#Congress Loot Guarantee

[computerjagat]

Guarantee Of Loot: बीजेपी अध्यक्ष नड्डा बोले- कांग्रेस केवल लूट की गारंटी दे सकती है

भारतीय जनता पार्टी (भाजपा) के अध्यक्ष जे पी नड्डा ने सोमव��र को दावा किया कि विपक्षी दल केवल ‘लूट की गारंटी’ दे सकता है. उन्होंने कांग्रेस पर आरोप लगाया कि वह भ्रष्टाचार के जरिए धन एकत्र करने की खातिर कर्नाटक को ‘एटीएम’ में बदल रही है ताकि अपने चुनाव प्रचार के पैसे जुटा सके. नड्डा ने कर्नाटक में विभिन्न जांच एजेंसी की छापेमारी में कुछ ठेकेदारों के पास से 100 करोड़ रुपये से अधिक राशि कथित रूप से…

[rauthschild]

We have described for you the deplorable criminality which has gained access to our world through the British Government(s) and their collusion with the Holy Roman Empire -- the impersonation of people as different kinds of corporations, the illegal and unlawful direct taxation of civilians by private banks, the use of commercial corporations to usurp national governments, and we have touched upon the corruption of the courts, especially Admiralty Courts and the so-called King's Bench (Maritime Commerce) courts.

We have plainly stated that the courts are bonding court cases and presenting them as investment opportunities. The bond numbers are case numbers, and the odds of conviction and "commission returns" on these bonds run at 96% on average, so the Hired Jurists running these courts are highly motivated to secure convictions by any means possible ---- the courts and the court's officers share in the booty they collect.

Government "Investors" are also highly motivated to keep this gravy train running. Where else can you guarantee yourself a 96% rate of return on a short term bond investment?

When first confronted about this "Court Registry Investment System" court officials stonewalled and denied the existence of any such bond investment (and ultimately, payola) system by which they receive commissions, aka, "pension" payments from all the loot rolling in from the illegal confiscation of privately-held American assets and equally illegal betting on the rigged outcome of court cases controlled by Hired Jurists in the King's Service.

The Guilty Parties observe that there is no law against murdering corporations, stealing from corporations, impounding corporations, etc., but then, in the same token, corporations should have no ability to make unlimited political campaign contributions, should they?

Those responsible for the unconscionable contracts allowing them to create all these Puerto Rican shelf corporations, and the Roman Inferior Cestui Que Vie Trusts that result when the shelf corporations are bankrupted, should be paying all the charges and expenses of maintaining these corporations and should also be paying all taxes owed by these imaginary corporate franchises, too.

The living victims of this personage scheme should be held absolutely harmless from all charges and harm, but as everyone can see and attest, the Parent Corporations and Administrators have been evading their Usufructuary Duty and foisting their responsibility off onto the victims of their inland piracy.

The Admiralty Courts have been busy collecting booty belonging purportedly to "rebels" engaged in illegal commercial mercenary "wars", and salvage fees owed by foreign sovereigns, and managing the Estates of imaginary British Merchant Mariners, who all just happen to be "Taxpayers" --- Warrant Officers who are responsible for collecting tariffs for the King, who are all based out of Puerto Rico and all declared "missing, lost at sea".

The Maritime Commercial Courts operated by the British Crown have been fraudulently confusing themselves -- the so-called United States District Courts -- with district courts of the United States authorized under Article V of the Federal Constitutions. Under this guise of borrowed rectitude, they have been operated as "concessions" to take advantage of the Cestui Que Vie ESTATES purportedly belonging to Municipal "citizens of the United States".

Are we all beginning to get the drift of just how crooked all these operations are and the nature of the "courts" that have been foisted off on the people of this country, who have all suffered crimes of impersonation and identity theft and human trafficking, at the hands of men employed by them to protect their "persons" and who are obligated by contract and treaty to do so?

As mentioned in our International Public Notice: Impersonation, the British Territorial Rump Congress created by Abraham Lincoln changed the meaning of the word "person" to mean "corporation".

See 37th Congress, Second Session, Chapter 49, Section 68.

This was followed up on February 2nd 1871, when the 41st British Territorial U.S. Congress declared itself to be the Successor of all United States Corporations.

The "United States" being referenced is the American Federal Republic and its corporations.

This takeover was done with no Notice to the Public, no listing in the Congressional Record, and, most importantly, no Notice to the Federation of States. It failed all requirements of Due Process.

How is that even possible?

By February 2nd 1871, all the State Governments had been confused with State of State Governments, and the Brits had illegally included State assets as if they were American State of State assets, and rolled everything into "State" Trusts.

They had also demanded that the people of each State write new Constitutions allowing their own British Territorial State-of-State operations to take over.

The American States of States, such as The State of New York, were replaced by British Territorial counterparts calling themselves, for example, "the State of New York". The name change was so slight, a change from "The" to "the", that nobody but British Collaborators knew there had been any change at all.

The new "State" Constitutions enacted between 1863 and 1871 were equally vague and deceitful, appearing very similar to prior service contracts and calculated to hide what was actually going on from the American Public.

By February 2nd 1871, the assets of the actual Autochthonous Nation States had been illegally and illogically misidentified as assets of the Federal Republic and had been cashiered in covert State Trusts, like the Michigan State (Trust).

This is what gives rise to the grammatical nightmare of "the Michigan State Capitol" and "California State University".

As an analogy, if the company hired to mow your lawn went bankrupt, or for any reason failed to perform, would this justify an assumption that your property was part of their bankruptcy or incompetence? Would this scenario justify an assumption that your home was an asset of their bankrupt business? Or an unclaimed chattel of theirs?

Certainly not, yet this is precisely the "reasoning" employed to secretly latch upon the assets of the American States and cashier them in State Trusts controlled by the Perpetrators of this gigantic fraud scheme.

With the State assets illegally cashiered in trusts controlled by the Perpetrators under False Pretenses, the original American State of State organizations inoperable, and British Territorial States of States operating as franchises of the British Territorial corporation calling itself "the United States of America" --- Incorporated, there was nothing to stop the Perpetrators from bypassing Due Process owed to the actual States and People.

According to them and what they told the rest of the world, we had ceased to exist. Our lawful American Government was reportedly "in interregnum" and in the meantime, our British Territorial and Holy Roman Empire Federal Subcontractors were "assuming" a "custodial interest" in our assets.

In this way, the British Territorial Government under contract to our States, contrived to unlawfully convert our State assets into Public Trust assets controlled by their Agents, and to mothball and substitute their own "services" for both our Autochthonous American States-of-State organizations and our lawful State Governments.

This is all premeditated, malicious, self-interested legal chicanery and constructive fraud, by which our foreign employees have attempted to erase our national sovereignty, use our assets as collateral backing their debts, and ultimately, bring False Claims on Abandonment against our assets for their benefit.

We never abandoned anything, just like we never volunteered to act as "Taxpayers" and never knowingly adopted U.S. Citizenship, and were told nothing about the Roman Inferior Trust ESTATES established for us under the resoundingly False Presumption that we were ever "citizens of the United States", either.

These False Friends and False Representatives impersonated the American States and seized upon their assets, and have controlled our State assets by dint of secrecy, False Legal Presumptions, and False Claims dependent on similar names deceits.

Our original state-of-state entities doing business as, for example, The State of New York, were members of the failed Confederation.

Likewise, the stricken State Republics and Republics of State, such as the Texas Republic and Republic of Texas, were members of the failed Federal Republic.

Their assets might, arguably, be salvaged and secured by the British Territorial Federal Subcontractors doing business as the United States of America, Incorporated ---- but not the assets of our Autochthonous Nation-States.

Our Autochthonous unincorporated States of the Union are members of the unincorporated Federation of States.

There are no "United States Corporations" present for British Interests to seize upon or assume any custodial interest in.

In the same way, there is no excuse for them impersonating our States as State Trusts, substituting their state-of-state organizations for ours, nor any of the criminal impersonations and undisclosed registrations of individual Americans that have taken place.

There is no plausible excuse for them bringing their Admiralty and Maritime courts ashore and misaddressing American civilians as corporate franchises and foreign persons in their own country.

All of this is in direct violation of both The Constitution of the United States of America and The Constitution of the United States, Article IV, in its entirety.

These men and women are present in our country to provide us with essential government services in "good faith", not to practice crimes of personage against us and pretend that they are our "representatives", custodians, guardians, and trustees.

For those who cannot believe that the Admiralty and Maritime courts presently operating in this country have been used to promote illegal and immoral confiscation of Autochthonous American assets, to commit personage against average Americans, to create a rigged bond market and to provide commissions masked as "pension payments" to the men and women engaged in this criminal activity, we are attaching a 66 page pdf file that adequately explains the Court Registry Investment System (CRIS) and documents its receipts.

[ejesgistnews]

Top Nigerian Newspaper Headlines online Today, What are the top Nigerian Newspaper Headlines for Today?  Staying updated on the latest developments in Nigeria is essential, especially in today's fast-paced world. Here are the top 10 Nigerian newspaper headlines for August 26, 2024, that capture the most significant news across the country. From breaking stories to in-depth analyses, these headlines reflect the top news in Nigeria this morning. Whether you're interested in politics, business, or social issues, these latest Nigerian newspaper headlines will keep you informed. Dive into the top stories in Nigeria today and stay ahead with the latest updates. The latest Nigerian headlines for August: Here are ten top headlines from Nigerian newspapers for today, Monday, August 26, 2024: 1. Gombe Gov To Pay N70,000 Minimum Wage: Governor Muhammadu Inuwa Yahaya of Gombe State has announced his intention to implement the new national minimum wage of ₦70,000 for workers in the state. The Deputy Governor, Dr. Manassah Jatau, confirmed this commitment during a meeting with the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) Gombe chapter. The state government has been paying a ₦10,000 monthly palliative since September 2023 to cushion the effects of subsidy removal. 2. APC Criticizes PDP Over Alleged Harassment, Seeks Apology To Minister: The All Progressives Congress (APC) Youth Wing Mobilisation Vanguard has called on the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) elders in the North West to focus on their internal issues rather than involving the Minister of Defence, Hon. Bello Matawalle. The APC described the PDP’s allegations of harassment by the Minister as baseless and politically motivated. 3. Ex-Sokoto Gov, Tambuwal Loses Brother: Former Governor of Sokoto State, Sen. Aminu Waziri Tambuwal, mourns the passing of his brother, Alhaji Ahmad Ibrahim Tambuwal, who died in Abuja after a brief illness. The funeral prayers were conducted at the Palace of the District Head of Tambuwal Local Government, and he was buried according to Islamic rites. 4. 2024 NBA Conference: Stop Looting Our Nat’l Treasury, Okonjo-Iweala Tells Political Office Holders: WTO Director-General Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has urged political office holders to cease looting the nation’s treasury. Speaking at the 2024 Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) Conference, she emphasized that Nigeria has not progressed as it should due to corruption and mismanagement. 5. Rights Abuse: Tinubu Creating Another SARS – Atiku: Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has criticized President Bola Tinubu’s administration for rising human rights abuses, comparing the situation to the disbanded Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS). Atiku highlighted cases of enforced disappearances and the misuse of the Cyber Crime Prevention Act to intimidate journalists and citizens. 6. Disclose Details Of Chinese Loans, Liabilities, Repayments, Others, SERAP Tells Govs, Wike: The Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) has urged Nigeria’s 36 state governors and the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, Mr. Nyesom Wike, to disclose details of any Chinese loans, liabilities, and other external borrowing obtained, and guaranteed by the Federal Government as well as the terms and conditions for any such borrowing including the provisions on collateral.   7. Two Police Officers Feared Killed, Three Injured As Shi’ites Launch Attack In Abuja: At least two police officers were killed and three others injured following an attack by members of the Islamic Movement of Nigeria (IMN), commonly known as Shi’ites, on some personnel of the Nigeria Police Force at Wuse Junction by traffic light on Sunday. 8. 130 Yoruba Groups Meet In Lagos To Discuss State Of Nation: No less than 130 pan-Yoruba groups will gather in Lagos on Wednesday to discuss the state of the nation amid the economic crisis, insecurity, hardship, and calls for cessation from different groups in the country. 9. Igbo Elders Demand Release Of Kanu,

Other Political Prisoners: The United Igbo Elders Council (UNIEC) has called on the Federal Government to unconditionally release the incarcerated leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), Nnamdi Kanu, and all political prisoners who are being detained in different parts of the country.   10. 36 States, FCT Get N3bn Each From Nigerian Govt To Combat Flooding, Boost Agriculture: The 36 states in the country and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) will receive N3bn from the Federal Government in an effort to mitigate the impact of the recent flood disaster. That is all for today on Nigerian Newspaper Headlines. Click here more Naija News.      

