From karenaram at hotmail.com Mon Apr 1 17:00:20 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Mon, 1 Apr 2019 17:00:20 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: Midwest Venezuela Speaking Tour with Gloria La Riva! References: <5ca23733b92d0_120f9dbef5c80331@asgworker-qmb3-9.nbuild.prd.useast1.3dna.io.mail> Message-ID: * Thursday, April 4 - University of Illinois Gregory Hall - Room #213 Wright Street Urbana, IL 61801 7:00pm CST [Party for Socialism and Liberation] Home About Join Us Support Sign up Midwest Venezuela Speaking Tour Featuring Gloria La Riva [https://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/answercoalition/pages/4861/attachments/original/1553530393/EYEWITNESS_VENEZUELA_.png?1553530393] [Share on Facebook] [Share on Twitter] On the heels of a month-long trip through Venezuela in the midst of growing U.S. aggression, anti-war activist Gloria La Riva will speak in numerous cities on the current situation in Venezuela, with a progressive perspective on the crucial issues facing the Venezuelan people: the U.S. economic sanctions, the U.S. media blockade, and the people's organizing efforts to overcome the aggression. La Riva will show exclusive first-hand video footage from her trip and answer the questions: * What is the Bolivarian revolution all about? * Is Venezuela suffering an economic collapse? * What is the role of the U.S., is the danger of U.S. war near? * How can people in the United States get involved? Midwest Tour cities * Monday, April 1 - Bowling Green, OH Grounds For Thought Coffee 174 S Main St, Bowling Green, OH 43402 6:30pm EST * Tuesday, April 2 - Antioch College Coretta Scott King Center One Morgan Pl, Yellow Springs, OH 45387 6:30pm EST RSVP here * Wednesday, April 3 - Depauw University Watson Forum 609 S Locust St, Greencastle IN 46135 5:00pm EST RSVP here * Thursday, April 4 - University of Illinois Gregory Hall - Room #213 Wright Street Urbana, IL 61801 7:00pm CST RSVP here * Friday, April 5 - St. Louis, Missouri St. Louis Association of Community Organizations 5888 Plymouth Ave, St. Louis 63112 7:00pm CST RSVP here * Saturday, April 6 - Chicago, Illinois Centro Autónomo 3460 W. Lawrence, Chicago, Illinois 60625 6:00pm CST RSVP here * Sunday, April 7 - Ann Arbor, Michigan University of Michigan, Kalamazoo Room 911 N University Ave, Ann Arbor, MI 48109 Contact: 248-804-9474 2:00pm EST RSVP here * Monday, April 8 - Milwaukee, Wisconsin Peace Action Bldg., 1001 E. Keefe St. Contact: 608-206-1756 7:00pm CST RSVP here * Tuesday, April 9 - Madison, Wisconsin First Unitarian Society - Landmark Auditorium 900 University Bay Dr. Contact: 312-753-8415 7:00pm CST RSVP here * Wednesday, April 10 - Minneapolis, Minnesota 4200 Cedar Ave. S. Contact: 651-357-0613 7:00pm CST RSVP here -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Tue Apr 2 02:36:49 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Tue, 2 Apr 2019 02:36:49 +0000 Subject: [Peace] US Military is all over Africa in spite of not being in Africa Message-ID: AFRICOM The US Military Is All Over Africa Despite Not Being at War in Africa There are currently roughly 7,500 US military personnel, including 1,000 contractors, deployed in Africa. For comparison, that figure was only 6,000 just a year ago. by Strategic Culture Foundation Around 200,000 US troops are stationed in 177 countries throughout the world. Those forces utilize several hundred military installations. Africa is no exemption. On August 2, Maj. Gen. Roger L. Cloutier took command of US Army Africa, promising to “hit the ground running.” The US is not waging any wars in Africa but it has a significant presence on the continent. Navy SEALs, Green Berets, and other special ops are currently conducting nearly 100 missions across 20 African countries at any given time, waging secret, limited-scale operations. According to the magazine Vice, US troops are now conducting 3,500 exercises and military engagements throughout Africa per year, an average of 10 per day — an astounding 1,900% increase since the command rolled out 10 years ago. Many activities described as “advise and assist” are actually indistinguishable from combat by any basic definition. There are currently roughly 7,500 US military personnel, including 1,000 contractors, deployed in Africa. For comparison, that figure was only 6,000 just a year ago. The troops are strung throughout the continent spread across 53 countries. There are 54 countries on the “Dark Continent.” More than 4,000 service members have converged on East Africa. The US troop count in Somalia doubled last year. [https://www.mintpressnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Fundraiser-Icon-400x2.jpg] When AFRICOM was created there were no plans to establish bases or put boots on the ground. Today, a network of small staging bases or stations have cropped up. According to investigative journalist Nick Turse, “US military bases (including forward operating sites, cooperative security locations, and contingency locations) in Africa number around fifty, at least.” US troops in harm’s way in Algeria, Burundi, Chad, Congo, Djibouti, Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, South Sudan Tunisia, and Uganda qualify for extra pay. The US African Command (AFRICOM) runs drone surveillance programs, cross-border raids, and intelligence. AFRICOM has claimed responsibility for development, public health, professional and security training, and other humanitarian tasks. Officials from the Departments of State, Homeland Security, Agriculture, Energy, Commerce, and Justice, among other agencies, are involved in AFRICOM activities. Military attachés outnumber diplomats at many embassies across Africa. Last October, four US soldiers lost their lives in Niger. The vast majority of Americans probably had no idea that the US even had troops participating in combat missions in Africa before the incident took place. One serviceman was reported dead in Somalia in June. The Defense Department is mulling plans to “right-size” special operations missions in Africa and reassign troops to other regions, aligning