One presidential hopeful’s assessment is that the child care system in the U.S. is disastrous. And based on the findings of a new survey, many working parents in the U.S. have reason to agree. The Pew Research Center…
Category: Occupy
“Rupert is a tremendous guy. I think Rupert [who for several years lived in the Trump building on 59th and Park Avenue in Manhattan] is one of the people I really respect and like. And I think Rupert respects what I’ve done.” But what about Murdoch’s grumpy Trump tweets? “When I got into the world of politics, that was a different realm for me and maybe he felt differently. But I think he respects what I’ve done and he’s a tremendous guy and I think we have a very good relationship.”
Extract from Michael Wolff @ the The Hollywood Reporter (01/06/16)
ps. here @ the interpretOr, we note that the ascendancy of both megalomaniacs was facilitated by the late, and by no means great, Roy Cohn, who arranged Murdoch’s first Oval Office meeting with President Ronald Reagan in 1983…
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TOP STORIES THIS WEEK
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| The Secret History of Superdelegates
712 Democratic officials will decide whether Clinton or Sanders wins the nomination. An In These Timesinvestigation shows that’s just what the party planned all along.
BY BRANKO MARCETIC
The private meetings that led to the creation of superdelegates have never been published or made public — until now.
BY IN THESE TIMES EDITORS
The paper seems bent on taking down Bernie.
BY ADAM JOHNSON
Finkelstein’s book is a call for Jewish suffering to be seen as part of the larger history of suffering under colonialism.
BY MAX AJL
A member of the 1982 commission explains why they created superdelegates and what they hoped to prevent.
BY BRANKO MARCETIC
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| WORKING IN THESE TIMES |
| The Verizon Strike Is Not Just About Wages. It Is About Power and Domination Over Workers.
Corporations love the ‘sharing economy’ because it’s built on one thing: greed.
BY ALEX GOUREVITCH
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RURAL AMERICA IN THESE TIMES
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| Big Oil Plots to Exclude Public from Public Land Auctions
Keep It In The Ground is a campaign based on the principle that fossil fuels on public lands must be left inthe ground.
BY STEVE HORN
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Between March 23 and April 2, 2016, Teaching Tolerance surveyed approximately 2,000 teachers, asking them how the presidential campaign was affecting their students and their teaching. The results indicated that the campaign is having a profoundly negative impact on schoolchildren across the country, producing an alarming level of fear and anxiety among children of color and inflaming racial and ethnic tensions in the classroom. Many students worry about being deported. Many educators fear teaching about the election at all.
A synthesis of our survey results make up the content of this report:The Trump Effect: The Impact of the Presidential Campaign on Our Nation’s Schools. A complete listing of the 5,000 survey comment is available here.
excerpts:
“My students are terrified of Donald Trump,” says one teacher from a middle school with a large population of African-American Muslims. “They think that if he’s elected, all black people will get sent back to Africa.”
“A Portland, Oregon, middle school teacher reported that her principal had imposed a “gag order” on teachers, prohibiting them from talking about the election. But the order didn’t stop one of her students from telling an immigrant classmate, “When Trump wins, you and your family will get sent back.” On the survey she posed the question, “What does a teacher do? I can assure you that if a student says that loudly and brazenly in class, far worse is happening in the hallway.”
::: simply click cover pic above to access report in pdf @ teachingtolerance.org :::
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TOP STORIES THIS WEEK
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Iowans have a long history of breaking from party orthodoxy. Our reporting from the state shows that could be good news for Sanders on February 1.
BY THEO ANDERSON
This is what neoliberal governance looks like.
BY JACOB LEDERMAN
Paul Mason, ardent critic of neoliberalism, sees a new epoch ahead.
BY PETER S. GROSVENOR
Why the American Hero trope is so dangerous.
BY SUSAN J. DOUGLAS
New York’s ‘Carwasheros’ Push for Safer, Fairer Workplaces Car washes are the ‘wild, wild West” of workplace regulation. The Car Wash Accountability Act will improve that–if it is ever implemented.