[mostlysignssomeportents]

This day in history

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#20yrsago 802.11a card for the price of dinner for two https://memex.craphound.com/2002/06/28/802-11a-card-for-the-price-of-dinner-for-two/

#15yrsago Real-money game-traders interviewed https://games.slashdot.org/story/07/06/28/0415211/the-mmog-moneysellers-respond-to-your-questions

#10yrsago Eulogy for Erik “Possum Man” Stewart https://memex.craphound.com/2012/06/28/eulogy-for-erik-possum-man-stewart/

#10yrsago Snow White rides, secret pockets of theme-park horror https://passport2dreams.blogspot.com/2012/06/through-forest-snow-whites-adventures.html

#10yrsago Chinese corruption and looting on a vast scale: industry, government, and military http://www.debtdeflation.com/blogs/2012/06/28/the-looting-of-china-by-the-kleptokapitalist-bourgeoisie-roaders/

#5yrsago UK government won’t promise help to remove highly flammable high-rise cladding https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/grenfell-tower-cladding-scandal-council-funding-government-no-guarantee-local-government-budgets-a7809216.html

#5yrsago David Cameron and Prince William condemned in leaked FIFA bribery and corruption report https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/06/27/prince-william-david-cameron-caught-fifa-corruption-scandal/

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#5yrsago Industrial robotics security is really, really terrible https://robosec.org/downloads/paper-robosec-sp-2017.pdf

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#5yrsago Texas Congresscritter wants to gag small investors who object to large CEO paychecks https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2017/06/27/federal-bill-attempts-to-silence-investors/

#5yrsago Researchers demonstrate attack for pwning entire wind-farms https://www.wired.com/story/wind-turbine-hack/

#5yrsago EFF will defend McMansion Hell from Zillow’s copyfraudulent bullying https://mcmansionhell.com/post/162344741791/update

#1yrago Lazy Congress only schedules 9 days’ work this summer https://pluralistic.net/2021/06/28/dubious-quant-residue/#back-to-work-you

#1yrago Podcasting “Qualia”: My column on quant-bias, antitrust, drug policy and epidemiology https://pluralistic.net/2021/06/28/dubious-quant-residue/#incinerators-r-us

[ghafoorbaloch]

Book Review:

PARTITION, CAN IT BE UNDONE?

By: Lal Khan

Date of the review: 18-06-2020

Time: 3:24pm PST

The book that Lal Khan written probably in the year 2000, is a wonderful book for all the people to know that what happened before and after partition of the Subcontinent. What the "so called" leaders of the partition done to this beautiful Indian Subcontinent is pertinently described in this exquisite book.

In his book, Lal Khan conspicuously expose the anathema of the British Imperialist policies. How the British Raj exploited the stoical working class of the Subcontinent and expanded their kingdom through the resources of India. He further on openly criticised the leadership of Congress and Muslim League. The leaders and also the Communist Party of India glided with the bourgeoisie and steadfastly crush the emerging revolution of the proletariat which could have possibly changed the structure of the Subcontinent, and as well as of the world.

Lal Khan, whose real name was Tanveer Gondal, a pure follower of Marxism, further adominish the people of the Subcontinent, particularly the Pakistani and Indian that Socialism and Marxism is the only way to demolish the capitalistic approach that has been looting the South Asian countries since the begining of the epoch. He says that the working class- proletariat will have to rise and fight this evil system which could ultimately benefit the exisiting and the future generations. This revolution, in accordance with the principles of the Marxism will definitely vanish the "cut throat" Capitalism. As Karl Marx said:

"The philosophers have only interpreted the world, the point is to change it".

Lal Khan in his book, Partition, can it be undone, says that the palsied and obnoxious Subcontinent which is suffering from anguish, even after premonition of the leaders after the partition obsequiously need a Socialist Federation for the advancement of the mankind. For this point, Lal Khan mentioned the four principles of Lenin for running a transitional socialist state and society. The four points briefed discussed which were written by Lenin in his book, 'State and Revolution' are the following:

Free and democratic elections to all positions in the Socialist state.

Right of recall of all officials by the Soviets.

No official to receive a higher wage than a skilled worker.

Gradually, all the tasks of the running society and the state to be performed by every one in turn, or as Lenin put it, 'Any cook should be able to be Prime Minister'

There shall be no standing army but an armed organisation in the Soviets.

Surely, this kind of a sanguine programme will subserviently be a benefit for the Subcontinent. Most importantly, health and education would be the fundamental right rather than a privilege. Illiteracy and trading of human pain will be a vast crime in a socialist state. It will be the foremost duty of the socialist state to provide free health and education and other basic human needs free and guaranteed for the all the people, by the proletariat state. In such a state, there will be no un-employement. Art, film, architecture, music, sport, drama and other fine arts will flourish.

For such a programme to avail, Lal Khan says, that the working class need to start a revolution and most importantly, take action.

Aristotle said:

"Action is the ruling law of drama".

I am the world will be a socialist in near future.

[onenettvchannel]

OneNETnews EXCLUSIVE: PBS Kids' Arthur is Speaking Out with George Floyd's Death, under the Worldwide Issue of BLM

BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS -- A year before the CoViD19 Pandemic in Wuhan, China... There's a newest short Public Service Announcement (PSA) straight from the PBS Kids at WGBH-TV 2: PBS Boston's original longest-running children's programming known as Arthur.

For those you don't know about Arthur from PBS Kids... A simplified explanation from the PBS website based from the About page:

"The chronicle adventures of Arthur Read is based on a children's books by the Author & Illustrator named Marc Brown, who has been working with the beloved Aardvark for over 4 decades. This was started in 1976, turned into the American-wide franchise before it goes worldwide. The viewing age target is aiming to 4-8 years old. His goal is to help foster an interest in reading and writing, to encourage positive social skills, and to model age-appropriate problem-solving strategies. It is originally produced by WGBH-TV 2: PBS Boston and animated by the Oasis Animation."

Arthur Read's house is located from the Elwood, Pennsylvania; under his own show with the same name for over 2 decades. His recent voice actor was named to Roman Lutterotti from 2019. But today, the death of George Floyd is in effect in selected countries worldwide from both North Carolina & Minnesota. The reason why before the worldwide protest starts, Black Lives Matter (BLM) will commence just a few weeks later after his death. You might remember with the non-protest person was arrested in Texas named Jose Martinez (known as BN_King, a former Brony media LIVE Streamer from Fort Worth city), after he was filmed for documenting his personal underground experience on foot (on our sister-affiliated station The Brony Network).

Today, he is now contacting from the video call by reaching out at home to Leah MacGrady, an oldest Lunch lady at the Lakewood Elementary School (LES), during the post-Pandemic of CoViD19 worldwide for the unfair issue of Black Lives Matter (BLM).

Arthur & Buster is speaking out publicly via Zoom by addressing this issue to OneNETnews, "I can't believe someone would be hurt like that, just because they're Black." He adds a response from Arthur... "Racism is so unfair. No one should ever judge someone by the color of their skin. I was talking to Mrs. (Leah) MacGrady the other day. She said there's a really long history of Black people not being treated fairly in this country."

Leah MacGardy was spoked to Arthur Read & Buster Baxter from home with the response of Black Lives Matter issue, "Well, Racism is like a Disease. If you don't treat it, it's just gonna get worse. It's about all of us. It's not enough to just say, I'm not racist, it's not my problem. We have to actively fight against racism. As my friend (John Lewis) once said... If you see something that is not right, not fair, not just, you have a moral obligation to do something about it".

She adds with the finale of response, "Talk about racism with your friends, your parents, your teachers. Don't be afraid to ask questions. We all have a lot to learn about this issue. Listen to people who have experienced racism firsthand. Imagine what it would be like if it happened to you or someone you love. And finally, act. When you see or hear of someone being treated unfairly, stand up for them, say something! It might be scary, but I guarantee you it's better for everyone. And it's the right thing to do."

At the end of the Public Service Announcement (PSA), the memoriam of John Lewis was reportedly died from the Pancreatic Cancer (known as the founding Father of Better America in the 5th District of Atlanta, Georgia from his hometown of Troy, Alabama). His battle was failed for 6 months but not for the CoViD19 post-Pandemic at the Civil Rights & Congress.

The Kapisanan ng mga Brodkaster ng Pilipinas (KBP) was possibly violating the free-to-air network of Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) if they air the Racism episode or the newest short of Arthur, under the Broadcast Code of the Philippines in 2007 with the referencing of Article 15: Section 4. There will be a fine on Television to PHP30,000 (U$D612). Additionally, it also applies to the Senate Bill #2814: Section 3.2 & 4b (Anti-Ethnic or Racial Profiling and Discrimination Act of 2011) with a sentence for a year, known as the Arresto Mayor with other fine of PHP100,000 (U$D2,100). PBS is on the crystal clear kid safe standards to prevent the racism episode or the short, excluding this Public Service Announcement (PSA).

Arthur has warned to the kids' viewers like you to stop this protest or the illegal activity of Black Lives Matter (BLM) for George Floyd. As always until then, it has to make a difference at all cost, during the post-Pandemic of CoViD19 worldwide; even for the bashers on social media themselves. Act responsibly if you can.