the efforts with the security priorities defined by the 2018 National Defense Strategy. That document prioritizes great power competition over defeating terrorist groups in remote corners of the globe. Roughly 1,200 special ops troops on missions in Africa are looking at a drawdown. But it has nothing to do with leaving or significantly cutting back. And the right to unilaterally return will be reserved. The infrastructure is being expanded enough to make it capable of accommodating substantial reinforcements. The construction work is in progress. The bases will remain operational and their numbers keep on rising. A large drone base in Agadez, the largest city in central Niger, is reported to be under construction. The facility will host armed MQ-9 Reaper drones which will finally take flight in 2019. The MQ-9 Reaper has a range of 1,150 miles, allowing it to provide strike support and intelligence-gathering capabilities across West and North Africa from this new base outside of Agadez. It can carry GBU-12 Paveway II bombs. The aircraft features synthetic aperture radar for integrating GBU-38 Joint Direct Attack Munitions. The armament suite can include four Hellfire air-to-ground anti-armor and anti-personnel missiles. There are an estimated 800 US troops on the ground in Niger, along with one drone base and the base in Agadez that is being built. The Hill called it “the largest US Air Force-led construction project of all time.” According to Business Insider, “The US military presence here is the second largest in Africa behind the sole permanent US base on the continent, in the tiny Horn of Africa nation of Djibouti.” Four thousand American servicemen are stationed at Camp Lemonnier (the US base located near Djibouti City) — a critical strategic base for the American military because of its port and its proximity to the Middle East. Officially, the camp is the only US base on the continent or, as AFRICOM calls it, “a forward operating site,” — the others are “cooperative security locations” or “non-enduring contingency locations.” Camp Lemonnier is the hub of a network of American drone bases in Africa that are used for aerial attacks against insurgents in Yemen, Nigeria, and Somalia, as well as for exercising control over the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait. In 2014, the US signed a new 20-year lease on the base with the Djiboutian government, and committed over $1.4 billion to modernize and expand the facility in the years to come. In March, the US and Ghana signed a military agreement outlining the conditions of the US military presence in that nation, including its construction activities. The news was met with protests inside the country. It should be noted that the drone attacks that are regularly launched in Africa are in violation of US law. The Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF), adopted after Sept. 11, 2001, states that the president is authorized to use force against the planners of those attacks and those who harbor them. But that act does not apply to the rebel groups operating in Africa. It’s hard to believe that the US presence will be really diminished, and there is no way to know, as too many aspects of it are shrouded in secrecy with nothing but “leaks” emerging from time to time. It should be noted that the documents obtained by TomDispatch under the United States Freedom of Information Act contradict AFRICOM’s official statements about the scale of US military bases around the world, including 36 AFRICOM bases in 24 African countries that have not been previously disclosed in official reports. The US foothold in Africa is strong. It’s almost ubiquitous. Some large sites under construction will provide the US with the ability to host large aircraft and accommodate substantial forces and their hardware. This all prompts the still-unanswered question — “Where does the US have troops in Africa, and why?” One thing is certain — while waging an intensive drone war, the US is building a vast military infrastructure for a large-scale ground war on the continent. Top Photo | U.S. Air Force, soldiers of the East Africa Response Force (EARF) depart from a U.S. Air Force C-130 Hercules in Juba, South Sudan, Dec. 21, 2013 (AP/U.S. Air Force, Tech. Sgt. Micah Theurich) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Tue Apr 2 21:25:35 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Tue, 2 Apr 2019 21:25:35 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: Gloria La Riva on Thursday References: Message-ID: > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Venezuela presentation flyer.pdf Type: application/pdf Size: 140048 bytes Desc: Venezuela presentation flyer.pdf URL: From stuartnlevy at gmail.com Wed Apr 3 22:33:40 2019 From: stuartnlevy at gmail.com (Stuart Levy) Date: Wed, 3 Apr 2019 17:33:40 -0500 Subject: [Peace] =?utf-8?q?4/5_Friday_noon_in_YMCA_Friday_Forum=3A_Kathy_K?= =?utf-8?q?elly=2C_Voices_for_Creative_Nonviolence=E2=80=80=E2=80=8B?= In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <248b0d82-1cd4-850e-a2c4-1d4790e27ffa@gmail.com> The great peace activist Kathy Kelly speaks this Friday noon in the YMCA Friday Forum. -------- Forwarded Message -------- Subject: [Friday Forum] Kathy Kelly, Voices for Creative Nonviolence ​     Date: Tue, 2 Apr 2019 14:26:05 +0000 From: University YMCA Reply-To: kasey at universityymca.org To: Stuart Levy [Friday Forum] Kathy Kelly, Voices for Creative Nonviolence peace activist, Kathy Kelly   *Friday Forum with Kathy Kelly* *Voices for Creative Nonviolence* Friday, April 5 at 12:00pm University YMCA | Latzer Hall About the speaker: Kathy Kelly is an American peace activist, pacifist and author, one of the founding members of Voices in the Wilderness, and currently a co-coordinator of Voices for Creative Nonviolence.     