A roundup of news and information.
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Oathkeepers and the Age of Treason-
Mother Jones News, April, 2010
Oathkeepers Offer Kentucky's Kim Davis a Security Detail-
MSNBC, Sept. 11, 2015
"As right-wing groups go, the Oath Keepers organization is more alarming than most. The group says its members – former military, police and first responders –pledge to “defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic.” And while that hardly sounds objectionable, it’s how the organization perceives its duties that’s unsettling.
A few months ago, for example, Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes told a conservative gathering that Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) should be tried for treason and “hung by the neck until dead” for going “along with the program of the destruction of this country.”
A month later, Rhodes was in New York, insisting that President Obama is “trying to” create “a race war.” He added, “[T]he leftists in this country hate this country, they hate it, and they will get in bed with radical Islamists because they have a common enemy, western civilization.”
We last saw very well armed Oath Keepers activists carrying assault rifles in Ferguson, Missouri, and stationing themselves outside military-recruitment centers in Chattanooga. But this week, as Right Wing Watch reported, the Oath Keepers organization offered a “security detail” for anti-gay Kentucky clerk Kim Davis."
Up Front: Al Jazeera Interview with Edward Snowden, Daniel Ellsberg, and Hamid Karzai
The European Refugee Crises: Anatomy of a Cover-up.
Storm Clouds Gathering, Sept. 11, 2015
"If you watch the news, you've probably heard about the refugee crisis in Europe (or the "migrant crisis" as some are referring to it). Hundreds of thousands asylum seekers from the Middle East and Africa are flooding across the borders. As of July, European countries had received over 437,000 Asylum applications for the year. In 2014 just over 840,000 applications were received.
So why is this happening? Where are migrants/refugees coming from? Why are there so many of them?
The corporate media and the political establishment on both the left and the right will answer those questions with a combination of half truths and outright lies This shouldn't be surprising. It is in their interest to cover up the role they played in creating the crisis."
Europe's Refugee Crisis Was Made in America-
Prosecute Torturers and Their Bosses -
On Wednesday, the iconic yellow-bordered magazine, beset by financial issues, entered its own uncharted territory. In an effort to stave off further decline, the magazine was effectively sold by its nonprofit parent organization to a for-profit venture whose principal shareholder is one of Rupert Murdoch’s global media companies."
Nigeria Reopens Investigation Into Halliburton Huge Bribery Scandal-
Occupy Democrats, Sept. 10, 2015
"The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission detained ten Halliburton operatives and raided the company’s Lagos offices in 2010 and announced that they planned to summon Cheney to face justice. Halliburton $180 million in bribes over ten years to secure some $6 billion in contracts for Bonny Island liquefied natural gas program in the Niger River delta. Halliburton pled guilty and settled for $597 million in American court. The case against Cheney was bungled and dropped, but since the United States demanded that all of those involved be punished before the seized bribe money can be returned to Nigeria, Buhari has announced his intention to seek out and charge those who escaped justice the first time."
"What is surprising and undeniably significant about Francis’s message is the forceful way he foregrounds a radical systemic analysis of the deep structural causes of the climate and ecological crisis, the kind of radical response required, and the political and economic forces standing in the way. In the process, he echoes what climate-justice advocates have been saying for decades. In fact, perhaps most remarkable is the way Francis has made this bracing argument for climate justice, with an explicit “preferential option for the poor”—the essence of a once-suspect and marginalized liberation theology—central to his papacy, indeed to the very mission of the church in the 21st century."
Most abortions today involve some combination of endless wait, interminable journey, military-level coordination, and lots of money. Roe v. Wade was supposed to put an end to women crossing state lines for their abortions. But while reporting this story, I learned of women who drove from Kentucky to New Jersey, or flew from Texas to Washington, DC, because it was the only way they could have the procedure. Even where laws can't quite make it impossible for abortion clinics to stay open—they are closing down at a rate of 1.5 every single week—they can make it exhausting to operate one. In every corner of America, four years of unrelenting assaults on reproductive rights have transformed all facets of giving an abortion or getting one—possibly for good.