SOURCE: *https://pbs.org/parents/shows/arthur/about/ *https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_(season_23) *https://arthur.fandom.com/wiki/Elwood_City *https://arthur.fandom.com/wiki/Leah_MacGrady *https://wral.com/fbi-to-investigate-arrest-of-black-man-who-died-after-being-pinned-by-officer/19114480/ *https://wral.com/protests-over-death-of-george-floyd-end-in-fires-looting-property-damage-in-raleigh-and-fayetteville/19122800/ *https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Lewis *https://troymessenger.com/2020/07/17/john-lewis-lion-of-civil-rights-and-congress-dies-at-80/ *https://troymessenger.com/2020/07/30/lewis-mourned-as-founding-father-of-better-america/ *https://www.kbp.org.ph/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/2007-Broadcast-Code-Revised-June-15-2011.pdf and *http://www.senate.gov.ph/lisdata/112189539!.pdf

EXTREMELY HONEST DISCLAIMER: The views & opinions expressed from this news report are not those from the WGBH-TV: PBS in Boston. It does not clearly imitate this Police Suspect and/or the kids' programme in any matter of tolerance. Furthermore, the assumption for this news report will NOT state, intervene or reflect those of our news reporters. The station, management, interwebs and the network. Thanks for reading everypony...

-- OneNETnews Team

[alexsmitposts]

COVID and the Terror of Uncertainty There are two worlds, in a way never before imagined, one of people and jobs, of life and experience, the other a shadowy world of deceit and terrorism. As the month of March 2020 comes to an end and April begins, the entire planet is being tested. As expected, as promised as any idiot might guess, political leadership has failed and the organizations intended to coordinate the planetary response to biological threats has shown itself to be politicized, weakened or possibly worse. On March 30, 2020, the Berman Law Group of Boca Raton, Florida, filed a $20 trillion lawsuit against the government of China for creating and disseminating the COVID 19 virus which has, well, we don’t really know. One has to remind one’s self of our times. A few years ago, what was termed an “Arab Spring” emerged, largely manipulated by militarized subsidiaries of Google and Facebook, funded by totalitarian regimes aligned with the US. “Spring,” as it turned out means something different to the people of the Middle East. The social reformers of the West delivered head choppers and Islamists, stolen oil and looted factories and not so much democracy as promised. Then, as so easily predicted, those who brought the disease thus offered the cure, “coalition” bombings, occupation, drone assassination and unending suffering. In Ukraine, “spring” meant false flag snipers and downing an airliner followed by a descent into politics more familiar to those who studied the last century and the fascist attempt to rule the world. Nothing is as it seems, nothing seen can be believed, nothing read is true, nothing taught exists, all is flimflammery and bluster, buffoonery and mayhem. Well, what does one see? Living in the United States, one sees a lockdown of a nation for one, two, three or more months. What one doesn’t see is where, exactly 200 million people are, how they live, where the money comes from to feed them and what the sinking feeling of hopelessness is doing to them. For the “haves,” well financed retirees or medical workers not yet infected, life may be changed, even grim but it will continue. Quite recently, a number of publications began spreading the rumor that 21 million Chinese mobile phone users had simply disappeared, meaning that they had died of COVID 19 and were now in mass graves. This type of story is common and such things spring up almost daily. The reason isn’t simple, a sea of absurd lies is manufactured by “think tanks” in order to drown those gems of embarrassing truth that escaped the Google censors or the control of the corporate media. Here in the US, the concern is generated by driving past miles of closed factories, stores and restaurants. The government plans to send out small checks to cover up to 5% of economic losses of the working poor who were always no more than 3 weeks from homelessness. Now they can’t be thrown out on the street, not for awhile anyway, law has prevented this but the lost income will never be replaced, income that paid insurance, health care for children, bought food and clothing and that American lifestyle of fast food, cable television and continual texting. Those jobs, the restaurants and shops, many of the factories, no longer exist. No bail out can save them in a permanently retracted economy that will never be able to reabsorb millions of workers whose livelihood was governed by economic fakery. Where two weeks before stores were emptied, now the money that financed buying carloads of toilet paper has dwindled away. No one talks of this. No one reports this. No one asks where 200 million Americans are, how they feed their kids, how they spend their days, and how fear is playing on their vulnerability. There is no social welfare state in America. The benefits for retirees, Medicare and Social Security, are being chipped away by “conservative” politics. Health care for veterans, and there are many millions of former military whose lives were destroyed while America destroyed the Middle East, has disappeared, unspoken of and unreported. Veterans are being told they are being removed from health care and can no longer be treated, including and especially the totally disabled combat veterans. Supplies don’t exist, the pharmacies are out of medications and it didn’t start with COVID 19, it began with Donald Trump. Veterans’ health care, the largest health care system in the world, disappeared when no one was looking. It is dead and gone. It will never be reported, no organization will complain to congress because, you see, if you aren’t a bank or oil company, one of those with their hands out for $6 trillion in free money from the Trump regime, you don’t exist. A few paragraphs ago we mentioned the massive lawsuit against China. The assumption that China created COVID 19 is based on an important research paper written in 2015 that tied a research facility in Wuhan to a study on a bat virus that created something capable of infecting the world, a disease exactly like COVID 19. This is the origin of the “blame China” ploy, just like the blame Russia for fake gas attacks in Syria or when the Kiev regime shot down MH17. All that was needed was a fake court, fake evidence and controlled media. With the accusation against China, all that is needed is for China to be tied, in this case for supplying a virus, to a dangerous terror group, to a global pandemic. The terror group, as we discovered was the USAID, a CIA affiliate that used the Wuhan virus to create something frightening at the University of North Carolina, not in Wuhan. A lawsuit and trial will condemn China in a rigged American court. Experts, so many experts, who saw China defeat the disease in weeks while it has run rampant across the US, have come to believe that the US was always the origin and that COVID 19 had been around for some time inside the US before showing up in China. What is strange is that some questions are never asked. Why so many die in Northern Italy? The best hospitals in the world are there, no transportation hubs, no ties to “Wuhan” and no bio-warfare labs? Are they being experimented on? Then we have Detroit, another anomaly. A city of all private homes, a city filled with poor, a disease spread rapidly through a community that uses no public transportation and that has been housebound by weather for months. No one looks for a “patient zero” or “super-spreader,” a term used in studies on bio-terrorism. The other untold story is the restructuring of America’s employment environment, no trade unions anymore, no contracts, no benefits, no guarantees, the war on the worker that Reagan began and Bush (43) won behind the smokescreen of 9/11 and the fake War on Terror. You see, injured workers seldom qualify for benefits and those laid off because of economic slowdowns are denied benefits though processes of fake accusations and legal trickery. It gets worse, if you are injured on a job, let’s say a piece of heavy equipment breaks and you are seriously injured. Not only will you likely never receive wage compensation, but you are likely to be denied needed medical care as well. Medical treatment is often withheld, other than enough to make sure you don’t die right away, until a “hearings process” is exhausted, which can take up to two years. During that time, a physical injury will often lead to permanent crippling and care, when it becomes available eventually, is palliative only, often opiate pain relievers. This is what is meant when it is said that the social welfare “SafetyNet” in the US has disappeared. This is where 200 million Americans without hope now live, to fend for themselves and watch television, being told day and night to hate China and wait for a check with Donald Trump’s signature that might buy tires for a car that was repossessed.

[whatshappeninginchile]

One million Chileans march in Santiago, city grinds to halt

By Dave Sherwood and Natalia A. Ramos Miranda

SANTIAGO (Reuters) - As many as a million Chileans protested peacefully late into the evening on Friday in the capital Santiago in the biggest rallies yet since violence broke out a week ago over entrenched inequality in the South American nation.

Protesters waving national flags, dancing, banging pots with wooden spoons and bearing placards urging political and social change streamed through the streets, walking for miles (km) from around Santiago to converge on Plaza Italia.Traffic already hobbled by truck and taxi drivers protesting road tolls ground to a standstill in Santiago as crowds shut down major avenues and public transport closed early ahead of marches that built throughout the afternoon.

By mid-evening, most had made their way home in the dark ahead of an 11 p.m. military curfew.

Santiago Governor Karla Rubilar said a million people marched in the capital - more than five percent of the country’s population. Protesters elsewhere took to the streets in every major Chilean city.

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“Today is a historic day,” Rubilar wrote on Twitter. “The Metropolitan Region is host to a peaceful march of almost one million people who represent a dream for a new Chile.”

Some local commentators estimated the Santiago rally well over the million mark, describing it as the largest single march since the dying years of the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet.

Chile’s unrest is the latest in a flare-up of protests in South America and around the world - from Beirut to Barcelona - each with local triggers but also sharing underlying anger at social disparities and ruling elites.

Protests in Chile that started over a hike in public transport fares last Friday boiled into riots, arson and looting that have killed at least 17 people, injured hundreds, resulted in more than 7,000 arrests and caused more than $1.4 billion of losses to Chilean businesses.

Chile’s military has taken over security in Santiago, a city of 6 million people now under a state of emergency with night-time curfews as 20,000 soldiers patrol the streets.

Clotilde Soto, a retired teacher aged 82, said she had taken to the streets because she did not want to die without seeing change for the better in her country.

“Above all we need better salaries and better pensions,” she said.

Chile’s center-right President Sebastian Pinera, a billionaire businessman, trounced the opposition in the most recent 2017 election, dealing the center-left ruling coalition its biggest loss since the country’s return to democracy in 1990.

But as protests ignited this week, Pinera scrapped previous plans and promised instead to boost the minimum wage and pensions, ditch fare hikes on public transportation and fix the country’s ailing health care system.

“We’ve all heard the message. We’ve all changed,” said Pinera on Twitter following the peak of the rallies. “Today’s joyful and peaceful march, in which Chileans have asked for a more just and unified Chile, opens hopeful paths into the future.”

Still, many protest placards, chants and graffiti scrawled on buildings around the city call for his exit.

MULTICOLORED CROWD

As crowds of colorful demonstrators stretched along Santiago’s thoroughfares as far as the eye could see, the noise of pots and pans being clanged with spoons, a clamor that has become the soundtrack for the popular uprising, was ear-splitting.

“The people, united, will never be defeated,” the crowds chanted over the din.

By early evening there had been no signs of violence or clashes with the security forces, who maintained a significant but low-key presence inside paint-spattered and stone-dented armored vehicles parked in side streets.

Beatriz Demur, 42, a yoga teacher from the suburb of Barrio Brazil, joined a stream of demonstrators shuffling toward Plaza Italia with her daughter Tabatha, 22.

“We want Chile to be a better place,” said Demur. “The most powerful have privatized everything. It’s been that way for 30 years.”Eyeing the crowds packing the square, her daughter said: “I have waited for this a long time ... It’s not scary, it’s exciting. It means change.”

Slideshow (35 Images)

Anali Parra, 26, a street hawker, was with her daughter Catalina, 9, and five-month-old son Gideon Jesus, his buggy decked in streamers and an indigenous Mapuche flag.

“This isn’t going to go away,” Parra said. “Pinera should just go now.”

‘URGENT’ REFORMS

On Friday morning, trucks, cars and taxis had slowed to a crawl on major roads, honking horns and waving Chilean flags. “No more tolls! Enough with the abuse!” read bright yellow-and-red signs plastered to the front of vehicles.

Many bus drivers in Santiago also staged a walk-off on Friday after one of their number was shot.

While much of wealthy east Santiago has remained calm under evening lockdown, the poorer side of the city has seen widespread vandalism and looting.

Pinera told the nation on Thursday he had heard the demands of Chileans “loud and clear.”