Invite Friends on Facebook       *This lecture is part of the spring 2019 Friday Forum Lecture Series, "RESIST: building a culture of nonviolence"* To learn more about the Spring 2019 Friday Forum Lecture series, visit:***universityymca.org/friday-forum * *This series was made possible thanks to the generous support of our partners: * Center for Global Studies, Channing-Murray Foundation, UIUC School of Social Work, First Mennonite Church of Urbana-Champaign, Wesley United Methodist Church and Foundation, Department of Gender and Women’s Studies, the Social Action Committee of the Unitarian Universalist Church of Urbana Champaign, the Chapel of St. John the Divine, and Urbana Champaign Friends Meeting               *www.universityymca.org*              footer image google analytics -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From davidgreen50 at gmail.com Wed Apr 3 23:56:28 2019 From: davidgreen50 at gmail.com (David Green) Date: Wed, 3 Apr 2019 18:56:28 -0500 Subject: [Peace] [Peace-discuss] News from Neptune for March 29 In-Reply-To: <174B33BC-F1BE-47A5-9E29-FA0C15A7A19E@gmail.com> References: <174B33BC-F1BE-47A5-9E29-FA0C15A7A19E@gmail.com> Message-ID: Thanks Karen. Yes, of course the Eichmann issue is complicated by so many things, including the complicity, for example of the leader of the Jewish community in Hungary, a Zionist, to save himself while telling his community to cooperate with the Germans; that is, to go to their deaths, resulting in another famous trial in Israel (Rudolph Kastner, who was ultimately assassinated). But beyond that, Arendt's criticism of the Eichmann trial and the price she had to pay for being honest and truthful to her best ability, regarding which I should probably brush up on myself, or just watch the movie again. But whatever Eichmann's just deserts, it was a political trial, easier to see in retrospect given Israel's emergence as an American ally and the subsequent exploitation of the genocide, and the Mossad mystique. In addition, the concurrent hypocrisy regarding the CIA ratline of Nazis out of Germany, Klaus Barbie, etc. This is why I get so annoyed by the focus on the Nazis' conscription of Eastern Europeans to do their dirty work, and the subsequent chest-thumping by the Nazi-hunters in this country (Simon Wiesenthal, and the Justice Dept. O.S.I.) when these minor functionaries are exposed (although never very clearly and specifically exposed), all of which contributes to the Israeli (Mossad) mystique that was so much a part of Israel endearing itself to Jewish-American (and Gentile-American) hearts in the 1960s. Eichmann was a horrible Nazi and killer; but the West German leadership through the 60s was also made up of Nazis. Justice was done, but in a manner that was politically convenient and useful. On Wed, Apr 3, 2019 at 1:06 PM C G Estabrook via Peace-discuss < peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net> wrote: > Thanks for the comments. I appreciate how closely you listen to us. > > It might be interesting (as David suggested) to read Arendt’s “Eichmann in > Jerusalem" (1963) in the present context < > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eichmann_in_Jerusalem>. > > > > On Mar 30, 2019, at 12:26 PM, Karen Aram wrote: > > > >> > >> I found yesterdays NFN, https://youtu.be/HON84MPaoVc, particularly > interesting and informative. > >> > >> Carl’s new strategy of being positive, in relation to a Democrat, then > allowing others to point out the flaws, is quite refreshing. > > > >> We need to thank Code Pink for providing the information and data > proving what I suspect in relation to Tulsi Gabbard, that of her being a > “sheepherder” for the Democrat Party, attempting to sway the anti-war > crowd, by “talking about war.” It’s about time someone “talks about it.” > However, candidates will talk about whatever they deem necessary to get > votes, and funding. The DNC would shut her down if they didn’t like what > she is doing. Poor woman, she does retain her cool, when taking so much > criticism from those who support war, whatever their political affiliation, > but that doesn’t make her Presidential material, nor is it proof she is > “anti-war” as Code Pink proves. > > > >> Perhaps I misinterpret David, in referring to the “kidnap, of Adolph > Eichmann?” are you implying, that is the beginning of the immoral behavior > of the Mossad, Shin Bet? > > > >> I realize many at the time felt Israel and the US should always take > the moral high ground and follow the law. Just as many think “Truth and > Reconciliation” to be justice. If they had kidnapped and tortured and/or > murdered Eichmann, I would agree. If they had done what the Mossad did in > the seventy’s in relation to Munich, by murdering the members of Black > September responsible for terrorism perpetrated against athletes in the > Olympics, I would agree. They didn’t, they brought a war criminal to trial, > he received “due process,” and the relatives and victims had justice, if > one can ever achieve justice for crimes against humanity. I would have, > preferred prison for life, solitary confinement as we do with political > prisoners in the US, like Chelsea Manning, as I don’t support the death > penalty. However, allowing a war criminal, Eichmann wasn’t “just a military > man following orders,” he was one of the architects of the “final > solution,” to live out their life in comfort is not only an injustice, but > an example of inhumanity, inequality, and racism. > > > > Imagine a future where US war criminals flee the US and take up > residence in Israel or KSA, I wouldn’t be concerned if the Iraqi’s or > Libyans then kidnapped and took them back to their nation for trial by the > victims. It would be more just than these people living in wealth and > splendor throughout the rest of their days as if heroes, as is current. > > > > > >> > > > > > > > >> On Mar 30, 2019, at 09:30, C G Estabrook wrote: > >> > >> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HON84MPaoVc > >> > >> News from Neptune #415 > >> A "Boys of Summer” edition [Links and notes by J.B. Nicholson] > >> Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HON84MPaoVc > >> > >> Links to items referenced on the show. > >> > >> Roger Kahn's "Boys of Summer" > >> ISBN-10: 0060883960 > >> ISBN-13: 978-0060883966 > >> > >> > >> > >> George Will on "Democratic candidates are channeling