[Peace-discuss] Notes

[J.B. Nicholson]

Spying: The global spy state marches forward.

https://www.nbcsandiego.com/news/local/Fast-Food-Drive-Throughs-May-Use-License-Plate-Readers-in-the-Near-Future-512669691.html 
-- Fast food restaurants will soon profile their drive-thru customers via 
their license plates.

Ever wonder how databases are built and maintained?

This is one method: organizations collect it, use it for unforeseeable 
purposes (I'll explain this below) and then sometimes release information 
(whether on-purpose or by accident). It hardly matters to those described 
in the data if the data is released on-purpose or not; what matters is when 
sensitive data gets out.

 From the article:
> It’s an idea that has some people concerned about privacy issues, says
> San Diego State University business ethics professor, Wendy Patrick.
> 
> “People are often very private when it comes to their dining habits.
> They don’t necessarily want all their friends and colleagues to know
> that they’re getting a Big Mac and a milkshake at the noon hour,”
> Patrick said.

This is true, and a clear illustration that people are comfortable with 
some people knowing this information -- credit card personnel, fast food 
restaurant personnel, and anyone within eyesight of the purchase -- but 
they're not interested in creating a permanent public record of this or 
having these choices affect their lives when it comes to other people's 
judgments (getting health insurance, life insurance, a job, making friends, 
and so on).

> That’s the least of it. Patrick said some consumers may worry about how
> their personal information will be used.

This is an interesting point that I think a lot of consumers and news 
organizations get wrong. The main focus today is incomplete: reports today 
will highlight how collected information can be used to build a profile on 
a customer (as shown in this article's lead picture where the current 
drive-thru customer is identified by driver's license headshot, name, and 
most commonly-ordered items), or to advertise to someone.

But the real answer to the question "how will this information be used?" 
is: nobody knows.

Part of the reason nobody knows: not even the firm collecting the data can 
tell you everything they'll do with that data in the foreseeable future 
(forget about times/dates beyond that). They may do multiple things with it 
at the same time, too many things to list out fully:
- track where people go nearby (they could aim their cameras just outside 
their own property and scan who passes by),
- predict where you'll travel given previous trips,
- anticipate your next order based on your previous order ("Would you like 
another chicken sandwich and curly fries like you ordered last week in 
Tulsa, Oklahoma at 1:10AM, visibly crying after visiting Joe's Bar?").

There could also be things firms don't want to admit they'll do with this 
data such as sell or give copies of data to others (without your knowledge 
or consent) as this helps the firm make money and establish friendly 
relations with other firms. Google has been known to give data to the US 
government to help maintain good relations.

Another part of the reason nobody knows: Nobody knows where the data will go:
- if the data gets out there's no telling what the data will be used for or 
be used by,
- if the firm changes hands (organization X buys out organization Y) the 
new organization's policies go into effect, and we don't know if they will 
be ethical.
- sometimes firms release what they call "anonymized" information -- info 
where they believe they've removed all of the uniquely identifying parts. 
But we know that doesn't work. See the famous database where reporters were 
able to turn a set of search engine queries into a specific woman looking 
up medical problems for her friends 
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AOL_search_data_leak).

So given what we do know about how data sharing works, that IT 
organizations do leak/publish data, the only way to prevent data describing 
you from being part of these databases is to not do business with these 
organizations in the first place. This is easier said than done but 
currently the best defense we know.





Alleged molestations are bad news for some people, not others: NBC News 
essentially collaborates with people in power to hide details of who said 
what surrounding Hillary Clinton-era State Dept. child rape and 
prostitution allegations.

https://archive.fo/GtKvC
http://www.nbcnews.com/id/52184794/t/new-allegations-state-department-cover-up

 From the article:
> NBC News has obtained documents tied to ongoing investigations at the
> State Department involving eight cases of alleged misconduct by state
> department workers, contractors, and a United States ambassador. The
> incidents reportedly occurred during Hillary Clinton’s tenure, according
> to the documents.
> 
> An internal Inspector General memo from last October reported the
> ambassador under investigation “routinely ditched his protective
> security detail in order to solicit sexual favors from both prostitutes
> and minor children.” The report also states that a high-ranking official
> at the State Department directed investigators to “cease the
> investigation.”
> 
> The ambassador, whom NBC News has chosen not to identify, denied all
> allegations.
> 
> While refusing to comment on the specific investigations, a state
> department spokesperson said “the notion that we would not vigorously
> pursue criminal misconduct in a case, in any case, is preposterous.”

With so few details and names identified, is NBC News really news?