He has sent lawmakers legislation to overturn a recent hike in electricity rates, and called for reforms to guarantee a minimum wage of $480 a month and introduce state medical insurance for catastrophes.

Seated with a group of elderly Chileans over lunch on Friday, Pinera put finishing touches on a bill to hike minimum pensions by 20%. “We must approve these projects with the urgency that Chileans demand,” Pinera said.

Lawmakers pushing the reforms forward were nonetheless forced to evacuate the country’s Congress in the port city of Valparaiso earlier in the day when angry protesters rushed the building, overwhelming security forces.

An online poll conducted by local company Activa Research of 2,090 people between Oct. 22-23 found 83% of respondents said they supported the goals of the demonstrators, but 72.5% opposed violence as a method of protest.

The principal causes of the protests were low salaries, high utility prices, poor pensions and economic inequality, it said.

Reporting by Dave Sherwood; Additional reporting by Natalia Ramos, Aislinn Laing and Fabian Cambero; Writing by Dave Sherwood; Editing by Andrew Cawthorne, Daniel Wallis and Sandra Maler

source: Reuters

[zayaanhashistory]

Bleeding Kansas

Bleeding Kansas describes the period of repeated outbreaks of violent guerrilla warfare between pro-slavery and anti-slavery forces following the creation of the new territory of Kansas in 1854. In all, some 55 people were killed between 1855 and 1859. The struggle intensified the ongoing debate over the future of slavery in the United States and served as a key precursor to the Civil War. 

By early 1854, with the United States expanding rapidly westward, Congress had begun debating a proposed bill to organize the former Louisiana Purchase lands then known as the Nebraska Territory. To get crucial southern votes for the bill, Senator Stephen Douglas of Illinois proposed an amendment that effectively repealed the Missouri Compromise, which had outlawed the extension of slavery north of the 36º 30’ parallel (Missouri’s southern border) except in Missouri itself. Passed over fierce opposition in Congress and signed into law in 1854, the Kansas-Nebraska Act created the territories of Kansas and Nebraska and gave each the right to decide whether or not to permit slavery when it joined the Union. Douglas believed that popular sovereignty, as this idea was known, would resolve the ongoing sectional debate between North and South over slavery’s extension into the territories. The Kansas-Nebraska Act divided Douglas’ Democratic Party and inspired the formation of the Republican Party, which opposed extending slavery into new territory. While Nebraska was so far north that it was virtually guaranteed to become a free state, Kansas bordered the slave state of Missouri. Over the next seven years, Kansas became a battleground over the future of slavery in the United States.  

In New England, a group of abolitionists formed the Emigrant Aid Company, which sent anti-slavery settlers to Kansas to ensure it would become a free territory. On the other side, thousands of pro-slavery Missourians flooded into the new territory to illegally vote in Kansas’ first territorial election in November 1854. Pro-slavery candidate John Whitfield easily defeated two Free Soil candidates to become the territory’s delegate to Congress, with only half the ballots cast by registered voters. In March 1855, when elections took place for the first territorial legislature, thousands of heavily armed “border ruffians” showed up in Kansas again. Through illegal votes and intimidation of anti-slavery voters, they ensured the election of a slate of pro-slavery legislators. Northerners and other anti-slavery settlers refused to accept this government and set up their own. Some of these Free Staters, known as “jayhawkers,” armed themselves in preparation for clashes with pro-slavery forces. As tensions increased within the territory, President Franklin Pierce recognized the pro-slavery legislature as the only legitimate government of Kansas.  Sporadic outbursts of violence occurred between pro-and anti-slavery forces in late 1855 and early 1856. In a sharp escalation of that violence, a pro-slavery group stormed the Free State stronghold of Lawrence on May 21, 1856, destroying printing presses, looting homes and stores and setting fire to a hotel. In response to the “Sack of Lawrence,” as it became known, the abolitionist John Brown marched through Pottawatomie Valley in Kansas territory on May 24 along with seven men, including four of his sons. Determined to confront pro-slavery settlers, the group dragged five men from their homes along Pottawatomie Creek and brutally killed them. Despite the visibility of the violence in Kansas, relatively few of the settlers in the new territory were deeply invested in the conflict over slavery. Many of those listed on the pro-slavery side were poor farmers who didn’t even enslave people, while few anti-slavery settlers were champions of Black rights. Both groups simply wanted land for themselves and their families, but were caught up in the ongoing battle that was tearing the nation apart. 

The upheaval in Kansas captured the attention of the entire nation and even spread to Congress. Two days before Brown’s attack in Pottawatomie, Representative Preston Brooks of South Carolina beat Senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts with his cane on the Senate floor in retaliation for Sumner’s angry speech denouncing supporters of slavery in Kansas (including Brooks’ cousin, Senator Andrew Butler of South Carolina). In July 1856, pro-slavery forces suppressed a meeting of the Free State government in Topeka, another anti-slavery stronghold. Brown again retaliated, leading his supporters in guerrilla attacks at Black Jack and Osawatomie. That fall, newly appointed territorial governor John Geary ordered armed settlers to disperse, and the violence waned. In late 1857, Free Staters boycotted the vote to send delegates to a constitutional convention at Lecompton, citing illegal pro-slavery influences on the election. Seeking to quickly resolve the issue of Kansas statehood, President James Buchanan pushed Congress to accept the Lecompton Constitution, despite overwhelming opposition from Douglas and others who saw it as an illegal violation of popular sovereignty. As a compromise, Congress sent the Lecompton Constitution back to Kansas for another vote in August 1858; this time Free Staters voted, and the constitution was rejected. 

Though attention on Kansas had waned after 1856, sporadic violence continued, including the murder of a group of Free Staters along the Marais des Cygnes River in May 1858 and the temporary return of Brown, who led a raid to liberate a group of enslaved people in the winter of 1858-59. Brown’s role in the violence in Kansas helped him raise money for his raid on Harpers Ferry in Virginia in 1859. The raid failed, and Brown was executed, becoming a martyr to the abolitionist cause. The unsettled situation in Kansas was still a matter of heated controversy during the 1858 Senate race in Illinois, when the former one-term congressman Abraham Lincoln, now a Republican, challenged Douglas for his Senate seat. Lincoln lost that race but his eloquent performance in their series of debates helped revive his political career and earn him a national reputation by 1860. 

Though Kansas adopted a free state constitution in a convention at Wyandotte in 1859, pro-slavery forces in the Senate refused to let the territory enter the Union as a free state. Only after the Confederate states seceded in the wake of Lincoln’s election in 1860 did Congress approve the Wyandotte Constitution. Kansas entered the Union in January 1861, barely three months before the Civil War began. 

[mostlysignssomeportents]

The CARES Shock Doctrine

It's been 13 years since Naomi Klein's Shock Doctrine described the neoliberal playbook: crises are seized as a moment to smuggle in policies that could not pass public muster under normal circumstances, ratcheting private gains at public expense. https://tsd.naomiklein.org/shock-doctrine.html In March, Congress pass the CARES Act, sweeping law that nominally offered relief to Americans. It was the opening salvo in a fusillade of interventions whose workings are poorly understood - which have served to make the already wealthy immeasurably wealthier. If you've wondered how the stock and bond markets could be soaring even as unemployment has also climbed to apocalyptic levels, as an eviction crisis looms, as Americans form mile-long lines for food banks -- this is how. If you're only going to read one longread this week, read Robert Brenner's "Escalating Plunder," in the New Left Review. It's long, but not as long as the legislation it analyzes, and it is much, much clearer about what that legislation accomplishes. https://newleftreview.org/issues/II123/articles/robert-brenner-escalating-plunder Start with the full scope of the bailout: the $454b that Congress gave to America's largest corporations is table-stakes. Congress also created a bull market in corporate debt by guaranteeing to buy bonds issued by the companies if no one else wanted them. Even junk bonds issued by companies whose mismanagement and corporate autophagia - buybacks, executive compensation, layoffs - had driven them to death's door BEFORE the crisis. That guarantee allowed corporate America a tenfold leverage of its "relief" through debt, yielding ~$4.54 TRILLION. The public's relief budget - unemployment, cash, and student loans weighed in at a mere $603B. Put that another way: the USG just handed the largest companies in the US 200% of their total annual profits in "relief," with no strings attached, save for some minor constraints on the aviation industry. And while the bills that created this corporate welfare program originated with Senate Republicans, that's only because Congressional Dems explictly asked them to do so, abdicated Congress's power of the purse to let the GOP decide who would get money, and how much. It's hard not to interpret this as Dems handing the donor class a cash bribe on the eve of an election. It's not just letting the Senate write the bills - it's passing them by "voice vote," which lets Dem Congressjerks vote in favor without having their support recorded. It's an unbelievably idiotic piece of tactics, a bet that corporations will reward Dem complicity with GOP looting by helping Dems, instead of the GOP. The bet that plutes will hate racism more than they love money is painfully stupid. Contrast that with what Dems COULD have spent on: health care, more unemployment/paycheck protection, food and rent money. The could have DARED the GOP to deny Americans the basics of human survival - again, on the eve of an historic election. Instead, they sat idly by as the Fed's bond guarantee ensured a supply of easy money for corporations whose ability to borrow had vanished prior to the crisis as investors had finally wised up to the foolishness of loaning to firms dedicated to devouring themselves. That ready access to credit then boosted the stock market: the bull market for bonds begat a bull market in stocks. If you want to know how America's billionaires made more billions during the crisis, that's how. It's not merely investor confidence in e-commerce that made Bezos his excess billions: its Amazon's ability to borrow $10 BILLION AT 0.4 PERCENT ON A THREE YEAR BOND. The corporate wing of the Dems is pretty open about all this. Look at Richard Neal, who trumpeted that he wasn't voting for "stimulus" (which would help all of us), but rather "relief" - for the investors and execs he'd just bailed out. Neal was an architect of the post-2008 bailouts too, playing a key role in the decision not to help everyday Americans - who had been preyed upon by unimaginably wealthy financiers - with their mortgages, but rather, to make the finance sector whole. (Neal is at the center of another scandal: Leaked internal comms from the Mass College Dems reveal that they conspired to smear Neal's primary opponent, Alex Morse, with false sexual abuse allegations) https://theintercept.com/2020/08/11/college-democrats-alex-morse-richard-neal/ Congressional Dems have, once again, snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. The CARES Act they let the GOP write and then rammed through into law includes $174b worth of new tax breaks for the super-rich that were jettisoned from Trump's 2019 tax bill as too extreme. We are living through a shock doctrine. This could be the moment in which America recognizes the brittleness of its public sphere and corporate arrangements and restructures them to survive the wave of climate emergencies on our horizon. Instead, both parties have conspired to double down on that brittleness, that fragility, that precarity, with hardly a peep in objection from lawmakers in either house. The major exception, naturally, is AOC, who called it "One of the largest corporate bailouts with as few strings as possible in American history [with] crumbs for our families." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DJO_-0cenc

[newstfionline]

How Andrés Manuel López Obrador will remake Mexico

The Economist, Jun 23rd 2018

Mexico City and Villahermosa, Tabasco--Even a short walk in Tabasco can feel unbearable. When Graham Greene visited Mexico 80 years ago, he lamented the tropical southern state’s “blinding heat and the mosquito-noisy air” that left “no escape for anyone at all”. Now Tabascans can at least endure the humidity with fans and air-conditioning. But half of the state’s residents are poor and electricity prices are among the highest in the country. Twenty-three years ago a local politician decided to do something radical. Andrés Manuel López Obrador (known as AMLO), fresh from an unsuccessful run for governor, organised a campaign of “civil resistance”, instructing Tabascans not to pay their electricity bills.