Author Jeff Halper says the usual explanations of Israel’s behavior didn’t make sense to him.
BY MARC DAALDER
It’s no coincidence that Trump, the candidate least in need of money or media attention, is the most outspoken against war.
BY LEONARD C. GOODMAN
The Lessons of Syriza’s Failed Push Against Austerity
Austerity policies haven’t worked in Greece, but neither have the radical Left’s efforts to push back against them.
BY BRANKO MARCETIC
The Newspaper That Transformed Black America–And The Course of History
How an ambitious migrant came to Chicago and changed history with the power of journalism.
BY SALIM MUWAKKIL
The grassroots is taking charge of Sanders’ campaign–and they’re not waiting around for the establishment.
BY JIM HIGHTOWER
What a legacy.
BY JOE CONASON
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| WORKING IN THESE TIMES |
| Bernie Sanders and Unions’ Relationship Status: It’s Complicated
Many union members say Bernie Sanders should be labor’s choice for president. But convincing unions to endorse him isn’t so simple.
BY DAVID MOBERG
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| RURAL AMERICA |
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Communities today face not just the behavior of individual corporations, but a system of law that insulates corporate power from democratic control.
BY THOMAS LINZEY
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TOP STORIES THIS WEEK
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WORKING IN THESE TIMES
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Along with a $1.1 trillion spending bill that will keep government funded…
The Communications Workers of America (CWA) on Thursday endorsed Sen. Bernie…
As climate talks in Paris approach, stakes are high for frontline communities with the most to lose. Yesterday, UNICEF reported that children will suffer the harshest impacts from rising temperatures. Their findings revealed that “over half a billion children live in extremely high flood occurrence zones; nearly 160 million live in high or extremely high drought severity zones.”
The billions of children in these vulnerable areas are also living below the poverty line. Along with death and devastation brought on by climate change impacts, rising temperatures can also contribute to malnutrition, malaria and diarrhea — all of which are deadly to children. With the WMO revealing that this year is the hottest on record, NGOs are turning up the pressure on negotiators to deliver an even stronger deal to “avert these costs for the world’s poorest people.”
Coverage
- Ethiopia: Unicef Says Children Will Bear the Brunt of Climate Change (AllAfrica)
- 690 Million Children At Risk From Impacts Of Climate Change: UNICEF (Tech Times)
- Poor nations face soaring costs if warming limit exceeded – Oxfam (Reuters)
- Oxfam puts the spotlight on adaptation funds ahead of Paris talks (Deutsche Welle)
Tools and Resources
- Press Release: 2015 likely to be Warmest on Record, 2011-2015 Warmest Five Year Period (WMO)
- Press Release: Delays in cutting emissions set to cost developing countries hundreds of billions of dollars more (Oxfam)
- Report: Game-changers in the Paris climate deal (Oxfam)
- Coverage: Children will bear the brunt of climate change – UNICEF report (UN News Centre)
- Op-ed: Paris climate deal needs solidarity on loss and damage (Climate Home)
- Briefing: Community-based adaptation: managing uncertainty (Care International)
- Briefing: Natural catastrophes and climate change (Swiss Re)
- Report: Severe weather in North America (Munich Re)
- Briefing: Climate change and the financial services sector (Allianz)
- Report: Communicating flood risks in a changing climate (Climate Outreach)
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TOP STORIES THIS WEEK
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It is not a radical political vision. It’s an unflinching commitment to democracy.
BY THEO ANDERSON
The response to the Paris attacks should be to bring back class struggle by insisting on global solidarity of the exploited.
BY SLAVOJ ZIZEK
A stint in the slammer convinced the conservative author that liberals are crooks.
Our response to such unspeakable tragedies can’t be to create even more tragedies in other countries.
BY GREGORY SHUPAK
It’s unconscionable that refugees fleeing the horrors of war and poverty are being met with calls for their removal by the counties they are seeking safety in.
Some of Zizek’s ideas about Syrian refugees skirt dangerously closely to the Right’s.
Salaita’s settlement is a victory for him and academic freedom. But will we ever know who was watching him?