"America is an exceptional country when it comes to guns. It's one of the few countries in which the right to bear arms is constitutionally protected, and presidential candidates in other nations don't cook bacon with guns. But America's relationship with guns is unique in another crucial way: Among developed nations, the US is far and away the most violent — in large part due to the easy access many Americans have to firearms. These charts and maps show what that violence looks like compared with the rest of the world, why it happens, and why it's such a tough problem to fix."
It’s almost certain Debs would not have approved of Sanders running for nomination in the Democratic Party. As a leader of the early 20th century Socialist Party, Debs once said he was more proud of going to jail for leading a rail workers strike than early in his career serving in the Indiana state legislature as an elected Democratic representative.
Unfortunately, there’s a tendency among defenders of the status quo to turn great historical figures into harmless icons, saintly martyrs to high ideals who loved everyone and threatened no one. This to a degree has happened with the Rev. Martin Luther, King, Jr., a radical fighter for civil rights in his day that the political establishment now treats with a kind of perfunctory reverence."
American Adults Get a "D" in Science -
"As the public grapples with issues such climate change, the rise of drug-resistant superbugs and genetically modified crops, a firm understanding of “scientific facts and principles” will help voters understand what’s at stake and “make informed judgments,”
The European Refugee Crises: Anatomy of a Cover-up.
Storm Clouds Gathering, Sept. 11, 2015
"If you watch the news, you've probably heard about the refugee crisis in Europe (or the "migrant crisis" as some are referring to it). Hundreds of thousands asylum seekers from the Middle East and Africa are flooding across the borders. As of July, European countries had received over 437,000 Asylum applications for the year. In 2014 just over 840,000 applications were received.
So why is this happening? Where are migrants/refugees coming from? Why are there so many of them?
The corporate media and the political establishment on both the left and the right will answer those questions with a combination of half truths and outright lies This shouldn't be surprising. It is in their interest to cover up the role they played in creating the crisis."
Europe's Refugee Crisis Was Made in America-
The Nation, Sept.9, 2015
All over Europe and the Mediterranean world, barriers are being breached: the natural and man-made barriers used by nation-states to shut out unwanted travelers; the barriers of fear and grief that keep people from fleeing war or poverty until they have no choice; the barriers of indifference that enable
the rest of us to get on with our lives as if those men, women, and children were no concern of ours. More than 380,000 people have crossed the Mediterranean this year in search of safety, two-thirds of them landing in Greece; at least 2,850 have drowned or are missing at sea. Syrians, Iraqis, Afghans, and others walk for days in the heat, sleep rough on docks or station platforms or by the side of the road, are tear-gassed and beaten at borders and crammed into trains like cattle as they try to make their way north.
Prosecute Torturers and Their Bosses -
New York Times, Dec.21, 2014
"Americans have known about many of these acts for years, but the 524-page executive summary of the Senate Intelligence Committee's report erases any lingering doubt about their depravity and illegality like "rectal feeding" scores of detainees were waterboarded, hung by their wrists, confined in coffins, sleep deprived, threatened with death, and brutally beaten. In November 2002, one detainee who was chained to a concrete floor died of "suspected hypothermia".
These are, simply, crimes. They are prohibited by federal law, which defines torture as the intentional infliction of "severe physical or mental pain or suffering". They are also banned by the Convention Against Torture, the international treaty that the United States ratified in 1994 and that requires prosecution of any acts of torture.
So it is no wonder that todays blinkered apologists are desperate to call these acts anything but torture, which they clearly were. As the report reveals, these claims fail for a simple reason: CIA officials admitted at the time that what they intended to do was illegal."
"Terrorism persists because terrorism works. Terrorism works because we let it.
It takes a great deal of violence to wipe out an army. But it only takes a tiny bit of violence to instill a sense of fear in a population. Terrorism is not meant to conquer through force; it is meant to conquer through fear."