The campaign has lasted for over two decades. Some 570,000 Tabascan households have racked up debts with the Federal Electricity Commission (CFE) averaging 10,500 pesos ($500) each. In 2015 the CFE began another bout of cutting off non-payers. Mr López Obrador, by then head of his newly created party, the Movement for National Regeneration (Morena), summoned a brigade of vigilante electricians to reconnect them. He also warned the state’s governor, Arturo Núñez Jiménez, that his palatial office would suffer power cuts were he to try disconnecting people again.

These events sum up what many Mexicans have long liked about Mr López Obrador, and what others fear. His concern for the poor and wish to improve their lot is sincere. However, Mr López Obrador has a shaky grasp of economics--urging some people not to pay their bills tends to drive up prices for everyone else, for example. And he has little respect for rules or institutions. This matters because Mr López Obrador is set to become Mexico’s president in an election on July 1st. He has a poll lead of 25 points over his nearest challenger, Ricardo Anaya of the conservative National Action Party (PAN). José Antonio Meade, a non-party candidate picked by the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), is further adrift. There is also a chance that a coalition led by Morena, founded four years ago, will win control of congress.

Mexicans are likely to deliver a voto de castigo (punishment vote) because the president, Enrique Peña Nieto of the PRI, is the least popular leader for decades. People are also angry at the PAN. Though the PAN turfed the PRI from power in 2000, ending seven decades of one-party rule, it failed to govern much better and the PRI returned under Mr Peña in 2012.

Mr López Obrador promises drastic change. Mexico will have a charismatic president for the first time since the 19th century, says Enrique Krauze, a historian who first called him a “tropical messiah”. On the campaign trail he says that a “fourth transformation” of Mexico is coming, after independence in 1821, a civil war and liberal reforms in the 1850s and 1860s, and a revolution that began in 1910. The change will be “as profound” as the revolution, but “without violence”, he promises. He vows to overthrow the “mafia of power”, that he believes holds back Mexico.

When he says he will “uproot the corrupt regime”, he is talking about everyone in the political class except himself and his circle. His opponents say he wants to unravel the market-friendly policies that the PRI and PAN have cleaved to since the 1980s. Some fear that in a country where democracy is barely old enough to order a tequila, a charismatic populist might seriously undermine it.

Mexicans are fed up. During 30 years of growing democracy and economic liberalisation, they were told that Mexico would become a rich country. Income per head has risen by 40% over the same period. But growth has been uneven. The parts of the country near the United States have prospered while peasants in the south still toil outdoors in the sun. The economy has been sluggish in recent years, partly thanks to a low oil price. Meanwhile, Mexicans are furious about corruption and terrified of gang violence.

Mr López Obrador governed Mexico City between 2000 and 2005, before unsuccessful presidential runs with the centre-left Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) in 2006 and 2012. The question as he seeks the presidency for a third time is whether he will fix some of what is wrong with Mexico, or replace its (admittedly imperfect) institutions with a more personal and messianic style of government.

The acronym of Mr López Obrador’s party is an allusion to La Virgen Morena of Guadalupe, Mexico’s patron saint. It is also a term used to describe darker-skinned Mexicans, who often live in the poor south. The gap between Mexico’s richest and poorest regions is twice as wide as the next-biggest one in the OECD, in Chile. That is partly because the North American Free-Trade Agreement largely benefited northern Mexico, where American firms built factories and created millions of jobs. Mr Núñez says Tabasco is “forgotten” by central government, a feeling many southerners share.

Mr López Obrador, who would become the first president born south of Mexico City in half a century, wants to redress the imbalance. He has plans for new infrastructure in the south, vowing to pave every road in Oaxaca, a mountainous state with a poverty rate of 70%. He also promises a railway from Quintana Roo to Chiapas, and a road and rail corridor across the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, in Oaxaca and Veracruz, paid for with loans from China. He would also build two oil refineries, in Campeche and Tabasco. A fanciful scheme for “food self-sufficiency” would include price guarantees for crops produced by southern farmers.

Winning votes in the south was never hard for Mr López Obrador. What is different this time is that northerners, who used to worry that he would wreck the economy, are warming to him. Incredibly, he is now more popular among the richest third of voters than among the poorest. “He has matured,” insists Rafael De Dávila, a previously PAN-voting electrical engineer in Escobedo, a suburb of Monterrey, the state capital of fast-growing Nuevo León.

That may be true. Mr López Obrador has courted voters who wearily recall his antics in 2006, when his protesting supporters shut down Mexico City for months after he lost the presidential election narrowly to Felipe Calderón. He is making fewer mistakes on the campaign trail this time. Advisers have, for example, persuaded him to drop contentious plans for a referendum to repeal energy reforms, which in 2014 allowed foreign oil firms into Mexico for the first time since 1938.

His campaign produces lighthearted videos, most recently a series featuring middle-class Mexicans confessing to friends and family that they are “AMLOvers”. Crucially, he is more relaxed. When rumours spread that Russia was meddling in the election to favour him, he responded with a video on social media. Standing by a harbour, he introduced himself with a smile as “Andrés Manuelovich” and said he was waiting for a submarine to arrive with a delivery of Russian gold.

His argument that the political system is broken has been assisted by the torrid tenure of Mr Peña, who entered office on a wave of optimism. Mr Peña forged a coalition of Mexico’s main parties to pass sweeping reforms and aimed for growth of 6% by the end of his term. But the most important changes--to energy and education--will take years to be felt. The collapse of oil prices in 2014 hurt the economy. Under Mr Peña the economy has grown by only 2.5% a year.

Mr Peña is unpopular mainly because his government has been passive and unaccountable on the two issues that matter most to Mexicans, corruption and security. Mr Peña vowed to halve a murder rate that had rocketed after his predecessor, Mr Calderón, sent the army to fight drug cartels. But after locking up several drug kingpins, his administration did not respond when their would-be heirs began to fight each other and diversify beyond drug smuggling. Mexico is on course for 32,000 murders this year, a record high and double the toll in 2014.

The best-known violent crime during Mr Peña’s tenure was the disappearance in 2014 of 43 student teachers, who were pulled off buses and almost certainly murdered. An early investigation was botched. Later ones showed that local officials and drug gangs were shockingly entwined. Mr López Obrador’s rivals talk about a “smarter” approach to crime. He offers a vague “amnesty” to low-level drug dealers. Many Mexicans, hungry for peace, think he cannot do worse than today’s government.

Then there is corruption. Under Mr Peña, it has grown more blatant, or at least been exposed more effectively. Two ministries run by Rosario Robles, now secretary of agrarian development, saw 1.3bn pesos vanish from their coffers. Several governors from the PRI face charges of treating state funds as personal piggy banks. The government is accused of shelving a bribery investigation into Emilio Lozoya, a member of Mr Peña’s campaign team who went on to run Pemex, the state oil firm. During Mr Peña’s tenure Mexico has fallen 30 places in Transparency International’s corruption index. It is now 135th, tied with Russia.

Any public faith that Mr Peña would curb graft melted away in 2014 when a journalist revealed that his wife’s $7m house had belonged to a businessman who had won several contracts under his presidency. Under previous governments, crooked bigwigs would typically build, say, a road and take a cut, explains Armando Santacruz of Mexico United Against Crime, an NGO. Now, he says, they invoice for the road, funnel the money through phantom companies, build nothing and run off with all the loot.

Corruption has grown more visible not because the state is adept at investigating it but because of a nascent civil society and social media. In 2015 when David Korenfeld, boss of the state water authority, took a government helicopter to go on holiday with his family, a neighbour snapped some photos of them and their suitcases. Mr Korenfeld, an old friend of Mr Peña, resigned after the images went viral.

Mr Peña’s government has hampered the fight against corruption. Civil-society leaders and journalists say they report corruption to ministers, but nothing happens. Institutions to catch and prosecute graft remain pliable and neglected. Critics point to a bribery scandal involving Odebrecht, a Brazilian construction firm, which has led to people being charged in nearly every Latin American country. The exceptions are despotic Venezuela--and Mexico.

Mr López Obrador promises to “eliminate, not reduce” corruption through an attitude of zero tolerance and the shining example of his own incorruptibility. Yet in 2003 while he was mayor of Mexico City René Bejarano, a close political associate, was caught on video accepting $45,000 in cash from a businessman. As mayor he refused to enforce rulings from the supreme court, including one to clear a bottling factory taken over by striking workers. He was the superior arbiter in this case, he explained, because the court lacked “social sensitivity”. He seems uninterested in creating the independent institutions needed to expose and prosecute graft effectively. “He thinks there will be a big bag of corruption money he can find and spend on the poor,” huffs an aide to a rival candidate.

Mr López Obrador pledges referendums to solve policy questions, including a recall vote every two years during his presidential term. To some that looks like accountability. To others it is a troubling break with representative democracy and the principle of single-term presidencies enshrined by the revolution.

In stump speeches Mr López Obrador touts a brand of austere populism. There can be “no rich government with a poor populace,” he says. He vows to halve the president’s salary and those of senior bureaucrats, refrain from spending public money on clothes, sell the presidential plane and move the official residence to somewhere more humble. He derides a $13bn airport proposed for Mexico City, saying that its construction was unnecessary and riddled with corruption. Government ministries in the capital are to be scattered around the country.

Strangely absent from this populist brew is anti-Americanism, despite the unpopularity of America’s president. Mr López Obrador insists he will not recklessly provoke Donald Trump. “We have to have enough patience to get to grips with President Donald Trump, to maintain the relationship,” he said on June 10th.

To soothe fears that he would be fiscally irresponsible, he is rumoured to be adding to his team Guillermo Ortiz, a former chief of the central bank, and Santiago Levy of the Inter-American Development Bank. Their task will be to find the money to pay for their boss’s policies. The most expensive include a universal pension for the elderly and disabled, scholarships for poor students and an overhaul of water infrastructure. Those promises alone would cost 1.7% of GDP each year at a time when the budget deficit is 2.9% of GDP.

Unlike Mr Trump, who abhors policy details, Mr López Obrador obsesses over them. One adviser recounts his poring over the party’s 461-page election manifesto and crossing out policies he deemed unaffordable. As mayor of Mexico City he worked with the private sector to refurbish the city centre. He did not run up huge debts and left office with an approval rating of 85%. All this points to a pragmatic streak. Optimists hope that he will offset extra spending with cuts elsewhere.

Pessimists note that Hugo Chávez initially posed as a moderate, too. Mr López Obrador will surely not plunge Mexico into tyranny and destitution the way Chávez did Venezuela. But many question his sincerity. If he really cares about curbing corruption, why did he enlist Napoleón Gómez Urrutia, a mining-union leader accused of embezzling millions of dollars, as a senate candidate for his party? If the PRI is part of the mafia of power, why is he encouraging its senior officials to join him? And if he truly cares about the poor, why does he vow to roll back reforms that would make their schools better by hiring teachers on the basis of merit?