BY MARILYN KATZ
A new film traces the history of America’s most famous housing projects.
BY MAYA DUKMASOVA
A fundamental aspect of ISIS’ strategy lies in the necessity of a heavy-handed, reactionary response from the West to further their own narrative, ideology and recruiting.
BY TOM ENGELHARDT
Zionism began as class-oriented project within the Jewish community. Opposing it requires a class analysis of who benefits from Zionism within that community.
BY BENJAMIN BALTHASER
Activists said the reading materials were untested, insensitive and clueless.
BY SARAH LAHM
The greatest threat to Israel’s security today is neither ISIS nor Iran, but its own occupation of Palestine.
BY MARC DAALDER
In order to create a more egalitarian society, we must take back the reins of our government from the billionaire class.
BY BERNIE SANDERS
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| WORKING IN THESE TIMES |
| Security Guards from Chicago’s O’Hare Airport Join One-Day Nationwide Airport Worker Strike
Security guards at O’Hare International Airport in Chicago walk off the job as part of a wave of labor actions at 11 major American airports this week.
BY TOM LADENDORF
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| RURAL AMERICA |
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Industrialized countries are the biggest contributors to global warming, but it is farmers and rural communities that are among the first to suffer from climate change.
BY RURAL AMERICA IN THESE TIMES
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…excerpt from The Tree:
In the first concrete legal action against ExxonMobil’s web of climate lies, New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman has announced he will investigate whether the oil giant knowingly misled the public and investors about the dangers of climate change. Last month from InsideClimate News and the Los Angeles Times revealed that Exxon’s own scientists warned the company’s top leadership that burning fossil fuels causes climate change with potentially “catastrophic” impacts as far back as 1977. Yet despite this warning the company spent decades funneling millions of dollars into groups that dispute or cast doubt on the connection between fossil fuels and climate change. With the dirty tactics of fossil fuel companies well and truly in the open, the ExxonMobil investigation should be a warning shot for other companies that they will no longer be allowed to peddle misinformation and must once and for all wake up to the dampening demand for fossil fuels…
More recent coverage of Exxon Mobil climate change revelations…
- More oil companies could join Exxon Mobil as focus of climate investigations (New York Times)
- ExxonMobil under investigation over claims it lied about climate change risks (Guardian)
- Exxon Mobil investigated in New York over possible lies on climate (New York Times)
- Gore calls for Exxon Mobil inquiry on climate change (New York Times)
- Congressmen call on SEC to investigate Exxon’s climate disclosures (Inside Climate News)
- Exxon knew about climate change almost 40 years ago (Scientific American)
- ExxonMobil targets journalists and activists after climate change investigation (Motherboard)
Projected impact of the former on Paris Climate Talks?
The New Matilda:
‘Malcolm Turnbull’s Dirty Money Means Oz Won’t Be Taken Seriously At Paris Climate Talks, says 350.org’
Climate advocacy group 350.org has demanded Malcolm Turnbull divest from ExxonMobil, which is under investigation for a climate change cover-up…
::: click here for piece in full @ The New Matilda :::
WORKING IN THESE TIMES
Labor For Bernie Sanders Activists Say They Are Undeterred By Union Endorsements of Hillary Clinton
RURAL AMERICA
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“It’s like having a global 24-hour-a-day, 365-day-a-year search warrant running on whole societies, including Australia.”
Senator Scott Ludlam
Australia accessed private internet data gathered by the NSA even more than Britain, according to a previously unreported document released by Edward…
After marathon negotiations in Atlanta, leaders from 12 nations cement pactwhich coalition of critics say will raise the price of essential drugs, drive industrial scale agribusiness, and threaten workers rights…
by Lauren McCauley, staff writer
Amid a last minute scramble, leaders from the United States and 11 other Pacific Rim countries announced Monday that they had reached agreement on a sweeping trade deal, one that critics, including US presidential candidate Bernie Sanders, say will slash standards and protections for both consumers and workers—with impacts to be felt across the globe.
