B" Movie

Just how blind will America be?
(There ain't no telling)
The world is on the edge of its seat
Defeat on the horizon. Very surprising
That we all could see the plot
And claimed that we could not...
(All right)
Just how blind, America?
Just as Vietnam exploded in the rice, snap, crackle, and pop
Could not stop people determined to be free
Just how blind will America be?

How long will the citizens sit and wait?
It's looking like Europe in '38
Did they move to stop Hitler before it was too late?
(No)
How long, America, before the consequences of
Keeping the school systems segregated
Allowing the press to be intimidated
Watching the price of everything soar
And hearing complaints ‘cause the rich want more?

-- Gil Scott-Heron

News and Opinion

If Israel Receives Immense Support, It’s Going To Receive Immense Criticism

One of the more asinine liberal Zionist talking points is conceding that you are technically allowed to criticize Israel while insisting that it veers into antisemitism if you place more emphasis on Israel’s abuses than on abuses in other countries.

If you believe Israel is worthy of disproportionately high levels of support, then you must necessarily also concede that it is worthy of disproportionately high levels of criticism.

You cannot simultaneously claim that it is appropriate and normal for the United States to be gifting billions of dollars in weaponry to Israel, AND that Americans should pay no more attention to Israel’s humanitarian abuses than those seen in places like Sudan or the DRC.

You cannot simultaneously claim that it is right and good for the governments of the western world to unite behind Israel’s relentless warmongering and provide it with myriad forms of military support, diplomatic cover and mass media apologia, AND claim it is a sign of prejudice against Jews for you to place more emphasis on Israel’s acts of military aggression than on those of Russia.

You cannot simultaneously claim that it is fine and correct for western governments to be aggressively stomping out free speech that is critical of Israel in the name of combatting “antisemitism”, AND insist that we should pay as much attention to the Israel lobby as we give to the lobbyists of nations like Qatar.

You can’t make support for Israel absolutely central to the foreign and domestic policies of my nation’s government, AND tell me that Israel should not be a special focal point of my scrutiny and opposition. You can do one or the other with logical coherence, but you can’t do both.

It’s fine if you want to try to argue that Israel is a super duper mega important ally whose fate is inseparable from the fate of my own country, but you don’t get to then turn around and also tell me I should place no more emphasis on its violence and abuses than on those of nations like Iran or North Korea. That’s not a thing.

If my rulers are going to insist on supporting Israel’s nonstop wars, assaulting my free speech rights in order to defend Israeli information interests, and allowing obscenely powerful lobby groups to manipulate my government for the benefit of Israel, then Israel is going to receive a disproportionate amount of attention from me, because there is no other nation on earth for whom all of these things are being done.

There is no valid argument to the contrary.

COL. Douglas Macgregor : Iran Stronger Now; Putin Takes Off the Gloves

Trump accuses Iran of stalling peace deal to ‘outwait’ him until US midterms

Donald Trump has accused Iran of trying to stall on making a peace agreement by running down the clock before November’s US midterm elections in the hope of getting better terms. “They thought they were going to outwait me, you know, ‘we’ll outwait him, he’s got the midterms’,” the US president told a meeting of his cabinet at the White House on Wednesday. He insisted the approach – supposedly aimed at ratcheting up pressure on the US and global economies by keeping the strategically vital strait of Hormuz closed – would fail, and claimed that Iran “wants very much to make a deal”.

“I don’t care about the midterms, look what happened last night,” Trump said, an apparent reference to the triumph of Ken Paxton, whom he had endorsed, over the sitting Republican senator John Cornyn in the Texas Republican Senate primary.

Trump said the Iranian economy was in freefall, suggesting that made it imperative for Iran to compromise: “They have 250% inflation, their money has no value, their whole economic system is broken down.” His comments, at the 12th cabinet meeting of Trump’s second term, came as talks aimed at ending the near-three-month conflict are said to be at a crucial stage. Current attempts to reach a deal had so far failed, he claimed, because “we’re not satisfied with it. But we will be,” the president added. “Either that, or we will just have to finish the job.”

Asked whether he would agree to a short-term deal that allowed Iran and Oman to be in control of the strait of Hormuz, Trump replied: “The strait is going to be open to everybody. Nobody is going to control it. We’ll watch over it , but nobody is going to control it. That’s part of the negotiation that we have. They would like to control it. It’s international waters and Oman will behave just like everybody else, or we will have to blow them up.”