late-night > infomercials" > >> > https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/commentary/2019/03/10/george-f-will-democratic/ > >> > >> > >> > >> Michael Roberts on Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) in a 3-part series on > his blog: > >> > >> Modern monetary theory – part 1: Chartalism and Marx > >> Part 1: > https://thenextrecession.wordpress.com/2019/01/28/modern-monetary-theory-part-1-chartalism-and-marx/ > >> > >> MMT 2 – the tricks of circulation > >> Part 2: > https://thenextrecession.wordpress.com/2019/02/05/mmt-3-a-backstop-to-capitalism/ > >> > >> MMT 3 – a backstop to capitalism > >> > https://thenextrecession.wordpress.com/2019/02/05/mmt-3-a-backstop-to-capitalism/ > >> > >> > >> > >> Rob Urie on "Re: The Green New Deal: First, Shoot the Economists" > >> > https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/03/29/re-the-green-new-deal-first-shoot-the-economists/ > >> > >> > >> > >> Doug Henwood on MMT > >> https://www.jacobinmag.com/2019/02/modern-monetary-theory-isnt-helping > >> > >> Randy Wray on "Response to Doug Henwood’s Trolling on MMT in Jacobin" > >> > https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2019/02/randy-wray-response-doug-henwoods-trolling-mmt-jacobin.html > >> > >> Originally published in > >> > http://neweconomicperspectives.org/2019/02/response-to-doug-henwoods-trolling-in-jacobin.html > >> > >> > >> > >> > >> Jim Dey on "Polls say progressive tax is popular — or is it?" > >> > http://www.news-gazette.com/opinion/columns/2019-03-29/jim-dey-polls-say-progressive-tax-popular-%E2%80%94-or-it.html > >> > >> > >> > >> "Capital in the Twenty-first Century" by Thomas Piketty > >> Complete book: > https://dowbor.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/14Thomas-Piketty.pdf > >> > >> > >> Tobin Tax > >> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tobin_tax > >> > >> > >> > >> > >> CodePink on "War and Peace and the 2020 Presidential Candidates" > >> > https://www.commondreams.org/views/2019/03/27/war-and-peace-and-2020-presidential-candidates > >> > >> > >> Sen. Sanders on NBC's "Meet the Press" > >> > https://www.nbcnews.com/meet-the-press/video/bernie-sanders-would-use-drones-to-fight-terror-542522435844 > >> > >> > >> > >> > >> > >> UPI on "Rafi Eitan, spy who captured Nazi Adolf Eichmann, dies" > >> > https://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/2019/03/24/Rafi-Eitan-spy-who-captured-Nazi-Adolf-Eichmann-dies/5831553484489/ > >> > >> New York Times on "Rafi Eitan, 92, Israeli Spymaster Who Caught > Eichmann, Is Dead" > >> https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/23/obituaries/rafi-eitan-dead.html > >> > >> > >> > >> > >> Associated Press on "New Zealand bans manifesto of accused Christchurch > killer, igniting debate about censorship and free speech" > >> > https://www.scmp.com/news/asia/australasia/article/3003087/new-zealand-bans-manifesto-accused-christchurch-killer > >> > >> > >> > >> > >> Jonathan Cook on "Trump’s Green Light to Israel: First the Golan, Then > the West Bank?" > >> > https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/03/28/trumps-green-light-to-israel-first-the-golan-then-the-west-bank/ > >> > >> Related: > >> > >> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OT1v4fbljx4 -- Pres. Trump deems Golan > Heights to be part of Israel > >> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rsoip2fsb1E -- RT: Russia, Turkey > blast move to recognize Golan Heights as Israeli > >> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3segzWTLsk -- Ruptly: UN Security > Council meeting on Syria & Golan Heights recognition > >> > >> > >> Map of Golan Heights > >> > https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/42/Golan_Heights_Map.PNG > >> > >> > >> > >> > >> Russia Defies US Threats Over Venezuela > >> Transcript: > https://therealnews.com/stories/russia-defies-us-threats-over-venezuela > >> Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2MX_LS_NqQA > >> > >> > >> > >> > >> J.B. Nicholson on "Is Tulsi Gabbard really anti-war? No, she’s > pro-drone and for “surgical strikes”." > >> > https://digitalcitizen.info/2019/02/13/is-tulsi-gabbard-really-anti-war-no-shes-pro-drone-and-for-surgical-strikes/ > >> > >> January 2018 Rep. Tulsi Gabbard interview with Jeremy Scahill of The > Intercept > >> Transcript: > https://theintercept.com/2018/01/17/intercepted-podcast-white-mirror/ > >> Audio: https://traffic.megaphone.fm/PPY1407171456.mp3 > >> > >> > >> > >> > >> > >> Adeel Hassan, Karen Zraick and Alan Blinder on "Morris Dees, a > Co-Founder of the Southern Poverty Law Center, Is Ousted" > >> > https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/14/us/morris-dees-southern-poverty-law-center-fired.html > >> > >> > >> Alexander Cockburn on "King of the Hate Business" > >> https://www.thenation.com/article/king-hate-business/ > >> > >> > >> > >> Paul Craig Roberts on "Now We Will Find Out If Trump Is Really The > President Or Merely A Figurehead" > >> > https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2019/03/25/now-we-will-find-out-if-trump-is-really-the-president-or-merely-a-figurehead/ > >> > >> -J > >> > > > > _______________________________________________ > Peace-discuss mailing list > Peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net > https://lists.chambana.net/mailman/listinfo/peace-discuss > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Thu Apr 4 03:07:13 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Thu, 4 Apr 2019 03:07:13 +0000 Subject: [Peace] [Peace-discuss] News from Neptune for March 29 In-Reply-To: References: <174B33BC-F1BE-47A5-9E29-FA0C15A7A19E@gmail.com> Message-ID: Thank you David. I appreciate your detailed explanation. I personally find suggestions of Jewish collusion, or complicity, unnecessary and irrelevant, I’m not referring to your statement below, but rather to those who I see as “anti-semites” when they place blame on the victims. It does need to be understood that humans are flawed, and under such horrific conditions many will betray everyone and everything. I agree, the criticism