The agreement, known as the Trans Pacific Partnership (or TPP), which would tie together as much as 40 percent of the world’s economy, has for nearly 8 years been negotiated in secret. Though details of the compromise were not yet revealed early Monday, critics said that—minutia aside—the global trade pact will certainly be a boon for corporate power…
“TPP is a deal for big business,” said Nick Dearden, director of the UK-based Nick Dearden,Global Justice Now.
“Wall Street and other big corporations have won again. It is time for the rest of us to stop letting multi-national corporations rig the system to pad their profits at our expense.”
– Bernie Sanders
Presidential candidate Bernie Sanders was also quick to condemn the deal. Saying he was disappointed but not surprised by the “disastrous” agreement, Sanders added: “Wall Street and other big corporations have won again. It is time for the rest of us to stop letting multi-national corporations rig the system to pad their profits at our expense.”
The compromise was reached after five days of round-the-clock negotiations in Atlanta, Georgia. U.S. President Barack Obama reportedly “spent recent days contacting world leaders to seal the deal.”
The negotiations had been extended after talks got stuck over the issue of how long a monopoly period should be allowed on next-generation biotech drugs. The compromise reportedly reached between the U.S. and Australia “is a hybrid that protects companies’ data for five years to eight years,” the New York Times reports, falling short of the 12 years desired by U.S. negotiators…’
::: click on through for this piece in full @ CommonDreams.org :::
News & Views | 09.18.15
Featured…
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Refugees Left Stranded As EU Faces ‘Crisis of Political Will’ by Andrea Germanos “You aren’t going to solve these problems by closing borders.” |
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‘Foolish and Mean-Spirited’: US House Votes to Defund Planned Parenthood by Deirdre Fulton Both measures are opposed by women’s health organizations, the White House, and a majority of the American public. |
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Citing Abuses, US Commission Demands Release of Refugee Families by Sarah Lazare The violations are so egregious that all families should be released, detentions reduced, and alternatives to incarceration fostered. |
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Up 72 Perecent From Just Six Years Ago, Organic Farm Sales Soar by Nadia Prupis Americans are increasingly hungry for naturally-grown and healthier foods. |
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Facing South, Bernie Sanders Ramps Up Outreach in SC and Beyond by Deirdre Fulton David is rising against Goliath, with a grassroots campaign meant to increase Sanders’ exposure among minority voters in the Bible Belt and across the South. |
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According to New IEA Chief, Arctic Drilling Is Stupid Business by Sarah Lazare Birol’s statements come amid growing calls to place people and the planet over profit by leaving fossil fuels in the ground. |
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New Orleans Running ‘Modern Debtors Prison,’ Lawsuit Charges by Nadia Prupis Orleans Parish has resurrected unconstitutional “debtors’ prisons” by routinely jailing the region’s poorest residents over their inability to pay court fees and other fines. |
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Obama’s Fateful Syrian Choice by Robert Parry He can either work with Russia’s President Putin to stabilize Syria or he can opt for a confrontation that could lead to an open-ended war. |
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The Fed Gets It Right. Now Let’s Move to Full Employment by Isaiah Poole “The case for raising short-term interest rates is extraordinarily weak. That is not the economy we have today.” |
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Open Homes, Open Borders: A Dispatch from a German Village Sheltering 400 Refugees by Melody Ermachild Chavis There is no end to the long line of human beings underway tonight. |
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Standing With Ahmed and All Children of Color by Sonali Kolhatkar If Obama truly wants America to be great, as his tweet to Ahmed suggests, he can begin by making it a country that treats its Muslim citizens without suspicion. |
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Resisting the Lure of Intervention by John Feffer With each nuclear weapon, jet engine, and space rocket we deploy, we venture further into the Orange Zone, heading blindly, if not boldly, toward the point of no return. |
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The Republican Foreign Policy Consensus: Lunacy by Robert Borosage If you want a president to lead us into constant wars “anywhere in the world,” Republicans have your man. |
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Uploaded on Sep 9, 2015
Under the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), multinational corporations will be able to sue the Australian Government in secret corporate courts over laws that protect our health, environment and workers’ rights.