At one stage, Trump appeared to contradict himself after renewing his call on Arab allies including Saudi Arabia and Qatar to sign the Abraham accords granting full diplomatic recognition of Israel. “I think those countries owe to us … I don’t think we should make a deal if they don’t sign,” he said. But he retreated when asked whether the Iran agreement was contingent on more countries joining the accords – which were signed by the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan and Morocco during his first presidency – saying: “I don’t want to say that. I’m not going to give you what’s contingent.”

COL. Lawrence Wilkerson : What Remains of International Law?


Lebanese Cities Face ‘Direct Threat of Israeli Occupation’ as IDF Orders 200,000 People to Evacuate

The Israel Defense Forces’ intensified its bombardment of the southern Lebanese city of Tyre on Wednesday just two hours after ordering the evacuation of 200,000 area residents, further violating a US-brokered ceasefire and stoking fears of Israeli occupation and even colonization.

The IDF ordered the entire city of Tyre and surrounding areas, including Palestinian refugee camps, to immediately flee north of the Zahrani River. Israeli bombing of Tyre has caused considerable damage to the UNESCO World Heritage site and one of the world’s oldest continuously inhabited cities.

“Our villages have been systematically razed over these past months, and now the cities themselves are in the crosshairs,” Lebanese journalist Ali Hashem said on X.


IDF Arabic language spokesperson Avichay Adraee said on X Wednesday that “in light of the terrorist Hezbollah party’s violation of the ceasefire agreement and targeting of Israeli territory, the Israel Defense Forces are compelled to act forcefully against it.”

While Hezbollah has launched drones, rockets, and attacks against Israeli troops, the militant resistance group says they are responses to Israeli violations of the April 16 ceasefire. IDF attacks have killed more than 700 Lebanese, including many women and children, since the truce took effect, despite US President Donald Trump telling Israel that such strikes are “PROHIBITED.”

“The Israel Defense Forces do not intend to harm you,” Adraee’s message continued. “Your presence near Hezbollah elements, their facilities, or their combat means puts your lives at risk. Any building used by Hezbollah for military purposes may be subject to targeting.”

“To ensure your safety, evacuate your homes immediately and move north beyond the Zahrani River,” the order warns. “Be advised—any movement south of the Zahrani River may put your lives at risk.”

Adraee’s warning came as Lebanese communities reeled under intensified airstrikes that have killed or wounded scores of people across southern Lebanon since Tuesday.

Israel has been accused of ethnic cleansing as its forces raze entire villages in southern Lebanon, drawing comparisons to Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza, which has left more than 250,000 Palestinians dead, maimed, or missing, and around 2 million people forcibly displaced, starved, or sickened.

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said in March that Lebanese people displaced north of the Litani River would not be allowed to return to their homes—many of which have been looted by IDF troops—until people living in northern Israel are secure from Hezbollah rocket and drone threats.

The IDF has also extended its so-called “Yellow Line” in Lebanon, which it designated largely along the Litani River, in an effort to counter Hezbollah drone attacks that have killed or wounded at least scores of Israeli invaders.

Some observers fear another prolonged Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon, as happened for 18 years late last century. IDF troops briefly occupied the capital city of Beirut in 1982 and did not withdraw from southern Lebanon until 2000.

Others fear even worse, including the possible Israeli colonization of parts of Lebanon in pursuit of realizing a “Greater Israel” stretching from the Nile River in Egypt to the Euphrates in Iraq, land many religious Jews believe was promised to them by their deity figure.

Earlier this month, Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir revealed the existence of a “settlement plan” for southern Lebanon. This, after Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich asserted that “the Litani must be our new border.”

Such Israeli expansion would likely include the permanent ethnic cleansing of hundreds of thousands of Lebanese, similar to the 1947-49 forced expulsion of Palestinians during the Nakba, or “catastrophe,” a period of terrorist attacks, massacres, and death marches perpetrated by Jewish militias during the establishment of the modern state of Israel.

The International Criminal Court is believed to be seeking the arrest of Ben-Gvir and Smotrich in connection with the ethnic cleansing and settler colonization of the illegally occupied West Bank. The Hague-based tribunal has already issued warrants for the arrest of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

While negotiators from the United States, Iran, and mediating nations seek to achieve a lasting halt to hostilities in the Middle East, Israeli leaders have been actively working against peace. Addressing the prospect of a peace agreement, Ben-Gvir vowed during a Tuesday press briefing that “we will not allow this to happen.”