Economy/Exploitation: The "gig economy" continues exploiting the poor via 
"Mechanical Turk" from Amazon.com backed by the familiar refrain of the 
workers being "independent contractors".

https://thehustle.co/making-money-on-amazon-mechanical-turk/ -- How much 
can one make from Amazon's "Mechanical Turk"?

Mechanical Turk ("MTurk") is a job board hosted by Amazon where users pick 
which menial task (called a "HIT" for "Human Intelligence Task") they want 
to do and then get paid some small amount of money for doing that work. All 
of the HITs are tasks that can be done on one's computer and remotely.

 From the article:
> These HITs are typically things that computers and algorithms can’t
> quite handle yet — everything from psychological surveys to the
> identification of NSFW images.
> 
> A large percentage of the requesters who post these tasks are academic
> researchers with limited budgets, and tech companies looking to compile
> human-cultured data that can be fed to AI algorithms.
> 
> When a worker logs into her MTurk dashboard, she sees a list of 
> available HITs, who they’re offered by, the deadline, and the pay. She 
> might choose to transcribe a receipt ($0.01), summarize a block of text 
> ($0.35), or take a behavioral economics survey ($1).
> 
> Some HITs take 10 minutes and pay out $1 (a $6/hour pay rate); others
> call for 5 minutes and pay $0.10 ($1.20/hour). Requesters have control
> over the rates they choose to set — and Amazon takes a 20%-45% cut of
> each transaction.

Who are these workers (called "Turkers")?

> Turkers skew young (77% fall between the ages of 18-37), educated (70%
> have a B.A. or higher), and slightly female (51%). Despite an uptick in
> foreign users over the past few years, the majority of them (75%) are
> based in the US.
> 
> These workers also tend to suffer economically.
> 
> One in 3 Turkers is unemployed, and the average Turker reports a
> household income of ~$47k per year ($12k below the US national average).
> In a 2016 Pew survey, 25% of Turkers said they used MTurk because they
> lacked other available opportunities.
> 
> But recent data shows that Amazon isn’t doing most Turkers any favors.
> 
> A 2018 academic study analyzed 3.8m tasks completed by 2,676 workers on
> MTurk and found that average earnings through the platform amounted to
> $2 per hour. Only 4% of all workers earned more than the federal minimum
> wage of $7.25/hour.
>
> Because Turkers are independent contractors, they are not safeguarded by
> most labor protections, including minimum wage laws.

So the Turkers are getting exploited because they are paid so little, but 
it gets worse:

> The amount they earn on MTurk is determined almost entirely on their
> ability to: A) Secure as many “higher-paying” (i.e. minimum wage +)
> tasks as possible, and B) Complete them as fast as possible within the
> bounds of what requesters will accept. If the job isn’t completed
> satisfactorily, it can be rejected without pay.

Who gets the HITs?

> Roughly 80% of all tasks on the site are completed by just 20% of
> Turkers, who use a suite of tools and browser extensions, optimizing
> every move.

And HITs go quickly -- 5 seconds after an attractive posting is made, it is 
taken by someone else. It pays to reload the page often and have a browser 
with an add-on to help locate sufficiently attractive jobs rather than 
looking for them by manually scanning the job list.

Continuing from the article:

> [MTurk worker Mike] Naab Turks [works on MTurk] during short gaps in his
> day: A 30-minute lunch break may mean a few $1.25 Stanford studies. A
> 10-minute lull between meetings is a $2 psychological survey on
> chocolate. A 30-second stretch could net him $0.08 for a 1-question poll
> on the effectiveness of candle scents.
> 
> “Most of it is just filling in empty [space] in the day — time I’d
> probably be wasting otherwise,” he says. “If you’re not doing anything
> anyway, it’s just bonus money.”
> 
> One downside of this logic is that it promotes a constant, break-less
> cycle of work. To maintain a decent wage, Naab must be constantly alert,
> always tuned in, and willing to spring to action at the “ding!” of a
> $0.50 HIT.
> 
> Another downside is the uneven flow of the work. Some days, Naab might
> make $50 in a few hours; other days, he’ll only pull in a few bucks.
> 
> “I look at it from an hourly rate standpoint, rather than what I make
> total,” he says. “If a HIT takes 15 minutes and pays $3, that’s a $12
> pay rate, which isn’t bad.”

But that's precisely what no Turker can afford to do -- the work isn't 
steady and reliable enough to be able to plan ahead.