Australians voted for the government to run our country in the interests of the public, not corporations. Don’t let them hand sovereignty of our country over to foreign corporations.
Learn more about the TPP here: www.getup.org.au/tpp
A former CIA officer described as the latest victim of the Obama administration’s war on whistleblowers has issued a scathing open letter to civil rights groups asking, “Where were you?”…
In the letter published at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Jeffrey Sterling, who is black, specifically calls out the NAACP, National Action Network, Rainbow PUSH Coalition, and Congressional Black Caucus, writing “I saw you when other black faces were either killed or mistreated.” But, to these civil rights groups, he writes, he is “invisible.”
In a case that relied on circumstantial evidence, Sterling was convicted in January on nine separate felony charges, including seven counts of espionage.
He was given a 42-month sentence in May, which Norman Solomon, executive director of the Institute for Public Accuracy and coordinator of whistleblower advocacy organization ExposeFacts.org, described as “the continuation of a war on whistleblowing and journalism, to clamp down on the absolutely essential flow of information for democracy.”
::: click here or banner for piece in full @ CommonDreams :::
Sea Shepherd, August 10, 2015:
The newly unveiled logo for Sea Shepherd’s Operation HenkakuThe Campaign, to be Called ‘Operation Henkaku,’ Translating to ‘Metamorphosis’ or ‘Transformation,’ Reflects Sea Shepherd’s Evolving Efforts to End the Capture and Slaughter of Dolphins and Small Whales and the Growing Global Opposition to this Brutal Hunt…
Sea Shepherd Conservation Society and its team of Cove Guardians will officially launch the sixth consecutive season of Sea Shepherd’s Dolphin Defense Campaign on Sept. 1, 2015 in Taiji, Japan. Titled Operation Henkaku (Operation Metamorphosis), preparations are underway for the campaign, during which Sea Shepherd will once again have an international team of volunteer Cove Guardians stationed along the infamous cove, documenting and live streaming the brutal capture and slaughter of dolphins and pilot whales for the world to see.
In the drive hunt conducted by the Taiji Fishermen’s Union, typically spanning from September until March, more than a thousand cetaceans are driven into the cove each year – some ruthlessly killed before the eyes of their family members and others torn away from their family pods to be sold to captive facilities in Japan or overseas. As Sea Shepherd has documented time and time again, the captive selection process occurs simultaneously to the slaughter – and the lucrative international trade in live dolphins for captivity is the economic fuel that drives the hunting boats in search of pods…
…more @ seashepherd.org
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A California judge affirmed that it’s illegal to detain children, and ordered their mothers released, too.
BY JOSEPH SORRENTINO Attendees at parties across Iowa say that Bernie is “the guy we need right now.” BY DAVID GOODNER Andrew Highsmith charts the rise and fall of Flint, a city deserted by industry and divided by segregation. BY DANIEL HERTZ The cure for planned Apple-escence. BY KENDRA PIERRE-LOUIS The vision of the socialist organizer remains inspiring.
BY MAURICE ISSERMAN U.S. media commentary on the accord portrays U.S. global military supremacy as natural and desirable.
BY GREGORY SHUPAK Critics who simply claim that “Coates is no Baldwin” are ignoring what can be a comparison that allows us to understand both writers more deeply. BY ANDY SEAL On postwar anti-communist surveillance in Britain.
BY JANE MILLER Continually policing the ways women talk will further reduce them to silence. BY MAX BLUMENTHAL |
| WORKING IN THESE TIMES |
| As Nabisco Ships 600 Jobs Out of Chicago to Mexico, Maybe It’s Time To Give Up Oreos
Chicago is poised to lose 600 well-paying jobs on the city’s Southwest Side. BY MARILYN KATZ |
| RURAL AMERICA |
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In his new climate encyclical, Pope Francis seeks to rekindle ecological consciousness. BY DAYTON MARTINDALE
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“To move beyond the fossil fuel era is a matter of conscience, a matter of faith and indeed, a matter of our continued existence.”