US, Iran EXCHANGE FIRE As Trump Threatens To 'Blow Up' OMAN

Ro Khanna Urges Fellow Democrats to Stop Trying to Out Hawk Trump on Iran War

Congressman Ro Khanna on Tuesday suggested Democratic voters who believe the party lacks “principles,” as a number of respondents said in a new poll, have understandable questions about what Democrats stands for, as he denounced recent comments from several lawmakers who have attacked President Donald Trump for not being hawkish enough when it comes to the war he started in Iran.

“People want a Democratic Party that’s going to stand for things, that stands as the party that’s anti-war,” Khanna told Chris Hayes on MS NOW.

“And we should be the party that says, ‘Donald Trump, end this war, we’re going to support the negotiation’—and then we’re going to not get into these wars in the future,” he added.

Khanna accused his colleagues of sending the message: “Donald Trump, go blow up more things! Why aren’t you destroying more of Iran?”

“I’m not one of those Democrats,” said the congressman, who introduced a war powers resolution with Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) to stop Trump from launching unauthorized strikes against Iran. “I’m one of the people saying, ‘Yes, let’s get a negotiated settlement. Let’s work toward ending this war.’”

“The Democrats should be for ending this war and be against more of these foreign interventions,” said Khanna. “The last thing we want is to goad Donald Trump into getting us into more conflict there.”


As examples of what Khanna is talking about, influential Democrats including Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) and Sens. Cory Booker (D-NJ) and Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) have spent the last several days provoking the president over Iran, and by complaining that the deal to end the war isn’t tough enough on the country, which the US and Israel began preemptively attacking in February in violation of international law.

More than 3,400 people have been killed in Iran since the war started, while Israel has expanded hostilities to Lebanon, killing more than 3,000 people. The casualties in Iran have included about 150 people, mostly children, who were killed in an attack on a girls’ school when the war started; Amnesty International has called for the US to be held to account for the bombing. A number of other schools have also been attacked, as well as medical facilities.

Despite the carnage—as well as the economic impact of war, which Iran swiftly responded to by effectively closing the Strait of Hormuz, a key oil shipping route, and sending oil prices skyrocketing—Booker on Sunday debuted what Just Foreign Policy executive director Erik Sperling called “Democrat neocon talking points” regarding reports of an impending peace deal.

The senator said reports of the deal—including the reopening of the strait, a lift of US sanctions allowing Iran to sell oil freely, and an apparent agreement to hold formal talks on Iran’s nuclear program later—had him “outraged.”

“The president said he went into this to deal with the nuclear program. This does not deal with that,” said Booker, adding that the easing of sanctions of Iran would allow them to get “billions more” dollars.

“Giving Iran more money, as he has said, will allow them to do things like fuel their terrorist proxies,” the senator added.

His comments were followed by Wasserman Schultz’s interview on the same network Tuesday, when she said she was “concerned and frustrated over, again, another potential deal, a negotiation for a negotiation, where we’re going to unfreeze Iranian assets” and allowing Iran to “rebuild their ballistic missile program.”


Booker has taken more than $800,000 from pro-Israel groups including the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, while Wasserman Schultz has taken more than $1.4 million.

Murphy also condemned the reported deal on social media Sunday, saying that Trump “hasn’t accomplished ANY of his constantly shifting goals.”

“Iran still has its ballistic missile and drone program,” he said. “They still have a navy that can close the strait. A hardline regime is still in charge.”

Jeet Heer of The Nation said that because the war on Iran “is immensely unpopular... prominent Democrats want to outflank Trump by being more hawkish.”

Historian and analyst Stephen Wertheim credited Khanna with articulating “what the vast majority of Democrats believe, but too few of their leaders say and mean.”

A March poll by Pew Research Center found that nearly 90% of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents said the Trump administration had made the wrong decision going to war against Iran.

Khanna also spoke to Fox News over the weekend, saying he would support all efforts by Trump to negotiate a peace deal with Iran and expressing approval of the president’s apparent rejection of the “Lindsay Graham wing of the party,” referring to the South Carolina Republican, an outspoken advocate for military intervention in Iran and elsewhere.

Khanna’s comments, said Sperling, represented “what decent, pro-diplomacy messaging looks like.”