The most likely answer to these questions is a cynical one. His young party needs foot-soldiers to knock on doors and get out the vote. Last year it had just 320,000 members, according to the National Electoral Institute. The PRI had double that in the state of Puebla alone. By opposing education reforms, Mr López Obrador wins the support of a 100,000-strong teachers’ union. His overtures to Mr Urrutia, whose union boasts 120,000 members, will bring more recruits and lure other union bosses. The trickle of PRI officials defecting to Morena may become a flood if the PRI is thrashed on election day.

One thing looks certain. In whichever direction he takes Mexico, resistance will be weak. For the first time a single party is set to control the presidency, capital and congress all at once. Presidents in the 20th century were subservient to the PRI. Mr López Obrador has created a party which answers to him. Every other party faces destruction at the polls with only a divided PAN in a position to oppose him.

[informational-king]

Modi attacks Congress at Assam election rally, NDA ensures peace and development - by Informational king Team

Modi attacks Congress at Assam election rally, NDA ensures peace and development – by Informational king Team

By Team news service Guwahati: Attacking the Congress during its election campaign in Assam, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday called the grand old party a “loot engine” to fill the northeast state at any cost “to come to power” Is desperate “Empty Coffers”. Mocking the guarantees given to the Congress by the people when they came to power in Assam, Modi said that the opposition party gave a…

[deanewaldman]

American Freedom of Speech Has Been "Abridged"

Do Americans still have the right to speak their minds freely as guaranteed by the First Amendment? Apparently not, as one 19-year-old can attest.

Newly professional bike racer Quinn Simmons lost his job when he supported President Trump with one word. A Dutch journalist, Jose Been, had tweeted that he hopes "this horrible presidency ends for you [referring to Americans], adding, "if you follow me and support Trump, you can go." Cyclist Simmons tweeted back, "Bye." Officials of cycling team, Trek-Segafredo, fired Simmons claiming his tweet was "divisive, incendiary, and detrimental to the team." When a different tweet accused Simmons of being "a Trumper," he replied with a picture of the American flag. Apparently, this added to the incendiary and divisive nature of his speech.

The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was intentionally placed at the top of the list of fundamental American rights. The founding fathers thought the most important right was to protect our freedom to communicate from over-reach by a federal government.

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances." Every American should know this Amendment by heart and abide by it.

Progressives certainly know it, but they do not abide by it. They "abridge" (curtail) the freedom of speech of anyone with a different view, especially those who support President Trump. Progressive radicals, calling themselves liberals, in positions of authority or with media presence, such as broadcasters and Hollywood celebrities, may speak freely and falsely against President Trump. Dissenters cannot. Furthermore, progressives believe they are free to incite to sedition, violence, riot, and looting, even though such speech and actions are illegal read more...

Visit “Fixing US Healthcare” for more Info!!

[surly01]

It Can’t Happen Here

The media here is the opposition party. They don’t understand this country. They still do not understand why Donald Trump is the president of the United States.”

Originally published on the Doomstead Diner on June 2, 2020

"I swear to the Lord, I still can't see, why Democracy means, everybody but me." –Langston Hughes

I'm old enough to remember when White America was outraged– OUTRAGED, I say– when H. Rap Brown offered America the simple truth that "Violence is an American as cherry pie" in July of 1967 at a press conference in Washington, D.C. That was long before the Chicago police and the FBI murdered a sleeping Fred Hampton in December of 1969.

I'm old enough to remember WMD. Remember those?  "Yellowcake," the excuse for a Republican administration lying us into the wrong war, with Fox News and Hate Radio accusing those opposed of treason. Remember The Great Recession?  Presided over by a Republican president who having pissed away the Clinton budget surplus on tax cuts (and more tax cuts) for a war based on lies?  The effects of which then exacerbated by Republicans in Congress determined to sabotage whatever Obama might have tried to ease the suffering of millions?

Memory: the liberal superpower. But the long history of this country is written in blood, built on the bones of the indigenous, the slave, the immigrant laborer, and other "conditional citizens," whose rights to "life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness" are conditioned upon not being locked on by a police searchlight or targeted by police weapons.

There has been an open season on black American males with no bag limit. Cops are able to summarily execute black Americans with minimal, if any, consequence. Hence the long overdue rising which has bubbled over this week In response to the on-video murders of George Floyd, and before him Ahmaud Arbery. But a list of the dead would be a roll call of ignominy: Breonna Taylor, Freddie Gray, Michael Brown, Eric Garner, Tamir Rice, Philando Castile…

In late stage capitalism, where everything has been commoditized, where almost all speech is marketing, no one should be surprised that police are the occupation army of capital. Occupation armies treat the citizenry as hostile. Expect no less on America's streets.

Yet the brutality and direct targeting of journalists is new for this country, another milestone in the march to fascism.

Trump has sown hatred of the press for years, borrowing techniques more often seen in third world dictatorships, Now journalists are under assault from police and protesters alike.

On Friday, while reporting on live TV, CNN's Omar Jimenez and his crew was arrested as the crew covered George Floyd protests.  CNN reported that the arresting officers were from the Minnesota State Patrol. The reason for their arrests was not immediately clear, but was later attributed to orders issued by Gov. Tim Walz to clear the area.

CNN's Josh Campbell, also reporting from the area but not standing with the on-air crew, said he, too, was approached by police, but was allowed to remain. Jimenez is black and Latino, while Campbell is white. For his part, Walz apologized to CNN, saying there was "absolutely no reason" for the arrests and that he took "full responsibility."

Elsewhere around the country, journalists were harassed and targeted by police.

In Louisville, a police officer fired pepper balls at a local TV reporter, Kaitlin Rust. In Denver, police fired paintballs and tear gas, hitting a news photographer and his camera. Bellingcat has documented at least 50 separate incidents where journalists have been attacked by law enforcement.

Those who say that Trump's rhetoric is just harmless bloviating are kidding themselves. We are watching a real time devolution to fascism, American-style. Steve Bannon may be gone from the White House grounds, but his message lives on. The press is the enemy, says Bannon.

The media here is the opposition party. They don’t understand this country. They still do not understand why Donald Trump is the president of the United States.”

But they're going to understand it good and hard. Bannon's advice is to “flood the zone with shit,” overwhelming the media with disinformation, distraction, and denial. After three and a half years, the American press finds itself having gone from being called names to becoming targets of police suppression. Late Tuesday, Trump emerged from his bunker for a photo op and a message of repression.

"At this point we should probably just be called the states of america."

–Sarah Silverman

Trust in the government has steadily eroded ever since the Warren Commission report. Vietnam, death tolls. Pentagon Papers. Iran-Contra and that lying lout Oliver North. Pardons all around. Yellowcake. Cooked intel. War in Iraq after 9-11. Concealment, deception and outright lies have characterized U.S. national security policy for decades. So little surprise that some people are willing to dismiss appeals to authority and evidence-based claims.

Others are as eager and willing as ever to turn over their legal rights to a legally spurious junta making it up as they go along.

Far-Right extremists Are showing up, hoping to Turn the George Floyd Protests Into a new civil war. They show up in cars with license plates removed, and often dress in "antifa" drag, wearing the black goodies associated with "black bloc" anarchists. Plus it appears that Agents provocateur may now be part of the standard policing playbook for dealing with protest. For those interested, the blog Just Security has published an analysis of these infiltration tactics, particularly those of "accelerationists," an extreme subset of white nationalism whose goal is to bring about chaos and destruction via a Charles Mansonesque race war.

Many reports from Minnesota of cars without license plates. When approached by police the occupants scatter on foot. Here is one.

During Occupy I told anyone who would listen to assume that anyone exhorting you to violence is a cop or a spy. Now you can add infiltrator to the mix.

Trump called the protesters “thugs” and threatened to have them shot. “When the looting starts, the shooting starts,” he tweeted, parroting a former Miami police chief whose words spurred race riots in the late 1960s. Marvelous deflection from the over 100,000 deaths Trump has caused by his mishandling of the Covid-19 pandemic. All the better to drive Whites into the arms of the assorted fascists, grifters and neo-Confederates that comprise the Trump regime.

And we learn that "antifa," that all purpose blamesicle beloved of the alt-right, (and which is not an organized group), is to be designated as "terrorist organization." As with so many Trump pronunciamentos, the government has no existing legal authority to label any domestic group in the manner it currently designates foreign terrorist organizations.

Antifa just means "anti-fascist;" It's not a club holding monthly meetings.  But for the fuzzy thinkers of the right, antifa is some centrally controlled, George Soros-funded Monolith of The Resistance. Within the cult of perpetual victimhood that defines the drooling right in this country, antifa is a made-to-order whipping boy.

Why does he get away with it? The complicit beltway media and their apparatchik bosses whose fat livings depend on Republicans returning their phone calls. And whose stock in trade is "bothsiderism" punctuated by "whataboutism." A.J. Liebling famously said, "Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one." And the bookers and producers understand that and follow their assigned scripts, all of which support the existing system and the preservation of capital.

This week we learned that the only way to protest correctly is show up armed with guns at a state capitol.

10 steps to closing societies and to totalitarianism.

Invoke a terrifying internal and external enemy. Create secret prisons where torture takes place. Develop a thug caste or paramilitary force not answerable to citizens. Set up an internal surveillance system. Infiltrate and harass citizens' groups. Engage in arbitrary detention and release. Target key individuals. Control the press. Cast criticism as espionage and dissent as treason. Subvert the rule of law.

–Naomi Wolf

We should have undone the so-called PATRIOT Act and other pernicious laws before now. Indefinite detention, anyone? Trump and Barr will exploit the far corners of American law to hound their opponents. So for the second or third time in a decade, I awaken to learn I've been labeled a terrorist by my own government for believing that the government is abusive. So now I find myself an enemy of the state. It's not even Wednesday yet.

"When fascism comes to America it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross."

–Attributed to Sinclair Lewis

So why don't we just bring civil charges Or otherwise attempt to bring rogue cops to some sort of justice?

But when Goerge Floyd’s family goes to court to hold the officers liable for their actions, a judge in Minnesota may very well dismiss their claims. All because of a legal doctrine called "qualified immunity" that specifically shields government officials, including poilice, from most such claims. Police act like laws don't apply to them because of 'qualified immunity.' They're right.

The Supreme Court created qualified immunity in 1982. With that novel invention, the court granted all government officials immunity for violating constitutional and civil rights unless the victims of those violations can show that the rights were “clearly established.”Although innocuous sounding, the clearly established test is a legal obstacle that’s nearly impossible to overcome. It requires a victim to identify an earlier decision by the Supreme Court or a federal appeals court in the same jurisdiction holding that precisely the same conduct under the same circumstances is illegal or unconstitutional. If none exists, the official is immune. Whether the official’s actions are unconstitutional, intentional, or malicious is irrelevant to the test.

One imagines that if police were subject to civil liability for their actions, including loss of pension oif convicted, we might quickly see a change in the amount of abusive behavior on the part of police.