Archbishop Desmond Tutu.
Irving K. Barber Learning Centre Lecture presented by the Vancouver Institute. Webcast sponsored by the Irving K. Barber Learning Centre. Naomi Klein is the author of the critically acclaimed #1 international bestsellers, The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism and No Logo: Taking Aim at the Brand Bullies which have each been translated into more than 30 languages. She is a contributing editor for Harper’s Magazine, a reporter for Rolling Stone, and a syndicated columnist for The Nation and The Guardian.
Naomi Klein is a member of the board of directors for 350.org, a global grassroots movement to solve the climate crisis. Her new book is This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. The Climate (September, 2014). This lecture is co-sponsored by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, 350.org and Green College.
The 14 Defining Characteristics Of Fascism
Free Inquiry Spring 2003 5-11-3
Dr. Lawrence Britt has examined the fascist regimes of Hitler (Germany), Mussolini (Italy), Franco (Spain), Suharto (Indonesia) and several Latin American regimes. Britt found 14 defining characteristics common to each:
1. Powerful and Continuing Nationalism – Fascist regimes tend to make constant use of patriotic mottos, slogans, symbols, songs, and other paraphernalia. Flags are seen everywhere, as are flag symbols on clothing and in public displays.
2. Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights – Because of fear of enemies and the need for security, the people in fascist regimes are persuaded that human rights can be ignored in certain cases because of “need.” The people tend to look the other way or even approve of torture, summary executions, assassinations, long incarcerations of prisoners, etc.
3. Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause – The people are rallied into a unifying patriotic frenzy over the need to eliminate a perceived common threat or foe: racial , ethnic or religious minorities; liberals; communists; socialists, terrorists, etc.
4. Supremacy of the Military – Even when there are widespread domestic problems, the military is given a disproportionate amount of government funding, and the domestic agenda is neglected. Soldiers and military service are glamorized.
5. Rampant Sexism – The governments of fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively male-dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional gender roles are made more rigid. Divorce, abortion and homosexuality are suppressed and the state is represented as the ultimate guardian of the family institution.
6. Controlled Mass Media – Sometimes to media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or sympathetic media spokespeople and executives. Censorship, especially in war time, is very common.
7. Obsession with National Security – Fear is used as a motivational tool by the government over the masses.
8. Religion and Government are Intertwined – Governments in fascist nations tend to use the most common religion in the nation as a tool to manipulate public opinion. Religious rhetoric and terminology is common from government leaders, even when the major tenets of the religion are diametrically opposed to the government’s policies or actions.
9. Corporate Power is Protected – The industrial and business aristocracy of a fascist nation often are the ones who put the government leaders into power, creating a mutually beneficial business/government relationship and power elite.
10. Labor Power is Suppressed – Because the organizing power of labor is the only real threat to a fascist government, labor unions are either eliminated entirely, or are severely suppressed.
11. Disdain for Intellectuals and the Arts – Fascist nations tend to promote and tolerate open hostility to higher education, and academia. It is not uncommon for professors and other academics to be censored or even arrested. Free expression in the arts and letters is openly attacked.
12. Obsession with Crime and Punishment – Under fascist regimes, the police are given almost limitless power to enforce laws. The people are often willing to overlook police abuses and even forego civil liberties in the name of patriotism. There is often a national police force with virtually unlimited power in fascist nations.
13. Rampant Cronyism and Corruption – Fascist regimes almost always are governed by groups of friends and associates who appoint each other to government positions and use governmental power and authority to protect their friends from accountability. It is not uncommon in fascist regimes for national resources and even treasures to be appropriated or even outright stolen by government leaders.
14. Fraudulent Elections – Sometimes elections in fascist nations are a complete sham. Other times elections are manipulated by smear campaigns against or even assassination of opposition candidates, use of legislation to control voting numbers or political district boundaries, and manipulation of the media. Fascist nations also typically use their judiciaries to manipulate or control elections.