Israel Is Escalating Before US Backing Collapses

Israeli military tells residents of swathe of southern Lebanon to leave

Israel’s military has told residents across a swathe of southern Lebanon to leave and head north, as the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said his forces were escalating their offensive against Hezbollah. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said in a post on social media that all areas south of the Zahrani River, which runs about 40 kilometres (25 miles) north of the de facto Israel-Lebanon border, were considered combat zones.

“In light of the repeated violations of the ceasefire agreement by the terrorist organisation Hezbollah, the IDF will act against it with great force,” the military’s Arabic-language spokesman, Avichay Adraee, wrote on X. The warning late on Wednesday was the first since a ceasefire that took effect on 17 April, and came a day after Israel launched more than 120 airstrikes against Lebanon in one of the heaviest days of bombing in weeks.

The ceasefire brokered by the US last month now appears close to total collapse, complicating negotiations to bring a definitive end to the US-Israeli war with Iran. Tehran, which has a close relationship with Hezbollah, has repeatedly signalled that an end to Israel’s offensive in Lebanon is a condition of any deal with Washington. Observers said Israeli officials and military commanders wanted to inflict as much damage as possible on Hezbollah before a deal between Tehran and Washington imposed new limits on or stopped the current offensive.

Israel’s military said it targeted 100 sites linked to Hezbollah across southern Lebanon and the eastern Bekaa valley area, including storage facilities, command centres and observation points that Israeli officials say are used to attack troops and residents in northern Israel.

John Mearsheimer: Russia Bombing Kyiv Not Enough, Escalation Will Be Required

Zelensky Panic Begs Trump Help As Kiev AD Runs Out; Russia Confirms Oreshnik To Destroy Kiev Bunkers


Forget the WH hype: Oil to $180/bbl by Year's End w/Art Berman & Lt Col Daniel Davis

New York food co-op votes to boycott Israeli products after contentious campaign

Members of a storied food co-operative in Brooklyn have voted to boycott about a dozen products from Israel and Israeli settlements in occupied Palestine – capping years of contentious debate over a conflict half a world away that has threatened to rip apart a landmark institution for liberal New Yorkers. The Park Slope Food Coop vote, which took place Tuesday night during a three-hour virtual meeting attended by about 7,000 of the co-operative’s 17,000 members, follows months of dueling campaigning that one local rabbi opposed to the boycott described as a “proxy war”. The boycott is supposed to impact some brands of tahini, peppers and persimmons as well as other products. Sixty-seven percent of participants voted in favor of the boycott.

What may seem like a trivial squabble of little significance beyond the largely privileged community the co-op serves has become yet another microcosm of the deep rifts over Israel that the war in Gaza has exacerbated. The pro-boycott faction – led by Park Slope Food Coop Members in Solidarity with Palestine, and endorsed by more than two dozen advocacy groups including several Jewish ones – argued that the boycott is in line with the co-op’s long history of socially conscious shopping, and cited past boycotts of products from apartheid South Africa, and Chile under the Augusto Pinochet regime, as well as of several companies over their anti-labor or environmental practices.

The debate has drawn attention well beyond the co-op, which was founded in 1973 and has been the subject of numerous satirical portrayals over its stringent membership requirements and perceived self-importance. Dan Goldman and Brad Lander, two Democrats locked in a congressional primary race in which Israel is also playing a central role, have both weighed in against the vote (although Lander made clear he was not telling people how to vote). Others, like Palestinian advocate and Brooklyn resident Mahmoud Khalil, have defended the boycott movement as the minimum response to Israel “slaughtering civilians and committing human rights violations daily”.

Canada to order military plane fleet from Sweden in shift from US suppliers

Canada has announced plans to buy a fleet of early warning planes from Sweden’s Saab rather than a competing option from Boeing, as the country seeks to reduce reliance on US defense firms. Mark Carney, the prime minister, said on Wednesday that Canada would opt for Saab’s GlobalEye, which is based on Bombardier’s Global 6500 jet. Boeing’s E-7 Wedgetail plane – which has suffered from delays and cost overruns – had also been in contention.

“With a suite of advanced sensors and mission systems, Saab’s GlobalEye will be a key resource for the Canadian armed forces to detect and deter threats across the Arctic,” Carney told a defense conference in Ottawa. The prime minister pledged in March that Canada would take full responsibility for protecting its vast Arctic territory, after relying on decades on a partnership with the US to monitor its more than 4.4m sq km (1.7m sq miles) of land and sea, a territory larger than India.