Labor: "Disney heiress ‘livid’ after going to one of her family’s theme 
parks undercover"

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/disney-heiress-livid-after-going-to-one-of-her-familys-theme-parks-undercover-2019-07-15 
-- Abigail Disney said distressed workers told her about ‘foraging for food 
in other people’s garbage’

Abigail Disney is Roy Disney's granddaughter who co-founded the Disney 
company with his brother Walt Disney.

> She does not have an active role in the company. Disney said that her
> grandfather would not approve of the current working conditions at the
> parks he helped create.
> 
> She added that, “these people are much of the recipe for success …. when
> my grandfather worked there, he hired people there to have a job for
> life.”
> 
> This isn’t the first time that Abigail Disney has criticized how the
> Mickey Mouse company and its CEO, Bob Iger, are treating its lowest-paid
> employees. The Walt Disney Co. employs more than 200,000 people
> worldwide.
> 
> In April, she said that Iger’s $65 million pay package is “insane” at a
> Fast Company Impact Council discussion of “human capitalism,” noting his
> compensation is 1,424 times that of the median Disney employee. She also
> told CNBC that “Jesus Christ himself isn’t worth 500 times his median
> worker’s pay.”
> 
> A 2018 survey conducted by on behalf of a group of unions found that
> nearly three-quarters of full- and part-time employees (73%) said that
> they didn’t earn enough money working at Disneyland Resort to pay for
> basic expenses each month. More than half were worried about being
> evicted, and about one-tenth reported being homeless in the previous two
> years.
> 
> Disney, whose own net worth is $120 million, joined a group of 19
> ultrawealthy Americans, including George Soros, who signed an open
> letter to the 2020 presidential candidates last month calling for a
> moderate wealth tax on the richest 1% to help reduce inequality. She
> recently told The Cut that she has donated $70 million to charity over
> the past 30 years.
> 
> She also told Yahoo in the new interview that she’d emailed Iger her
> concerns, telling him he was “a great CEO by any measure, perhaps even
> the greatest CEO in the country right now,” and urging him to “be known
> as the guy who led to a better place, because that is what you have the
> power to do.” She said she was referred to the HR department.
> 
> The Walt Disney Co. responded in an email statement to MarketWatch that
> the company offers a starting minimum wage of $15 an hour, as well as
> free education opportunities, and healthcare benefits for hourly workers
> starting at $6 a week.
> 
> “Our Disney Aspire initiative is the most comprehensive employee
> education program in the country, covering 100% of all tuition costs,
> books and fees so our hourly workers can pursue higher education free of
> charge, and graduate free of debt. Under Bob Iger’s leadership, Disney
> has made an initial commitment of $150 million to fund this program in
> the first five years, and will continue to make significant investments
> to make Disney Aspire available to as many employees as possible,” the
> statement continued. “Disney also provides flexible schedules and
> subsidized childcare to make it easier for employees to take advantage
> of this opportunity — and we’re proud that more than 40% of our
> 88,000-plus hourly employees have already signed up to participate.”

There is nothing in the article on why such necessary things (healthcare, 
education, money to live) are being left to the private interests to choose 
to fund in the first place.



Labor: Amazon workers strike on 2019-07-15 (so-called "Prime Day" when 
goods on amazon.com go on sale)

https://qz.com/1666429/amazon-prime-day-2019-sees-workers-striking-around-the-world/

> [...] workers at its fulfillment centers around the US continue to complain of extremely odious[1] quotas, limited bathroom breaks[2], mandatory holiday shifts[3], and the need for pain medication[4] just to get through their 10-hour work days.

[1] 
https://gawker.com/inside-an-amazon-warehouse-the-relentless-need-to-mak-1780800336
[2] 
https://www.theverge.com/2018/4/16/17243026/amazon-warehouse-jobs-worker-conditions-bathroom-breaks
[3] https://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-employees-describe-peak-2019-2
[4] 
https://www.inquirer.com/news/working-amazon-warehouse-fulfillment-center-emily-guendelsberger-on-the-clock-20190709.html

Strike action locations:
> Shakopee, Minnesota fulfillment center will be walking out during a
> six-hour period that overlaps with the end of the facility’s morning
> shift and the start of its evening shift. There are about 1,500
> full-time employees at the facility, according to the Daily Beast[1].

[1] 
https://www.thedailybeast.com/amazon-warehouse-workers-in-minnesota-strike-on-prime-day

> Germany: Hundreds of employees at seven facilities will be striking
> today and tomorrow, over longstanding issues with employee pay. “While
> Amazon holds a giant Prime-Day bargain hunt, employees are deprived of a
> living wage,” Orhan Akman, a representative from the German labor union
> Ver.di, said in a statement shared with Quartz.