of Hannah Arendt, for her coverage of the trial, trivial and unwarranted. I understand your irritation with the trial of Eichmann, being used as a political ploy, the whole “lay the blame on a few individuals.” It’s the old “bread and circuses” by providing a facade of justice, or placating their bloodlust. Still I’m glad they captured and tried him, by whatever means, as long as no innocents were injured during the kidnapping. I wish we could see more trials, with shaming, and incarceration of war criminals, rather than allowing them to live out their lives in peace. It’s my understanding the trials of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, were little better, sacrificing a few while protecting the many, to provide a false sense of justice. Discussions of this nature are important, as we need to focus on institutions, systems, and root causes, more today than ever. On Apr 3, 2019, at 16:56, David Green > wrote: Thanks Karen. Yes, of course the Eichmann issue is complicated by so many things, including the complicity, for example of the leader of the Jewish community in Hungary, a Zionist, to save himself while telling his community to cooperate with the Germans; that is, to go to their deaths, resulting in another famous trial in Israel (Rudolph Kastner, who was ultimately assassinated). But beyond that, Arendt's criticism of the Eichmann trial and the price she had to pay for being honest and truthful to her best ability, regarding which I should probably brush up on myself, or just watch the movie again. But whatever Eichmann's just deserts, it was a political trial, easier to see in retrospect given Israel's emergence as an American ally and the subsequent exploitation of the genocide, and the Mossad mystique. In addition, the concurrent hypocrisy regarding the CIA ratline of Nazis out of Germany, Klaus Barbie, etc. This is why I get so annoyed by the focus on the Nazis' conscription of Eastern Europeans to do their dirty work, and the subsequent chest-thumping by the Nazi-hunters in this country (Simon Wiesenthal, and the Justice Dept. O.S.I.) when these minor functionaries are exposed (although never very clearly and specifically exposed), all of which contributes to the Israeli (Mossad) mystique that was so much a part of Israel endearing itself to Jewish-American (and Gentile-American) hearts in the 1960s. Eichmann was a horrible Nazi and killer; but the West German leadership through the 60s was also made up of Nazis. Justice was done, but in a manner that was politically convenient and useful. On Wed, Apr 3, 2019 at 1:06 PM C G Estabrook via Peace-discuss > wrote: Thanks for the comments. I appreciate how closely you listen to us. It might be interesting (as David suggested) to read Arendt’s “Eichmann in Jerusalem" (1963) in the present context . > On Mar 30, 2019, at 12:26 PM, Karen Aram > wrote: > >> >> I found yesterdays NFN, https://youtu.be/HON84MPaoVc, particularly interesting and informative. >> >> Carl’s new strategy of being positive, in relation to a Democrat, then allowing others to point out the flaws, is quite refreshing. > >> We need to thank Code Pink for providing the information and data proving what I suspect in relation to Tulsi Gabbard, that of her being a “sheepherder” for the Democrat Party, attempting to sway the anti-war crowd, by “talking about war.” It’s about time someone “talks about it.” However, candidates will talk about whatever they deem necessary to get votes, and funding. The DNC would shut her down if they didn’t like what she is doing. Poor woman, she does retain her cool, when taking so much criticism from those who support war, whatever their political affiliation, but that doesn’t make her Presidential material, nor is it proof she is “anti-war” as Code Pink proves. > >> Perhaps I misinterpret David, in referring to the “kidnap, of Adolph Eichmann?” are you implying, that is the beginning of the immoral behavior of the Mossad, Shin Bet? > >> I realize many at the time felt Israel and the US should always take the moral high ground and follow the law. Just as many think “Truth and Reconciliation” to be justice. If they had kidnapped and tortured and/or murdered Eichmann, I would agree. If they had done what the Mossad did in the seventy’s in relation to Munich, by murdering the members of Black September responsible for terrorism perpetrated against athletes in the Olympics, I would agree. They didn’t, they brought a war criminal to trial, he received “due process,” and the relatives and victims had justice, if one can ever achieve justice for crimes against humanity. I would have, preferred prison for life, solitary confinement as we do with political prisoners in the US, like Chelsea Manning, as I don’t support the death penalty. However, allowing a war criminal, Eichmann wasn’t “just a military man following orders,” he was one of the architects of the “final solution,” to live out their life in comfort is not only an injustice, but an example of inhumanity, inequality, and racism. > > Imagine a future where US war criminals flee the US and take up residence in Israel or KSA, I wouldn’t be concerned if the Iraqi’s or Libyans then kidnapped and took them back to their nation for trial by the victims. It would be more just than these people living in wealth and splendor throughout the rest of their days as if heroes, as is current. > > >> > > > >> On Mar 30, 2019, at 09:30, C G Estabrook > wrote: >> >> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HON84MPaoVc >> >> News from Neptune #415 >> A "Boys of Summer” edition [Links and notes by J.B. Nicholson] >> Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HON84MPaoVc >> >> Links to items referenced on the show. >> >> Roger Kahn's "Boys of Summer" >> ISBN-10: 0060883960 >> ISBN-13: 978-0060883966 >> >> >> >> George Will on "Democratic candidates are channeling late-night infomercials" >> https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/commentary/2019/03/10/george-f-will-democratic/ >> >> >> >> Michael Roberts on Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) in a 3-part series