Nestle CEO Says Americans Don't have a Right to Water
Huffington Post,, April 25, 2013
It is actually Illegal In Colorado To Collect The Rain That Falls Onto Your Home -
"Americans have known about many of these acts for years, but the 524-page executive summary of the Senate Intelligence Committee's report erases any lingering doubt about their depravity and illegality like "rectal feeding" scores of detainees were waterboarded, hung by their wrists, confined in coffins, sleep deprived, threatened with death, and brutally beaten. In November 2002, one detainee who was chained to a concrete floor died of "suspected hypothermia".
These are, simply, crimes. They are prohibited by federal law, which defines torture as the intentional infliction of "severe physical or mental pain or suffering". They are also banned by the Convention Against Torture, the international treaty that the United States ratified in 1994 and that requires prosecution of any acts of torture.
So it is no wonder that todays blinkered apologists are desperate to call these acts anything but torture, which they clearly were. As the report reveals, these claims fail for a simple reason: CIA officials admitted at the time that what they intended to do was illegal."
New Yorker, Sept. 8, 2015
"In science, of course, the very word “sacred” is profane. No ideas, religious or otherwise, get a free pass. The notion that some idea or concept is beyond question or attack is anathema to the entire scientific undertaking. This commitment to open questioning is deeply tied to the fact that science is an atheistic enterprise. “My practice as a scientist is atheistic,” the biologist J.B.S. Haldane wrote, in 1934. “That is to say, when I set up an experiment I assume that no god, angel, or devil is going to interfere with its course and this assumption has been justified by such success as I have achieved in my professional career.” It’s ironic, really, that so many people are fixated on the relationship between science and religion: basically, there isn’t one. In my more than thirty years as a practicing physicist, I have never heard the word “God” mentioned in a scientific meeting. Belief or nonbelief in God is irrelevant to our understanding of the workings of nature—just as it’s irrelevant to the question of whether or not citizens are obligated to follow the law."
"In science, of course, the very word “sacred” is profane. No ideas, religious or otherwise, get a free pass. The notion that some idea or concept is beyond question or attack is anathema to the entire scientific undertaking. This commitment to open questioning is deeply tied to the fact that science is an atheistic enterprise. “My practice as a scientist is atheistic,” the biologist J.B.S. Haldane wrote, in 1934. “That is to say, when I set up an experiment I assume that no god, angel, or devil is going to interfere with its course and this assumption has been justified by such success as I have achieved in my professional career.” It’s ironic, really, that so many people are fixated on the relationship between science and religion: basically, there isn’t one. In my more than thirty years as a practicing physicist, I have never heard the word “God” mentioned in a scientific meeting. Belief or nonbelief in God is irrelevant to our understanding of the workings of nature—just as it’s irrelevant to the question of whether or not citizens are obligated to follow the law."
Gawker, Jan. 8, 2015
It takes a great deal of violence to wipe out an army. But it only takes a tiny bit of violence to instill a sense of fear in a population. Terrorism is not meant to conquer through force; it is meant to conquer through fear."
Nestle CEO Says Americans Don't have a Right to Water
Huffington Post,, April 25, 2013
It is actually Illegal In Colorado To Collect The Rain That Falls Onto Your Home -
Washington Post, March 26, 2015
True Activist, April, 2013
Stuff Project, Sept. 2015
"In the West, water belongs to someone. The principle at stake is called prior appropriation, which is legalese for “first come, first served.” This doctrine forms the bedrock of water law in the Western states, where long ago settlers raced to gobble up all the water rights. Prior appropriation helps explain why water-intensive agriculture is still a major industry in a place as arid as the West: Many of the early claimants were farmers seeking to irrigate their crops.These days, with drought parching the region, there’s hardly enough water to go around. According to the law, the people who get first dibs are the ones who called it first, which tend to be the agricultural users and not the city dwellers."