As I got ready to post this, events have swarmed these scribblings. Moments after threatening to unleash the military against the American people, styling them "antifa," or "professional anarchists” – for the crime of seeking racial justice, #BunkerBoyTrump had military police teargas and shoot rubber bullets into a peaceful crowd. This display of supposed "toughness" was so a reality TV "president" he could hold a pointless photo op, clutching a Bible in front of a church. Thus making Sinclair Lewis a prophet:  Fascism has come to America.

I'm old enough to remember a different America. One where the cop on the beat or street was a potential source of aid and safety. Where people didn't cower in fear or snarl in loathing at their neighbors for their political beliefs. And one in which every yahoo with a grievance didn't brandish an AK-47 (or a hunting bow) at a public demonstration. Or where the President at least pretended to care about the welfare of his fellow citizens. But those days are long gone, as the American public learns what foreign governments have already learned through the last three and a half years: America is no longer to be trusted or counted upon.

Surly1 was an administrator and contributing author to Doomstead Diner. He is the author of numerous rants, screeds and spittle-flecked invective here and elsewhere. He lives a quiet domestic existence in Southeastern Virginia with his wife Contrary. Descended from a long line of people to whom one could never tell anything, all opinions are his and his alone, because he paid full retail for everything he has managed to learn.

[thisdaynews]

US election results on knife-edge: Biden maintains lead as Trump unleashes legal battle.

New Post has been published on https://thebiafrastar.com/us-election-results-on-knife-edge-biden-maintains-lead-as-trump-unleashes-legal-battle/

US election results on knife-edge: Biden maintains lead as Trump unleashes legal battle.

Lawsuits were launched by President Donald Trump across America yesterday, adding fresh drama to a presidential election that is already on knife edge. Lawyers were running in and out of law courts in at least five states yesterday disputing or affirming results. Democratic Party candidate Joe Biden is currently leading Trump by 264 to 214 electoral votes and is favourite to win the election. Key wins for both candidates in Georgia, Pennsylvania, Nevada and Arizona will determine the final lap of the race.

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President Trump’s moves to stop further vote counts in about four swing states however suffered a setback in Georgia and Michigan where the two court yesterday dismissed two separate law suits. In Georgia where Trump maintains a slim led against his Democrat rival, Joe Biden, the state court dismissed the lawsuit filed by Georgia Republicans to prevent the “unlawful counting of ballots received after the election” in Savannah.

They filed the lawsuit after a poll watcher for the party allegedly viewed unprocessed absentee ballots mixed in with absentee ballots that were set to be tabulated. Judge James F. Bass made the ruling orally in court Thursday morning. The state Republican party and the Trump campaign said they filed the court documents in Chatham County Superior Court on Wednesday evening after a party poll watcher “witnessed absentee ballots that had not been properly processed apparently mixed into a pile of absentee ballots that was already set to be tabulated.

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The proper chain of custody for the ballots was not followed,” they alleged according to court documents. The ballots in question were small in number: “one stack of three ballots and a second stack of fifty-three ballots, according to a copy of the filing provided by the state Republican party. In Michigan, a judge tossed a lawsuit brought by Trump’s campaign that demanded halting vote-counting in the state.

Michigan Court of Claims Judge Cynthia Stephens made the ruling during a court hearing on Thursday. She said she planned to issue a written ruling on Friday. The lawsuit claimed Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, a Democrat, was allowing absentee ballots to be counted without teams of bipartisan observers as well as challengers.

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She was accused of undermining the “constitutional right of all Michigan voters … to participate in fair and lawful elections.” Benson, through state attorneys, denied the allegations. Much of the dispute centered on the TCF Center in Detroit where pro-Trump protesters gathered while absentee ballots were being counted. Little succor in Pennsylvania Trump’s attorneys claimed in a Pennsylvania court that one of their observers in Philadelphia wasn’t allowed close enough to ballot processing.

They lost at the entry level court, but filed an appeal and a judge weighed in Thursday morning. Trump lawyer Pam Bondi said on Fox Business Network that an appellate judge entered an order “saying that we are to be immediately let in that convention center with 6-foot distancing of all aspects of that vote counting effective immediately so we can observe these votes being counted.” Trump’s campaign aides claimed the ruling allows them to better observe the vote counting in Philadelphia, and they threatened to be on the watch for what they called improper ballots.

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“It guarantees we’re gonna be able to watch the ballots being counted,” said Trump deputy campaign manager Justin Clark. Elections officials have appealed the ruling to the state Supreme Court, but they briefly paused counting in Philadelphia to reconfigure their space to comply with the order. Trump advisers scheduled the conference call to insist they have not given up in Pennsylvania, Arizona, Nevada and Georgia, all states Trump needs to win if he is to retain the presidency. “We are going to keep fighting for this election,” campaign manager Bill Stepien said.

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Dozen arrested as protesters demand vote count Police arrested dozens of people in Seattle, Minneapolis and Portland, Oregon overnight during protests demanding a tally of all votes in the US election, while smaller groups backing Trump returned to tabulation sites in closely contested states to insist counting be halted. In Seattle, seven people were arrested. In Minneapolis, police arrested more than 600 demonstrators who marched onto an interstate protesting Trump’s threats to challenge the election results. In Portland, protesters smashed windows at businesses, hurled objects including fireworks at officers. Police made at least 10 arrests, according to a statement from the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office.

In New York, hundreds of people paraded past boarded-up luxury stores on Manhattan’s Fifth Avenue, and in Chicago, demonstrators marched through downtown and along a street across the river from Trump Tower. Protesters also gathered in cities including Los Angeles, Houston, Pittsburgh and San Diego. Shares jump as dollar slips The dollar slipped and tech stocks rallied further on Thursday as Democrat Joe Biden drew closer to winning the U.S. presidency while the Bank of England became the latest central bank to say it will increase stimulus. Investors leapt on the prospect of gridlock in Congress and the notion Silicon Valley will be spared greater oversight as the Democrats are unlikely to win control of the Senate.

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Tech shares in Europe jumped almost 3%[.EU], extending a rally of more than 8% this week, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq, S&P 500 and Dow industrials rose 1% or more. European stocks hit two-week highs on strong earnings reports and after the Bank of England increased its already huge bond-buying stimulus by 150 billion pounds ($195 billion), or about 50 billion pounds more than expected. On Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 1.47%, the S&P 500 gained 1.61% and the Nasdaq Composite added 1.93%. Overnight in Asia, stocks rallied 2% to reach their highest since February 2018.

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Japan’s Nikkei rose 1.7% to a more than nine-month top, South Korea gained 2.4% and Chinese blue chips added 1.3% on hopes a Biden White House would ease up on tariffs. The U.S. dollar fell to two-week lows against a basket of currencies and a seven-month low against the Japanese yen as the likelihood of a Democratic blue wave in the White House and Congress slowly vanished, snuffing any large U.S. stimulus package. Iran’s Supreme leader mocks US democracy Iran’s supreme leader has mocked the rancorous aftermath of election day in the United States, saying that the vote has exposed the reality of US democracy. “What a spectacle!” supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei tweeted late Wednesday. One says this is the most fraudulent election in US history. Who says that? The president who is currently in office. “His rival says Trump intends to rig the election! This is how #USElections & US democracy are.”

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The deepening polarisation of US politics since Trump’s surprise election victory four years ago has drawn expressions of concern even from Western allies, with Germany warning of a “very explosive situation” in the aftermath of the poll. Despite US allegations that Tehran sought to use social media to influence voters in the run-up to polling day, Iran’s leadership has publicly insisted it favours neither candidate, despite their sharply divergent policies towards Tehran. Trump has led a campaign of “maximum pressure” against the Islamic republic, pulling Washington out of a multilateral deal on Iran’s nuclear programme and reimposing crippling unilateral sanctions.

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Biden has signalled he is ready to rejoin the landmark nuclear agreement struck in 2015 when he served as vice president under Trump’s predecessor Barack Obama. But on Tuesday, Khamenei insisted the outcome of the election would have no impact on Iranian policy. Facebook removes group calling for ‘civil war’ over election A huge viral Facebook group spreading unsubstantiated claims that there is a Democratic party plot to “steal” the election has been removed by the social media firm. Among the comments inside the group were threats of violence and calls for civil war and revolution.

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A Facebook spokesperson says it took action because of “worrying calls for violence” in the group “which was creating real-world events”. “Stop the Steal” was set up yesterday had more than 330,000 members before it was taken down. Posts called for its members to take to the streets in the event that Joe Biden is declared the next US president. Dozens of comments went much further and encouraged people to take up arms or even shoot their political opponents. Some threatened rioting and looting.

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The group taken down by Facebook was the by far the largest of a handful of “Stop the Steal” forums set up since election day. On Tuesday, a “#StoptheSteal” label gained a bit of popularity on Twitter, and included baseless and misleading claims of voter fraud and dirty tricks. Similar claims have been circulating in the Facebook group. The allegations include some of the ones we’ve debunked Facebook says it removed the group “in line with the exceptional measures that we are taking during this period of heightened tension”. It also said the group “was organised around the delegitimisation of the election process”.

SOURCES:Vanguard

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Pluralistic: 19 Mar 2020 (Marie Newman ousts Dan Lipinski, Radicalized radio documentary, African Whatsapp modders, Imagineering in a Box, Data is the New Toxic Waste, a fair covid bailout, Fox News is a death cult, food supply chains are healthy, magic for coronavirus)

Today's links

The worst Democrat in Congress just lost his job: Dan Lipinski primaried by the amazing Marie Newman.

Canada Reads documentary on Radicalized: The Great Canadian Book debate is indefinitely postponed, but here's an hour on my book!

Africa's Facebook modders are world leaders: Technological self-determination through adversarial interoperability.

Imagineering in a Box: Interdisciplinary theme park design lessons from Khan Academy and Disney.

Data is the New Toxic Waste: It was never "the new oil."

How to structure a fair covid bailout: Stimulus, not private jets.

Fox News is a suicide cult: Telling your elderly viewers to perform tribal loyalty by engaging in high-risk behaviors is a career-limiting move.

Grocery supply chains are resilient: One less thing to worry about.

Magic in the time of coronavirus: Never let a good crisis go to waste, card-trick edition.

This day in history: 2010, 2019

Colophon: Recent publications, current writing projects, upcoming appearances, current reading

The worst Democrat in Congress just lost his job (permalink)

Congress's worst Democrat is Dan Lipinski, a corrupt, anti-abortion, corporatist, gunhumping asshole in a safe seat that he inherited from his father in 2004, who handed it to him after nominations had closed, bypassing the semblance of democracy.

https://theintercept.com/2018/01/29/dan-lipinski-illinois-3rd-district-marie-newman/

He's a homophobic bigot who opposed the $15 minimum wage and allowed the rail-barons who fund his campaign to dismantle safety regulations.

He was primaried by Marie Newman (I'm a donor!) whose campaign was vicious sabotaged by the DNC.

https://theintercept.com/2019/04/26/dccc-blacklist-marie-newman-dan-lipinski/

Despite this, Marie Newman successfully primaried this piece of shit.

Like AOC's seat, Newman's is a very safe one, meaning she's all but guaranteed to go to Congress in November.