on his blog: >> >> Modern monetary theory – part 1: Chartalism and Marx >> Part 1: https://thenextrecession.wordpress.com/2019/01/28/modern-monetary-theory-part-1-chartalism-and-marx/ >> >> MMT 2 – the tricks of circulation >> Part 2: https://thenextrecession.wordpress.com/2019/02/05/mmt-3-a-backstop-to-capitalism/ >> >> MMT 3 – a backstop to capitalism >> https://thenextrecession.wordpress.com/2019/02/05/mmt-3-a-backstop-to-capitalism/ >> >> >> >> Rob Urie on "Re: The Green New Deal: First, Shoot the Economists" >> https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/03/29/re-the-green-new-deal-first-shoot-the-economists/ >> >> >> >> Doug Henwood on MMT >> https://www.jacobinmag.com/2019/02/modern-monetary-theory-isnt-helping >> >> Randy Wray on "Response to Doug Henwood’s Trolling on MMT in Jacobin" >> https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2019/02/randy-wray-response-doug-henwoods-trolling-mmt-jacobin.html >> >> Originally published in >> http://neweconomicperspectives.org/2019/02/response-to-doug-henwoods-trolling-in-jacobin.html >> >> >> >> >> Jim Dey on "Polls say progressive tax is popular — or is it?" >> http://www.news-gazette.com/opinion/columns/2019-03-29/jim-dey-polls-say-progressive-tax-popular-%E2%80%94-or-it.html >> >> >> >> "Capital in the Twenty-first Century" by Thomas Piketty >> Complete book: https://dowbor.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/14Thomas-Piketty.pdf >> >> >> Tobin Tax >> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tobin_tax >> >> >> >> >> CodePink on "War and Peace and the 2020 Presidential Candidates" >> https://www.commondreams.org/views/2019/03/27/war-and-peace-and-2020-presidential-candidates >> >> >> Sen. Sanders on NBC's "Meet the Press" >> https://www.nbcnews.com/meet-the-press/video/bernie-sanders-would-use-drones-to-fight-terror-542522435844 >> >> >> >> >> >> UPI on "Rafi Eitan, spy who captured Nazi Adolf Eichmann, dies" >> https://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/2019/03/24/Rafi-Eitan-spy-who-captured-Nazi-Adolf-Eichmann-dies/5831553484489/ >> >> New York Times on "Rafi Eitan, 92, Israeli Spymaster Who Caught Eichmann, Is Dead" >> https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/23/obituaries/rafi-eitan-dead.html >> >> >> >> >> Associated Press on "New Zealand bans manifesto of accused Christchurch killer, igniting debate about censorship and free speech" >> https://www.scmp.com/news/asia/australasia/article/3003087/new-zealand-bans-manifesto-accused-christchurch-killer >> >> >> >> >> Jonathan Cook on "Trump’s Green Light to Israel: First the Golan, Then the West Bank?" >> https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/03/28/trumps-green-light-to-israel-first-the-golan-then-the-west-bank/ >> >> Related: >> >> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OT1v4fbljx4 -- Pres. Trump deems Golan Heights to be part of Israel >> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rsoip2fsb1E -- RT: Russia, Turkey blast move to recognize Golan Heights as Israeli >> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3segzWTLsk -- Ruptly: UN Security Council meeting on Syria & Golan Heights recognition >> >> >> Map of Golan Heights >> https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/42/Golan_Heights_Map.PNG >> >> >> >> >> Russia Defies US Threats Over Venezuela >> Transcript: https://therealnews.com/stories/russia-defies-us-threats-over-venezuela >> Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2MX_LS_NqQA >> >> >> >> >> J.B. Nicholson on "Is Tulsi Gabbard really anti-war? No, she’s pro-drone and for “surgical strikes”." >> https://digitalcitizen.info/2019/02/13/is-tulsi-gabbard-really-anti-war-no-shes-pro-drone-and-for-surgical-strikes/ >> >> January 2018 Rep. Tulsi Gabbard interview with Jeremy Scahill of The Intercept >> Transcript: https://theintercept.com/2018/01/17/intercepted-podcast-white-mirror/ >> Audio: https://traffic.megaphone.fm/PPY1407171456.mp3 >> >> >> >> >> >> Adeel Hassan, Karen Zraick and Alan Blinder on "Morris Dees, a Co-Founder of the Southern Poverty Law Center, Is Ousted" >> https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/14/us/morris-dees-southern-poverty-law-center-fired.html >> >> >> Alexander Cockburn on "King of the Hate Business" >> https://www.thenation.com/article/king-hate-business/ >> >> >> >> Paul Craig Roberts on "Now We Will Find Out If Trump Is Really The President Or Merely A Figurehead" >> https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2019/03/25/now-we-will-find-out-if-trump-is-really-the-president-or-merely-a-figurehead/ >> >> -J >> > _______________________________________________ Peace-discuss mailing list Peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net https://lists.chambana.net/mailman/listinfo/peace-discuss -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Thu Apr 4 12:23:09 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Thu, 4 Apr 2019 12:23:09 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: Gloria La Riva on Thursday References: Message-ID: THU, APR 4 AT 7 PM CDT Eyewitness Venezuela: National Speaking Tour w/ Gloria La Riva > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Venezuela presentation flyer.pdf Type: application/pdf Size: 140048 bytes Desc: Venezuela presentation flyer.pdf URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Thu Apr 4 12:23:09 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Thu, 4 Apr 2019 12:23:09 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: Gloria La Riva on Thursday References: Message-ID: THU, APR 4 AT 7 PM CDT Eyewitness Venezuela: National Speaking Tour w/ Gloria La Riva > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Venezuela presentation flyer.pdf Type: application/pdf Size: 140048 bytes Desc: Venezuela presentation flyer.pdf URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Thu Apr 4 19:40:18 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Thu, 4 Apr 2019 19:40:18 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: We won! References: <5ca65be576921_8e4d109af5016351@asgworker-qmb3-11.nbuild.prd.useast1.3dna.io.mail> Message-ID: [CODEPINK.ORG] [Yemen Win] Dear Karen, We are so happy to share this wonderful news with you. This afternoon, the House had their final vote on S.J.Res.7 to end U.S. support for the brutal Saudi-led war on Yemen. The outcome was 247 to 175 in favor! [Thanks You Card]With your help, we have been working to end the war on Yemen for over four years now. This victory would have never happened without two champions in Congress who have been working tirelessly on this issue: Bernie Sanders in the Senate and Ro Khanna in the House. We appreciate all they have done to make this happen and are sending them a thank you card. Would you add your name to the card? We will deliver it to their offices on Monday. The war in Yemen is so horrific that every ten minutes a Yemeni child dies of malnutrition and the UN has deemed the crisis in Yemen to be the worst humanitarian disaster on earth. But we finally have the momentum to end U.S. involvement. Shortly after this momentous vote, Senator Bernie Sanders and Representative Ro Khanna said, “Today, the U.S. House of Representatives took a clear stand against war and famine and for Congress’ war powers by voting to end our complicity in the war in Yemen. This is the first time in the history of this nation that a War Powers Resolution has passed the House and Senate and made it to the president’s desk. Despite the many procedural roadblocks deployed in both chambers to block this resolution, commitment to human rights and Congressional responsibility prevailed. Finally, the U.S. Congress has reclaimed its constitutional authority over matters of war and peace." Now the resolution goes to President Trump’s desk. He has promised to veto it, but we are hopeful that either he will change his mind--as he is known to do--or we will get a two-thirds vote overriding his veto. If we find ourselves working on a veto override vote, we know we can count on Sanders and Khanna to work tirelessly again. Would you add your name to our thank you card to Sanders and Khanna for all their work? Along with Sanders and Khanna, it was the grassroots pressure you placed on Congress that made this happen. We all deserve to celebrate. But let’s remember that the war is not over. We must still commit to a lasting peace process and the rebuilding of this shattered nation. Towards peace in Yemen, Ann, Ariel, Carley, Clara, Jodie, Kelly, Kelsey, Kirsten, Lily, Maya, Mark, Medea, Nancy, Paki, Ryan, Sarah, Tighe, Ursula and Zena [Donate Now!] [http://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/themes/57bdd4fd79bffa57d0000008/attachments/original/1511733600/Twitter.png?1511733600] [http://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/themes/57bdd4fd79bffa57d0000008/attachments/original/1511733600/Facebook.png?1511733600] [http://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/themes/57bdd4fd79bffa57d0000008/attachments/original/1511733600/Instagram.png?1511733600] [http://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/themes/57bdd4fd79bffa57d0000008/attachments/original/1511733718/YouTube.png?1511733718] [http://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/themes/57bdd4fd79bffa57d0000008/attachments/original/1511733600/Flickr.png?1511733600] This email was sent to karenaram at hotmail.com. To stop receiving emails, click here. To update your email subscription, contact info at codepink.org. © Copyright 2019 | www.codepink.org Created with NationBuilder -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Thu Apr 4 19:40:18 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Thu, 4 Apr 2019 19:40:18 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: We won! References: <5ca65be576921_8e4d109af5016351@asgworker-qmb3-11.nbuild.prd.useast1.3dna.io.mail> Message-ID: [CODEPINK.ORG] [Yemen Win] Dear Karen, We are so happy to share this wonderful news with you. This afternoon, the House had their final vote on S.J.Res.7 to end U.S. support for the brutal Saudi-led war on Yemen. The outcome was 247 to 175 in favor! [Thanks You Card]With your help, we have been working to end the war on Yemen for over four years now. This victory would have never happened without two champions in Congress who have been working tirelessly on this issue: Bernie Sanders in the Senate and Ro Khanna in the House. We appreciate all they have done to make this happen and are sending them a thank you card. Would you add your name to the card? We will deliver it to their offices on Monday. The war in Yemen is so horrific that every ten minutes a Yemeni child dies of malnutrition and the UN has deemed the crisis in Yemen to be the worst humanitarian disaster on earth. But we finally have the momentum to end U.S. involvement. Shortly after this momentous vote, Senator Bernie Sanders and Representative Ro Khanna said, “Today, the U.S. House of Representatives took a clear stand against war and famine and for Congress’ war powers by voting to end our complicity in the war in Yemen. This is the first time in the history of this nation that a War Powers Resolution has passed the House and Senate and made it to the president’s desk. Despite the many procedural roadblocks deployed in both chambers to block this resolution, commitment to human rights and Congressional responsibility prevailed. Finally, the U.S. Congress has reclaimed its constitutional authority over matters of war and peace." Now the resolution goes to President Trump’s desk. He has promised to veto it, but we are hopeful that either he will change his mind--as he is known to do--or we will get a two-thirds vote overriding his veto. If we find ourselves working on a veto override vote, we know we can count on Sanders and Khanna to work tirelessly again. Would you add your name to our thank you card to Sanders and Khanna for all their work? Along with Sanders and Khanna, it was the grassroots pressure you placed on Congress that made this happen. We all deserve to celebrate. But let’s remember that the war is not over. We must still commit to a lasting peace process and the rebuilding of this shattered