> The UK: The GMB trade union will be staging protests at Amazon
> facilities across the country. Some of the most shocking accounts issues
> of issues faced by Amazon warehouse workers have come out of the UK. One
> undercover writer said they witnessed co-workers urinating in bottles to
> avoid missing quotas by taking bathroom breaks.
> 
> Still, the GMB isn’t calling on customers to boycott the online retailer
> during Prime Day. “We’re not calling for economic damage for Amazon,”
> Mick Rix, a union officer told the BBC. “What we’re asking for is for
> people to be aware. Leave feedback on Amazon.”
> 
> “Amazon workers want Jeff Bezos to know they are people—not robots,” Rix
> said in a statement shared with Quartz. “It is time that Jeff showed
> empathy with the very people that have helped to contribute to his vast
> and increasing personal fortune.”

> Elsewhere in Europe Workers in Spain and Poland will also be organizing
> demonstrations at Amazon facilities across their countries throughout
> the week.

> There will also be protests in the US this week in support of Amazon’s
> warehouse workers, as well as to call out the company’s dealings with
> the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) division. Workers at
> Amazon itself have called on the company to cut ties with ICE.
> Demonstrations will take place in New York, San Francisco, Shakopee,
> Portland, Amazon’s home base in Seattle, as well as other cities.


Labor: Airport workers prepare strike after 31 years on the job at $12/hr.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rbLQdJ6cf6k -- The Real News video
https://therealnews.com/stories/after-31-years-on-the-job-at-12-an-hour-airport-workers-prepare-to-strike 
-- transcript might appear here later.

All of the Amazon worker complaints we've heard about (being injured by 
robots, replaced with robot labor, forced to work without adequate bathroom 
breaks resulting in urinating in bottles while working, etc.) are raised 
here. Shifting money from one set of Amazon workers to others (in the 
so-called 'raise' which really wasn't a raise for those whose )




War: Sanctions are the means of attacking some countries instead of 
missiles and bombs, but sanctions are plenty deadly.

The Real News has a 3-part report on sanctions that are well worth watching 
or reading:

Venezuela:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mzm2g8ZbORU -- video
https://therealnews.com/series/war-by-other-means-understanding-and-challenging-u-s-sanctions-policies 
-- transcript might appear here later

Iran:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fO7u0742lf4 -- video
https://therealnews.com/stories/war-by-other-means-understanding-and-challenging-u-s-sanctions-against-iran-2-3 
-- transcript might appear here later

Russia:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMBHtIXMeWk -- video
https://therealnews.com/stories/war-by-other-means-understanding-and-challenging-u-s-sanctions-against-russia-3-3 
-- transcript might appear here later




Assange: CNN alleges that RT staffers were seen visiting Assange in the 
Ecuadorian embassy and that RT was too good at reporting on WikiLeaks' 
publications to not have been involved in somehow helping Assange acquire 
the documents but there's no evidence to back up CNN's claims.

https://archive.fo/X0kFx -- archive copy in case CNN changes their claims, 
pulls the article, etc.
https://www.cnn.com/2019/07/15/politics/assange-embassy-exclusive-documents/ -- 
source CNN article.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yntLTi1KWEk -- times when CNN interviewed 
Assange several times. Does this mean CNN helped Assange procure documents 
or bring CNN into ill repute (with no evidence)?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9CbU_IZ_kJc -- RT analysis of CNN's claims 
against RT.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FK_q3xAfYTc -- RT analysis of CNN's claims 
against RT.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ex0S8JqZy8 -- Meanwhile, CNN's ratings 
continue to sink.




Venezuela: US attacks against Venezuela continue even as coup fails -- 
according to an internal memo, $41.9 million in so-called "aid" earmarked 
for Honduras & Guatemala will instead go to the Guaidó-led opposition in 
Venezuela (unelected Venezuelan so-called government).

The US is losing their coup but the US keeps pumping money into the coup 
effort in order to gain control of Venezuela and thus its oil (the largest 
known oil reserves in the world). John Bolton has already told Fox News the 
truth about this coup: he thinks it would be great to see Venezuelan oil 
under American companies' control.

https://www.kff.org/news-summary/trump-administration-to-divert-more-than-40m-in-humanitarian-aid-from-central-american-nations-to-support-venezuelas-opposition/
https://www.seattletimes.com/nation-world/nation-politics/trump-administration-diverts-central-america-aid-to-us-backed-opposition-in-venezuela/
https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2019-07-16/usaid-diverting-humanitarian-aid-to-political-opposition-in-venezuela 
-- many organizations reporting on this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XUu5YQCurgQ -- RT's report including Sarah 
Flounders reaction.