They Thought They Were Free
By Milton Mayer
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TOP STORIES THIS WEEK
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Sanders’s laser-like focus on inequality is perfectly insync with the nation’s current political climate.
BY THEO ANDERSON Soon the Right will have to abandon its head-in-the-sand strategy–but its next tactic may be more dangerous. BY KATE ARONOFF A hawk’s eye-view of global warming. BY TODD MILLER AND ALEX DEVOID Blumenthal offers an unembellished look at the misery on the ground in the Gaza Strip during Israel’s Operation Protective Edge in 2014. BY BEN LORBER The New York Times is wrong: consumers eating grapes and mandarin oranges aren’t the ones really guilty of contributing to California’s water shortage. BY JIM NAURECKAS Jeb Bush’s Presidential Announcement Was Simultaneously Audacious and Underwhelming Bush’s presidential campaign announcement was high on the rhetoric. Unfortunately, it was also inconsistent with everything we already know about Jeb Bush. BY DAVID SIROTA The activists behind the group are known for pranking big corporate and governmental institutions. Now they have created a tool to help others do the same. BY MICHAEL PAYNE The new black comedy about nuclear war misses its target. BY EILEEN JONES |
| WORKING IN THESE TIMES |
| Chicago Charter School Students Say UNO Teacher Was Fired for Union Activism
It’s not every day that students walk out of school to demand the reinstatement of a fired teacher–let alone one they claim was fired for helping unionize the school. BY CRYSTAL STELLA BECERRIL |
| RURAL AMERICA |
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A new bill passed by the North Carolina Senate could prevent evidence of animal cruelty or labor violations on factory farms from ever leaving the workplace. BY DAYTON MARTINDALE
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Glenn Greenwald, best known for his series in “The Guardian” detailing classified information about global surveillance programs based on top-secret documents provided by Edward Snowden, spoke at the University of Utah on Tuesday, April 7, 2015.
excerpt from The Tree:
Two reports have undermined the Abbott Government’s rosy claims about the health of Australia’s World Heritage Great Barrier Reef. TheQueensland Auditor-General has released a scathing report on government efforts to improve the reef’s water quality, finding efforts to cut coral-killing runoff have been ineffective, and that information lacked transparency and misleading. A second report, by the Environmental Justice Australia and the US-based Earthjustice, has also found that the Reef’s current state meets as many as six of the eight criteria UNESCO uses in its “in danger” assessments. UNESCO only needs one for an “in danger” listing. Water quality and sediment issues are having a severe impact on the reef, but despite having knowledge of a report contradicting the government’s exaggerated claims of progress tackling these issues for several weeks, Environment Minister Greg Hunt pushed a misleading “report card” to UNESCO.
This move, part of a $218,000 lobbying effort detailed in documents obtained under FOI, resulted in a draft ruling not to list the natural icon as “in danger”, allowing massive coal projects to go ahead –assuming they don’t fall over economically first. The Federal government’s lobbying strategy may have avoided a negative listing for now, but UNESCO’s verdict was still not positive. The future of the reef and the $5 billion it contributes to the economy annually remains under serious threat if Australia keeps trying to export dirty coal to the world. Tourism operators are already being warned to stop using picturesque underwater photos of bright pink and yellow coral, as the reality is declining water quality is now so poor in places tourists cannot swim or snorkel…
- Sign: Standard chartered: Coral, not coal (Greenpeace)
- Satire to share: UNESCO Downgrades Icon To ‘Good Barrier Reef’ (SBS)
- Hashtags in use: #savethereef #SOSReef #FightForTheReef #UNESCO #coal #climate
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TOP STORIES THIS WEEK
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President Obama insists there’s “nothing secret” about the massive trade deal–yet we aren’t allowed to know anything that’s in it. BY JOEL BLEIFUSS
What happens in Baltimore isn’t going to stay in Baltimore. BY MARTHA BIONDI
The movements of the 1960s challenged the Leave It to Beaver values of American life, producing the culture wars. But those wars are now finished. BY MICAH UETRICHT The human tragedies The Water Knife chronicles are already happening today; they’re just not happening to us–yet. BY JESSICA STITES Bernie Sanders Isn’t a Crackpot–He Favors Policies the Majority of Americans Want Despite what corporate Democrats and the Bernie-bashing mainstream media might tell you, Main Street America favors left-leaning policies. BY BILL MOYERS AND MICHAEL WINSHIP The most formidable challenger for Jeb Bush is his own brother’s legacy. BY SUSAN J. DOUGLAS The public and even Congress are acting against mass surveillance. When will President Obama get the memo? BY DAVID SIROTA
May’s elections delivered the familiar thud of disappointment. BY JANE MILLER
The austerity-on-steroids measures currently taking place in Michigan may soon be coming to a state near you. BY LAURA GOTTESDIENER
The economists called their letter a “plea for economic sanity and humanity.” BY MARTIN DE BOURMONT |
| WORKING IN THESE TIMES |
| With Thousands Marching in the Streets, Chicago Teachers Union Declares ‘This Means War!’