Although Carney did not give details of the fleet size or the cost of a potential contract, military officials had earlier said they were looking to buy six early warning aircraft. Philippe Lagasse, associate director of international affairs at Ottawa’s Carleton University, said Canada’s decision to buy the GlobalEye planes was “an important test case for the Carney government’s policy of pivoting away from American military capability”.

Trump administration has paid $20bn in tariff refunds, with $65bn more to come

US importers are expected to receive $85bn in tariff refunds after the supreme court struck down Donald Trump’s tariffs in February, according to US Customs and Border Protection (CBP), the agency that collects tariffs. Importers and shippers have so far been refunded $20bn, according to court documents filed on Tuesday, with about $65bn more on the way.

After months of uncertainty and higher costs, American businesses largely welcomed the supreme court’s ruling that Trump overstepped his authority in enacting sweeping tariffs, including a baseline 10% tariff on all imports. It was the first time the highest court overruled Trump’s policies in his second term.

For nearly a year, many businesses across the US, ranging from whisky distilleries in Kentucky to giant corporations, have been reeling from the gut-punch of Trump’s signature tariffs. Walmart reported last year that it had to increase its prices, while Jim Beam, a bourbon maker, announced that it would close its distillery for a year as the industry navigated volatility brought on by the tariffs.

Though the court did not specify in its ruling whether businesses would be entitled to a refund, many major retailers and associations, including the US National Retail Federation and the US Chamber of Commerce, said they would pursue a swift return of the $133bn in tariffs that were covered by the court’s ruling.

‘Lawyers Have Been Disbarred for Less’: Ethics Complaint Skewers Former Trump AG Pam Bondi

The former chief justice of the Florida Supreme Court filed an ethics complaint against former US Attorney General Pam Bondi on Wednesday, accusing her of fostering an “environment of lawlessness” inside the Department of Justice.

The 23-page complaint, submitted to the Florida Bar, accuses Bondi, who was fired in April by President Donald Trump, of having “engaged in what appears to be serious professional misconduct” and violating her professional responsibilities during her time leading the DOJ.

The complaint was filed by Peggy Quince, who retired from the bench in 2019 after serving on the state’s high court for two decades. She was joined by a group of legal ethics organizations, including the group Lawyers Defending American Democracy (LDAD), where she now sits on the board. The complaint is also backed by over 100 legal scholars and retired judges.

“As the former chief justice of this state’s highest court, there are key principles that we must protect,” Quince said. “First, whatever legal position you have achieved, you are still bound to follow the Rules of Professional Conduct. All lawyers are alike in that regard, and no one lawyer is above the law. Second, the Florida Bar and the Florida Supreme Court have a duty to ensure that lawyers adhere to all applicable rules. That should be the baseline minimum for this profession.”

“The attorney general has the awesome responsibility to set a national example of ethical behavior—and to ensure that DOJ lawyers live up to that standard,” said James W. Conrad, Jr., an LDAD volunteer and a principal author of the complaint. “From her first day as attorney general, Bondi did just the opposite, personally and repeatedly violating ethical standards and coercing Department lawyers into violating their own professional responsibilities if they wanted to keep their jobs.”

Citing a memo she signed on her first day on the job directing DOJ employees to engage in “zealous advocacy” for the policy set by the “chief executive,” the complaint accuses Bondi of having fostered a “fall-in-line-or-be-gone” attitude within the department that measured success only by serving the interests of Trump.

As a result, it said employees “were induced to engage in acts they were ethically forbidden from doing, under threat of suspension or termination—or were fired for not doing so.”

The complaint highlights the DOJ’s “blatant violations” of the Epstein Files Transparency Act by failing to release large numbers of files, and overredacting ones that referenced powerful individuals—including Trump—while exposing sensitive information about more than 100 alleged survivors of the sex offender’s abuse, including nude photos of some.

Under Bondi’s watch, the complaint also says DOJ lawyers violated an “unprecedented number” of binding court orders, particularly in cases related to the unlawful detention of immigrants.

It cites a list created by Patrick J. Schiltz, the Chief Judge of the US District Court for Minnesota, which found that during US Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) “Operation Metro Surge,” the agency had violated 96 orders in a single month. A tally from another judge in New Jersey found between 52 and 72 violations within just two months.

In these cases, where ICE ignored orders to provide legal hearings, release detainees, or not remove them from the district, the complaint said Bondi took “no apparent action” to make the agency obey the law.

The complaint also accuses Bondi of directing employees to bring cases against Trump’s political and personal enemies without probable cause, in direct response to the president’s political pressure.