"In the West, water belongs to someone. The principle at stake is called prior appropriation, which is legalese for “first come, first served.” This doctrine forms the bedrock of water law in the Western states, where long ago settlers raced to gobble up all the water rights. Prior appropriation helps explain why water-intensive agriculture is still a major industry in a place as arid as the West: Many of the early claimants were farmers seeking to irrigate their crops.These days, with drought parching the region, there’s hardly enough water to go around. According to the law, the people who get first dibs are the ones who called it first, which tend to be the agricultural users and not the city dwellers."
Gizmodo, Sept. 10, 2015
"Ever since it was launched from the temple-like headquarters of the National Geographic Society in Washington in 1888, National Geographic magazine has illuminated the world’s hidden places and revealed its natural wonders.On Wednesday, the iconic yellow-bordered magazine, beset by financial issues, entered its own uncharted territory. In an effort to stave off further decline, the magazine was effectively sold by its nonprofit parent organization to a for-profit venture whose principal shareholder is one of Rupert Murdoch’s global media companies."
Nigeria Reopens Investigation Into Halliburton Huge Bribery Scandal-
Occupy Democrats, Sept. 10, 2015
"The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission detained ten Halliburton operatives and raided the company’s Lagos offices in 2010 and announced that they planned to summon Cheney to face justice. Halliburton $180 million in bribes over ten years to secure some $6 billion in contracts for Bonny Island liquefied natural gas program in the Niger River delta. Halliburton pled guilty and settled for $597 million in American court. The case against Cheney was bungled and dropped, but since the United States demanded that all of those involved be punished before the seized bribe money can be returned to Nigeria, Buhari has announced his intention to seek out and charge those who escaped justice the first time."
"Politicians Debating Climate Change", Sculpture by Isaac Cordal
The Nation, Sept. 9, 2015
"What is surprising and undeniably significant about Francis’s message is the forceful way he foregrounds a radical systemic analysis of the deep structural causes of the climate and ecological crisis, the kind of radical response required, and the political and economic forces standing in the way. In the process, he echoes what climate-justice advocates have been saying for decades. In fact, perhaps most remarkable is the way Francis has made this bracing argument for climate justice, with an explicit “preferential option for the poor”—the essence of a once-suspect and marginalized liberation theology—central to his papacy, indeed to the very mission of the church in the 21st century."
Mother Jones, Sept., 2015
Salon, Sept. 9, 2015
"We’ve witnessed over the last two decades in the United States a steady decline in the willingness of people in leading positions in the private sector – on Wall Street and in large corporations especially – to maintain minimum standards of public morality. They seek the highest profits and highest compensation for themselves regardless of social consequences."
Vox, August 26, 2015
Business Insider, Sept. 3, 2015
"Real-estate magnate Donald Trump admitted he didn't know the answers to what he called "gotcha" questions in a Thursday interview on foreign policy.
Among other things, the Republican presidential front-runner suggested it was not yet important for him to know the difference between Hezbollah and Hamas, the Islamic militant groups based in Lebanon and Palestine."
Counterpunch, Sept. 7, 2015
"In the annals of American socialism, the name of Eugene V. Debs stands out as the most prominent personality in the movement’s history. Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, the self-described independent socialist now campaigning for the Democratic presidential nomination, considers Debs one of his heroes.It’s almost certain Debs would not have approved of Sanders running for nomination in the Democratic Party. As a leader of the early 20th century Socialist Party, Debs once said he was more proud of going to jail for leading a rail workers strike than early in his career serving in the Indiana state legislature as an elected Democratic representative.
Unfortunately, there’s a tendency among defenders of the status quo to turn great historical figures into harmless icons, saintly martyrs to high ideals who loved everyone and threatened no one. This to a degree has happened with the Rev. Martin Luther, King, Jr., a radical fighter for civil rights in his day that the political establishment now treats with a kind of perfunctory reverence."
American Adults Get a "D" in Science -
Los Angeles Times, Sept 10, 2015
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