LA Times and many others report:
> The memo, dated July 11 and obtained by The Times, is a notification to
> Congress from the U.S. Agency for International Development that the
> money is going to Venezuela in response to an “exigent” crisis involving
> U.S. “national interest.”

It's also interesting that despite the US government's explicit 
instruction, even corporate media isn't obeying their instruction to call 
Guaidó the Venezuelan president. Instead he's (rightly) called "opposition 
leader".

> Sarah Flounders: Such funds are never used for humanitarian development,
> for humanitarian needs, or aid anywhere in the world. USAID money is
> always for political purposes. Now, a portion of this USAID money is
> going to Venezuela to further support a US-backed coup attempt which
> they failed to carry out. This is all-out intervention. The seizure of
> Venezuela's funds, the creation of hyperinflation, the sanctions where
> Venezuela can't sell its own products, its own bank accounts are stolen,
> this is piracy. It's highway robbery. And this is what the US government
> is involved in.
And RT's report also covers the piracy off the coast of Venezuela & 
Trinidad and Tobago which appear to be preferred trade routes for cocaine 
and heroin conveyance.





Democrats: Democratic 2020 presidential candidate Kamala Harris doesn't 
like Medicare for All, joins Biden in that respect.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MIzTIsX-eHs -- SecularTalk on how BidenCare 
(Biden's healthcare plan) would lead to 125,000 deaths from lack of healthcare.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OvkXiD6_HM -- Kamala Harris showing she 
doesn't like Medicare for All either.

The Democrats are handing you reasons why you can't trust them: when they 
had a majority in both houses of Congress and the presidency they could 
have passed HR 676 into law. They chose not to bring HR 676 up for voting.

This was not an accident.

Dems get HMO funding, and any proper Medicare for All bill would relegate 
HMOs to covering medically unnecessary work and prohibiting any HMO from 
competing with Medicare for All. But the Dems need to look like they care 
about their would-be voters' healthcare needs and respond to a clear 
majoritarian issue: widespread support for Medicare for All.

They can't do this without lying (as Joe Biden does) or outright claiming 
that some Dem candidate simply doesn't support Medicare for All.

Another avenue to denying the US public Medicare for All has surfaced: 
rebrand some weaker plan as "Medicare for All" and then offer that as a 
bill (which also possibly never comes up for a vote). That seems to be what 
Sen. Bernie Sanders is offering in his S 1129 bill (Sanders' Medicare for 
All bill) and Rep. Pramila Jayapal offers in her HR 1384 bill.

So Biden and Harris aren't doing anything new in objecting to Medicare for 
All, and there's no clear reason to favor Democrats (particularly the 
Democrats were told are 'leading the pack' of presidential hopefuls for 2020).

Related: "BidenCare" receives no critique from corporate comedian John 
Oliver but "TrumpCare" sure did.

As I pointed out in 
https://www.counterpunch.org/2016/11/24/comedians-as-sycophants-samantha-bee-john-oliver-and-the-democrats/ 
-- my article about corporate comedians including how John Oliver was 
tacitly stumping for Hillary Clinton in 2016 by remaining silent about her 
campaign while scrutinizing her competition -- Oliver warned us to "get 
ready for a barely-changed version of Obamacare called 'Trumpcare'". This 
was a ridiculous complaint in two senses:

1. Oliver was promoting ObamaCare as if it were a good thing. Oliver 
claimed that Pres. Trump is so egotistical he would basically rename the 
ACA (colloquially known as "Obamacare") to "Trumpcare" and keep the policy 
basically the same. There was no sign it would have happened and, in fact, 
it did not happen. But if it had happened, why would this be a problem for 
someone promoting Obamacare (as Oliver was)? As I said in late 2016, 
"People who depend on ‘Obamacare’ would rightly tell Oliver that learning a 
new colloquial name is a small price to pay for keeping the majority of the 
plan they want to keep.". As it turns out, people are quite keen on dumping 
whatever private plan they have now in favor of adopting Medicare for All 
just like they were in 2016.

2. "Bidencare" appears to be the accepted colloquial name for Joe Biden's 
inchoate HMO-centric healthcare plan (that is so bad he has to lie about 
Medicare for All in order to make Bidencare seem reasonable per 
https://jacobinmag.com/2019/07/biden-health-care-medicare-for-all ). 
Ultimately Bidencare is aimed at doing the same job as Obamacare did: 
forestall Medicare for All adoption for at least another 4 years. But 
there's no sign of complaint from corporate comics.

-J