It cites Bondi’s appointment of the inexperienced prosecutor Lindsey Halligan as US attorney to go after figures hated by Trump, like New York Attorney General Letitia James and former FBI Director James Comey, after previous prosecutors balked at bringing charges due to lack of evidence. After Halligan’s appointment was ruled to be improper, a judge threw out the indictments, though the DOJ has attempted to bring new charges.

A grand jury also declined the DOJ’s attempts to bring felony charges against six Democratic congresspeople who made a video reminding members of the military that they could disobey unlawful orders issued by the president.

It also accuses Bondi’s DOJ of attempting to hit anti-ICE protesters with vague and flimsy charges, like the man who was charged with felony assault for throwing a sandwich at a Customs and Border Protection Officer and was ultimately acquitted.

“Bondi repeatedly ignored her ethical obligations,” said Virginia Canter, chief counsel and director of anti-corruption and ethics at Democracy Defenders Fund, another group backing the complaint. “She was responsible for releasing sensitive information about Epstein victims, shielding documents in the Epstein files from the American public, violating court orders, and charging citizens for crimes without probable cause. This warrants an investigation and action—lawyers have been disbarred for less.”

Trump administration ‘drawing up plans’ to stop processing international flights in sanctuary cities

The Trump administration has threatened to stop processing international flights in major cities around the country as a reaction to protests against immigration enforcement. Markwayne Mullin, the homeland security secretary, said during an interview with Fox News on Tuesday that the administration is “drawing up plans” to take the action, in response to days of clashes at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center in New Jersey.

They plan to withdraw immigration processing services at cities with so-called sanctuary laws, which ban or limit local police from cooperating with federal immigration enforcement. He questioned the provision of federal immigration services at Newark Liberty international airport while Democratic lawmakers were showing up and joining demonstrators in criticizing conditions inside the Delaney Hall ICE facility in Newark.

Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) that provide security and immigration processing at airports are, along with ICE, part of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).

“If they’re going to not allow us to go out and arrest the ‘worst of the worst’… then why are we processing international flights into the airport there?” Mullin asked in the Fox interview, adding that they are “currently drawing up plans to say: Listen, in these sanctuary cities, where the local radical left Democrats aren’t allowing us to do our job and enforce federal laws – then we shouldn’t be processing international flights into their cities, either.”

Sanctuary policies do not prevent ICE operations but rather limit some collaborations between local officials and the federal immigration enforcement agency.

‘We are not criminals’: protests erupt as hunger strike rocks New Jersey ICE jail

Protests against immigration enforcement at a facility where detainees are on a hunger and labor strike erupted in fresh violence on Tuesday night as federal officers sprayed chemicals and charged demonstrators outside the jail in New Jersey. Following hours of relative quiet, a day after masked and armored Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) personnel pepper-sprayed US senator Andy Kim, tensions ramped up again outside the Delaney Hall facility on the fifth day of the strike.

At one point on Tuesday evening, a protester who threw something at ICE officers was chased by dozens of officials, tased and then carried into the jail. The Newark-based ICE facility is operated by the Geo Group, one of the biggest private prison companies in the US. According to activists and detainees, between 300 and 400 detainees are participating in the strike, demanding improved food, ventilation and medical care – and for their immigration cases to proceed.

The hunger and work strike and protests come as the Trump administration continues its controversial, aggressive and increasingly unpopular mass deportation campaign, targeting immigrants nationwide to detain and deport them. A letter from detainees was published by advocates on Tuesday morning. Two men recently released from Delaney confirmed in interviews with the Guardian their participation in the strike, despite denials by the Trump administration that any such strike was happening.

“We are detained, we are on hunger strike, demanding due process rights and the improvement of conditions,” one of the men said in an interview with the Guardian. “We are not criminals. We are people who enter [the facility] with a clean record. We pay our taxes. [We are] Fathers. Mothers. Spouses of citizens with existing petitions.”


the horse race


Platner Opens Up 9-Point Lead Even After Pro-Collins PAC Spends Millions on Negative Ads

Graham Platner, the presumptive Democratic nominee for the US Senate in Maine, has opened up a nine-point lead over incumbent Republican Sen. Susan Collins, according to a poll released Wednesday by the University of New Hampshire.

In a head-to-head matchup, the poll shows Platner gaining 51% of the vote, compared to 42% for Collins (R-Maine).