After a successful citywide strike three years ago, the Chicago Teachers union is not giving an inch. BY MARTIN DE BOURMONT |
| RURAL AMERICA |
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A war is underway between local farmers who support organic practices and want to ban GMOs, and the National Grange, which backs industrial agro-giants like Monsanto. BY JOHN COLLINS
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07 Jun 2015 | Scott Ludlam
excerpt:
“Low and middle-income Australians should not be forced to subsidise property investors through their taxes – it is fundamentally unfair,” Senator Ludlam said today.
“It is time to call an end to this skewed concession that has contributed to the housing bubble and provides a tax benefit ten times greater for the highest income earners than for the lowest.
“Independent costings from the Parliamentary Budget Office (PBO), released today by the Greens, show that by ending negative gearing for new investments we will save $2.9 billion over the forward estimates.
“We propose to invest a substantial part of the savings in new housing supply; to take 15,000 families and individuals off the social housing waiting list over the next four years and directly fund construction of 7000 new homes for the homeless by 2020.
“This will lift employment in the construction sector and boost innovation in the modular housing industry.
“These costings from the PBO give Joe Hockey all the evidence he needs to take a look at negative gearing, rather than blindly ruling it out of their tax review.
“As part of a broader move towards restoring fairness to the tax system, we have also asked the PBO to examine capital gains tax concessions, which are overwhelmingly subsidised by low and middle income taxpayers.
“The Greens will work to deliver a fair and equitable tax system which helps everyone, rather than a system that uses unfair concessions to skew the property market,” Senator Ludlam concluded.
This statement in full @ scott-ludlam.greensmps.org.au/
And here’s a stat to provide a bit more context from Homelessness Australia – ‘Homelessness Australia is the national peak body for homelessness in Australia’ :
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To break from the program of brutal austerity that has been imposed on Greece, its leaders have no choice but to take radical action. BY ALEXANDROS ORPHANIDES The Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians brought jazz back from the brink by connecting it to black struggle. BY SALIM MUWAKKIL A new documentary follows the weird subculture of Vietnam War reenactors–some of whom were actually there. BY EILEEN JONES If Jeb Bush wants to distance himself from the family name, he needs to reassess his brother’s actions in Iraq. BY DAVID SIROTA An existentialist Swedish movie occupies a completely original universe. BY MICHAEL ATKINSON |
| WORKING IN THESE TIMES |
| This Small Town Shows Why The Trans-Pacific Partnership Could Be A Disaster For American Workers
Galesburg, Illinois, residents saw their jobs disappear after the passage of NAFTA. The TPP likely won’t be any different. BY PETER COLE |
| RURAL AMERICA |
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The bill could be a game-changer for Native populations, finally allowing them the same opportunities to vote as other Americans. BY STEPHANIE WOODARD
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+ 26 chapters of the TPP still secret…
The real intent of these provisions is to impede health, environmental, safety, and, yes, even financial regulations meant to protect America’s own economy and citizens. Companies can sue governments for full compensation for any reduction in their future expected profits resulting from regulatory changes.
the interpretOr 