caucus99percent

free-range politics, organic community

Kyle Knight and Neela Goshal have written an interesting essay on the rights...or lack of same...of transgender people around the world.

The process is as universal as it gets: when a baby is born, a doctor, parent, or birth attendant announces the arrival of a “girl” or “boy.” That split-second assignment dictates multiple aspects of our lives. It is also something that most of us never question.

But some people’s gender evolves differently, and might not fit rigid traditional notions of female or male.

That should have no bearing on whether someone can enjoy fundamental rights. But for transgender people it does—to a humiliating, violent, and sometimes lethal degree.

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Tuesday February 15, 1916
Butte, Montana - Miners Trapped by Fire, Rescue Attempts Ongoing

Newspapers across the nation this morning are reporting on the fire which erupted last night in the Pennsylvania Mine at Butte, Montana. We offer a few examples:

From Salina, Kansas:

PENNED IN BY FIRE
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Flames In Airshaft of Anaconda Mine
Imprisoned Miners At Butte.
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TEN VICTIMS KNOWN DEAD
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Other Workmen Have Not Been Heard From
Since the Disaster.
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Butte, Mont., Feb. 15.-At least ten miners lost their lives in a fire which started last night in the air shaft on the 12,000 [1200] foot level of a mine of the Anaconda copper Mining Company and which still was burning early today....

Pennsylvania Mine, about 1900
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From Working in These Times of Feb 9, 2016-

“On Bill and Hillary Clinton’s First Date in 1971, They Crossed a Picket Line”
by Zach Schwartz-Weinstein

According to the above article, Hillary Rodham and Bill Clinton, young law students at Yale, were members of the student’s Committee for Local 35 and their signatures were on a statement of support for the union a week before the strike.

If you thought the political and humanitarian situation in Syria couldn't be any worse, you are about to be proven horribly wrong.
Unless several nation pull back from the brink right now, the Syrian Civil War is about to turn into a region-wide war that could plunge much of the Muslim world into open warfare, and could possibly even lead to a military confrontation between Russia and NATO.
Yes, it really is that dangerous.

I was provoked into writing this piece by a diary which discussed Supreme Court review of some sort of proposed regulation of carbon emissions from coal plants.

Henry Tadebois is a 24-year-old trans man from Melbourne. He works as a train conductor.

Henty has created this wonderfully humorous video to explain his circumstances to his family and friends:

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Monday February 14, 1916
From the International Socialist Review: Frank Bohn on Preparedness

In the February edition of the Review, Comrade Bohn offered some thoughts on the issue of preparedness:

PREPAREDNESS

A Speech Delivered at Carnegie Hall, New York, Jan. 5th, 1916
By FRANK BOHN
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I wished every American would see this movie.

Alan Grayson is running to win Marco Rubio's senate seat, and he's leading the polls by a significant amount.
And the Democratic Party establishment can't stand it!

Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia found dead this morning in his room at a resort in rural Texas. It appears that his death was from natural causes.
He arrived at the resort Friday. He was 79 years old, had been on the Supreme Court since 1986. There have been few details released as of this afternoon.