A February UNH poll showed Platner with an 11-point lead over Collins, although that survey left Platner just short of getting 50% of voters.

In 2020, polls universally showed Collins trailing against Democratic nominee Sara Gideon, although those same polls also rarely showed Gideon reaching or exceeding the 50% threshold.

The UNH poll is the second major poll released since Platner’s chief rival, Democratic Maine Gov. Janet Mills, suspended her campaign nearly a month ago. Last week, a Pan Atlantic Research survey showed Platner leading Collins by seven percentage points, an increase from a March survey that showed him leading by four points.

Platner’s widening lead comes even as a super political action committee (PAC) supporting Collins has spent millions of dollars in negative ads against the presumptive Democratic nominee, criticizing posts he wrote on Reddit several years ago and his since-covered tattoo of a skull and crossbones resembling an insignia worn by Nazi soldiers.

Semafor politics reporter Dave Weigel argued that the latest polls appear to show that Maine voters “have processed that [Platner is] the Bad Posts and Tat guy already,” and are still supporting his campaign.

Drop Site News co-founder Ryan Grim similarly observed that the latest bad poll for Collins came “after the GOP threw their best... oppo at Platner.”

Massie FILES PAPERWORK For 2028 Run


the evening greens

‘Planetary destruction on fast-forward’: witnessing the disappearance of Indonesia’s ‘eternity glaciers’

An expedition to document the end days of the last tropical glaciers in Oceania has revealed sombre footage of “planetary destruction on fast-forward”. The once-mighty ice sheets on Puncak Jaya, a mountain surrounded by dense rainforests in West Papua, Indonesia, have survived beyond projections they would disappear by 2026 but have shrunk to a fraction of their original size.

The most significant of the two remaining glaciers, which are known locally as “eternal snow” and referred to in English as the “eternity glaciers”, has lost 95% of its area since 2002, the expedition found. “The ice will be gone: it’s not a question of if, it’s a question of when,” said Klaus Thymann, a Danish explorer and the founder of Project Pressure, an environmental charity. “And ‘when’ is coming very, very soon.”

Tropical glaciers are mostly found in the Andes, but also exist in East Africa and Indonesia. They are rapidly losing mass as fossil fuel pollution heats the planet and melts the ice.

Thymann said “it might be weird to have an emotional reaction to an inanimate object” but documenting the loss of the eternity glaciers had left him tearful as he returned to camp after filming on a rare morning of clear skies. “On a philosophical level, you take eternity – something that’s an abstract, human construct – and we are even now killing our own constructs,” he said. “It raises some very interesting questions, I think, around the little speck we are in geological time, and what amount of chaos we’ve managed to do in such little time.”

Papua’s tropical glaciers lost 97% of their ice mass between 1980 and 2024, Indonesian researchers found in a study published last month. Four of its six glaciers have completely disappeared, and they project the final two will be gone by the end of the decade. A separate study published in December used satellite imagery and digitised analogue maps to document a decrease of glacier surface area of more than 99% since 1850, and by about 65% since the last survey in 2018. It reached the same conclusion about the impending disappearance of the glaciers.

Nasa images show wildfire damage to island dubbed ‘Galapagos of California’

Images from a Nasa satellite showcased the devastating scars left behind by a wildfire that consumed roughly a third of Santa Rosa Island, one of the five islands that make up Channel Islands national park off the southern California coast. Taken on 20 May, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (Modis) took the false-color image of the burn area, showing swaths of blackened land.

While the fire is mostly contained, the images drive home the potential lasting impact on the unique ecosystems across the rugged and remote island. Home to scores of rare and threatened species, Santa Rosa Island provides habitat to some plants and animals found nowhere else on earth.

The fire that scorched more than 18,300 acres (7,400 hectares) is believed to be the largest recorded on the island, officials said. The landscapes that evolved separately from California’s mainland are not considered fire-adapted ecosystems, and blazes of this magnitude and size are uncommon here.

While the cause of the fire is still under investigation, according to National Park Service officials, flames were spotted after a sailor crashed his boat onto Santa Rosa Island’s rocky shores and fired flares to seek help. Images shared by the coast guard showed that “SOS” was carved into the charred ground by the 67-year-old man before he was rescued by helicopter.

Attention has now turned to restoration, and how to protect the unique and extraordinary wildlife from further harm. A specialist crew of National Park Service firefighters are conducting fire severity analyses, and will continue monitoring the area to learn more about how ecosystems respond to fire in the long term.

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