Canada Reads documentary on Radicalized (permalink)

The Canada Reads national book prize is indefinitely postponed, thanks to covid. In lieu of the televised debates originally scheduled for this week, the CBC is airing one-hour specials on each book, including mine, Radicalized.

https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/1-6-canada-reads/clip/15766247-canada-reads-2020-special-episode-radicalized-by-cory-doctorow

If you're jonesing for The Great Canadian Book Debate, you can fill the gap with the whole series:

https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/1-6-canada-reads

Africa's Facebook modders are world leaders (permalink)

In most of Africa, the most popular app by far is WhatsApp, and unofficial WhatsApp mods – including one that started life as a Syrian alternative at the height of its civil war – are offering local tools for local contexts.

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/03/african-whatsapp-modders-are-masters-worldwide-adversarial-interoperability

"Nothing about us without us" has been a rallying cry for many movements, most recently the disability rights movement. Coders working for a Silicon Valley Big Tech firm shouldn't have the last work on how apps work for people half a world away.

The big WhatsApp mods accommodate lots of local needs: larger groups and filesizes, better privacy protection, multiple accounts on a single device.

But it's also hard to find reliable mods, because FB used legal threats to shut down the largest, most popular one.

Ironically, this has driven peer-to-peer app sharing, where people you trust will directly send the app from their phone to yours, assuring you that they haven't detected any spyware. That's just great.

What would be even better is if local coders could dismantle FB's digital colonialism and market their improved apps directly, come out of the shadows without fear of retaliation by distant juggernauts who want to capture "the next billion users" and own their digital lives.

The history of Adversarial Interoperability is full of users modifying their tools to improve them. Before John Deere was a monopolistic copyright troll, it used to send engineers out to farms to collect and integrate farmers' mods into its products.

https://securityledger.com/2019/03/opinion-my-grandfathers-john-deere-would-support-our-right-to-repair/

Every human being should have the right of technological self-determination: the right to decide which tools they use, and to change how those tools work to suit their own needs.

Imagineering in a Box (permalink)

Imagineering in a Box is a joint project from Khan Academy, Pixar and Disney Imagineering. It's a series of interactive lessons and lectures on designing themed spaces, rides to go in those spaces, and animatronics to go in those rides.

https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/hass-storytelling/imagineering-in-a-box

It's interdisciplinary: land design is meant to be undertaken with physical materials, ride design uses art and math, and animatronic design is robotics – mechanical engineering and software development.

Data is the New Toxic Waste (permalink)

In a new article for Kaspersky, I argue that data was never "the new oil" – instead, it was always the new toxic waste: "pluripotent, immortal – and impossible to contain."

https://www.kaspersky.com/blog/secure-futures-magazine/data-new-toxic-waste/34184/

Data breaches are inevitable (any data you collect will probably leak; any data you retain will definitely leak) and cumulative (your company's data breach can be combined with each subsequent attack to revictimize your customers). Identity thieves benefit enormously from cheap storage, and they collect, store and recombine every scrap of leaked data. Merging multiple data sets allows for reidentification of "anonymized" data, and it's impossible to predict which sets will leak in the future.

These nondeterministic harms have so far protected data-collectors from liability, but that can't last. Toxic waste also has nondeterministic harms (we never know which bit of effluent will kill which person), but we still punish firms that leak it.

Waiting until the laws change to purge your data is a bad bet – by then, it may be too late. All the data your company collects and retains represents an unquantifiable, potentially unlimited source of downstream liability.

What's more, you probably aren't doing anything useful with it. The companies that make the most grandiose claims about data analytics are either selling analytics or data (or both). These claims are sales literature, not peer-reviewed citations to empirical research.

Data is cheap to collect and store – if you don't have to pay for the chaos it sows when it leaks. And some day, we will make data-hoarders pay.

How to structure a fair covid bailout (permalink)

It's a foregone conclusions that there will be a bailout. My first worry is that it will be inflationary, because production has ground to a halt. More dollars chasing fewer goods — not good.

https://pluralistic.net/2020/03/18/diy-tp/#covid-stimulus

But there's another risk, which is that it will just go to the finance sector, who will use it to buy private jets and political influence, repeating the 2008 pattern.

https://mattstoller.substack.com/p/how-to-structure-the-coronavirus

Financialization is how the economy got so fragile in the first place. Leveraged buyouts, debt-loading, payoffs for layoffs, looting corporate cash reserves, selling assets and spiking executive competition made companies brittle. As Matt Stoller writes, financialization's goal "is to eliminate production in favor of scalable profitable things like brands, patents, and tax loopholes, because producers – engineers, artists, workers – are cost centers."

Bush/Obama had huge leverage over corporations during their bailout, but they squandered it by making companies subservient to finance, instead of public priorities, workers' rights, or a fair deal for customers.

We must not repeat that blunder. Any company that gets a covid bailout should:

be permanently banned from buybacks, and banned from dividends for 5 years. Companies need to restore their financial cushions.

have their share price zeroed. Shareholders aren't getting a bailout. They "took the risk and upside, they should get the downside too."

have limits on executive comp. Tax dollars shouldn't make execs who presided over failure into millionaires.

a ban on lobbying, limits on PR – you can't spend public handouts to lobby for more public handouts

no M&A activity for 5 years. We're bailing you out so you can run a productive business, not become an acquisition target.

This crisis is different than 2008. It's worse. Let's not make the response worse, as well.

(Image: Bernie Durfee, CC BY-SA)

Fox News is a suicide cult (permalink)

Throughout the crisis, Fox News has been dutifully fulfilling its role as a state new organ for the Trump admin. When Trump's narrative was "no big deal," the network engaged in denial and urged its viewers to engage in high-risk conduct to perform their tribal loyalty.

TV news viewers are much older than the median American. Fox viewers are much older than the median TV new viewer. Old people are at the highest risk of covid complications. Linear increases in patient age yield exponential increases in mortality.

Fox has since changed its orthodoxy to match the president's new narrative. But it's too late. Many viewers will cling to their original denial in order to protect themselves from feeling like dupes.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/media/on-fox-news-suddenly-a-very-different-tune-about-the-coronavirus/2020/03/16/7a7637cc-678f-11ea-9923-57073adce27c_story.html

Others are already incubating – and passing on the virus.

Fox News just murdered a substantial portion of its viewership.

https://ritholtz.com/2020/03/foxnews-clearpresentdanger/

But don't get smug. The Fox viewers' risky conduct will have spread the virus further, infecting people far beyond the circle of denialists.

And their cases and the cases of those they infected will contribute to the overwhelming of the health-care system.

People who have car-wrecks or burst appendices or complex births or other emergency hospitalizations will die as a result.

Fox didn't cause the pandemic, and its viewers aren't solely responsible for its spread. But their ideology and conduct made it much, much worse.

Grocery supply chains are resilient (permalink)

If you – like me – have been worried about empty US grocery shelves, it appears that you can rest easy (or easier).

US food distributors' warehouses are at 200-500% nominal, comparable to pre-Thanksgiving.

https://www.npr.org/2020/03/18/817920400/empty-grocery-shelves-are-alarming-but-theyre-not-permanent

They saw this coming and stocked up.

Food production is also still very healthy.

The shortages appear temporary, driven by logistics bottlenecks that will ease with time, assuming the labor force for grocers/warehousers/shippers remains healthy and available.

(Image: Lyza, CC BY-SA)

Magic in the time of coronavirus (permalink)

I really dote on the "social magic" of Andy at The Jerx, a one-on-one style of conjuring and mentalism that often plays out over weeks and months. He's been doing a series of performing tricks during coronavirus, and the latest instalment is great.

http://www.thejerx.com/blog/2020/3/19/magic-in-the-time-of-coronavirus-part-3

"I have this trick I'm working on but I've run out of people to perform it on in person. Can you hop on Skype for a few minutes?"

This implies that you could do the trick in person, and you can use it to do something you couldn't do in person.

"The window of the Skype frame makes switching and ditching and that sort of thing incredibly easy. You don't need a pocket index, you can have stuff just sitting on your computer desk off frame."

This day in history (permalink)

#10yrsago Peter Watts found guilty www.rifters.com/crawl/?p=1186

#10yrsago Icelandic Pirates soar: citizenship for Snowden? https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/03/icelandic-pirate-partys-rapid-rise-may-result-in-citizenship-for-snowden/

#1yrago Uber used spyware to surveil and poach drivers from Australian rival service Gocatch https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-03-18/uber-used-secret-spyware-to-try-and-crush-australian-start-up/10901120

#1yrago Kickstarter employees want to unionize under OPEIU and have formed Kickstarter United to make that happen https://www.theverge.com/2019/3/19/18254995/kickstarter-unionizing-union-representation-inclusivity-transparency-tech-us-crowdfunding

#1yrago The European Copyright Directive: What Is It, and Why Has It Drawn More Controversy Than Any Other Directive In EU History? https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/03/european-copyright-directive-what-it-and-why-has-it-drawn-more-controversy-any

#1yrago Matt Taibbi finally makes sense of the Pentagon's trillions in off-books "budgetary irregularities" https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/pentagon-budget-mystery-807276/

#1yrago New Zealand's domestic spies, obsessed with illegally surveilling environmental activists, missed a heavily armed right-wing terrorist https://consortiumnews.com/2019/03/15/misguided-spying-and-the-new-zealand-massacre/

Colophon (permalink)

Today's top sources: Disney Parks Blog (https://disneyparks.disney.go.com), Naked Capitalism (https://nakedcapitalism.com/).

Currently writing: I've just finished rewrites on a short story, "The Canadian Miracle," for MIT Tech Review. It's a story set in the world of my next novel, "The Lost Cause," a post-GND novel about truth and reconciliation. I've also just completed "Baby Twitter," a piece of design fiction also set in The Lost Cause's prehistory, for a British think-tank. I'm getting geared up to start work on the novel next.

Currently reading: Just started Lauren Beukes's forthcoming Afterland: it's Y the Last Man plus plus, and two chapters in, it's amazeballs. Last month, I finished Andrea Bernstein's "American Oligarchs"; it's a magnificent history of the Kushner and Trump families, showing how they cheated, stole and lied their way into power. I'm getting really into Anna Weiner's memoir about tech, "Uncanny Valley." I just loaded Matt Stoller's "Goliath" onto my underwater MP3 player and I'm listening to it as I swim laps.

Latest podcast: The Masque of the Red Death and Punch Brothers Punch https://craphound.com/podcast/2020/03/16/the-masque-of-the-red-death-and-punch-brothers-punch/

Upcoming books: "Poesy the Monster Slayer" (Jul 2020), a picture book about monsters, bedtime, gender, and kicking ass. Pre-order here: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781626723627?utm_source=socialmedia&utm_medium=socialpost&utm_term=na-poesycorypreorder&utm_content=na-preorder-buynow&utm_campaign=9781626723627

(we're having a launch for it in Burbank on July 11 at Dark Delicacies and you can get me AND Poesy to sign it and Dark Del will ship it to the monster kids in your life in time for the release date).

"Attack Surface": The third Little Brother book, Oct 20, 2020. https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250757531

"Little Brother/Homeland": A reissue omnibus edition with a new introduction by Edward Snowden: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250774583