nation. Towards peace in Yemen, Ann, Ariel, Carley, Clara, Jodie, Kelly, Kelsey, Kirsten, Lily, Maya, Mark, Medea, Nancy, Paki, Ryan, Sarah, Tighe, Ursula and Zena [Donate Now!] [http://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/themes/57bdd4fd79bffa57d0000008/attachments/original/1511733600/Twitter.png?1511733600] [http://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/themes/57bdd4fd79bffa57d0000008/attachments/original/1511733600/Facebook.png?1511733600] [http://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/themes/57bdd4fd79bffa57d0000008/attachments/original/1511733600/Instagram.png?1511733600] [http://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/themes/57bdd4fd79bffa57d0000008/attachments/original/1511733718/YouTube.png?1511733718] [http://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/themes/57bdd4fd79bffa57d0000008/attachments/original/1511733600/Flickr.png?1511733600] This email was sent to karenaram at hotmail.com. To stop receiving emails, click here. To update your email subscription, contact info at codepink.org. © Copyright 2019 | www.codepink.org Created with NationBuilder -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Thu Apr 4 22:39:54 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Thu, 4 Apr 2019 22:39:54 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Yemen Message-ID: Yes, this is good news, and while I understand the happiness of those who have been actively working to achieve this goal, I have to ask why this happened, why has it taken so long to halt. How many dead, how much destroyed, how many continuing to die of starvation or cholera? At least 80,000 children have already died, since March 2015, and thats likely a low figure. I doubt the relatives of the victims are jubilant, maybe relieved, but the horrors inflicted upon the people of Yemen is something that they will live with forever. [https://scontent-ort2-2.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-1/c274.216.180.180a/s32x32/12376821_10207973339760548_1113387025646562440_n.jpg?_nc_cat=102&_nc_eui2=AeEM3yRpqI7U5n_X2DMVwzZ6m4Bzb699-t4sOAMRU2rqetGRQ1ykRX2u_UB21MGqpQM6Ylq5YQdVVcvG_8_nk54DHYq-GvCbJAxbt6lDm06vqQ&_nc_ht=scontent-ort2-2.xx&oh=84172d2ac18ab07047aadc88b8ea0cdc&oe=5D3FC35B] Karen Aram MESSAGE FROM CODE PINK: "We are so happy to share this wonderful news with you. This afternoon, the House had their final vote on S.J.Res.7 to end U.S. support for the brutal Saudi-led war on Yemen. The outcome was 247 to 175 in favor!" -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kmedina67 at gmail.com Fri Apr 5 04:30:52 2019 From: kmedina67 at gmail.com (kmedina67) Date: Thu, 04 Apr 2019 23:30:52 -0500 Subject: [Peace] [Peace-discuss] Your message to Peace awaits moderator approval Message-ID: <5ca6d9ff.1c69fb81.18669.c198@mx.google.com> Dear Carl,  If people want to get the discussions, they sign up for the peace-discuss list.  - Karen Medina null -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Fri Apr 5 12:04:08 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Fri, 5 Apr 2019 12:04:08 +0000 Subject: [Peace] [Peace-discuss] Your message to Peace awaits moderator approval In-Reply-To: <5ca6d9ff.1c69fb81.18669.c198@mx.google.com> References: <5ca6d9ff.1c69fb81.18669.c198@mx.google.com> Message-ID: I don’t know what this discussion addressing Carl relates to, but most people have a delete button which they can use if they so desire. The fact that nasty personal attacks against members of AWARE have been allowed on the “Peace Discuss List” because of what is referred to as “freedom of speech, by those who have no interest in war or peace is offensive and one of the reasons I left the Peace Discuss List. When I signed people up, at the market, for the Peace List, during the four years of 2013 - 2016, I didn’t make a distinction between one list or the other, just suggested if people were interested in hearing more “in relation to politics” or “announcements” they sign our Peace List. The people I signed up were those who were interested in discussing political issues related to war or peace with whom I was conversing. We only have one sign up sheet, which does not distinguish between which list one wishes to be on. Preventing people from knowing what is happening is censorship. Of course many don’t want to know, as they prefer their cocoons of security, assuming that voting for the right Democrat every four years, will solve all, given the majority of people in Champaign/Urbana get their news from mainstream media, they have no idea that thousands marched in DC recently in opposition to US intervention in Venezuela, my postings announcing what had taken place were censored by the monitor. People have no idea that only last week hundreds marched in DC opposing Nato. If the good people of Champaign Urbana don’t want to acknowledge the humanitarian crisis in Yemen began in 2015 under the Obama Administration, along with our drone wars, interventions in Venezuela with sanctions killing thousands by Obama, and that our interventions under the Trump administration are a continuation of US foreign policy and will do so no matter which of the two Party’s is in power, then we are all doomed. Given how few events AWARE does other than our monthly demos, there seems little reason to have a peace list if we can’t post information related to war or peace. What it should not be is a “community announcement board” for events unrelated to “war or politics.” On Apr 4, 2019, at 21:30, kmedina67 via Peace > wrote: Dear Carl, If people want to get the discussions, they sign up for the peace-discuss list. - Karen Medina _______________________________________________ Peace mailing list Peace at lists.chambana.net https://lists.chambana.net/mailman/listinfo/peace -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From brussel at illinois.edu Fri Apr 5 16:39:54 2019 From: brussel at illinois.edu (Brussel, Morton K) Date: Fri, 5 Apr 2019 16:39:54 +0000 Subject: [Peace] [Peace-discuss] Your message to Peace awaits moderator approval In-Reply-To: References: <5ca6d9ff.1c69fb81.18669.c198@mx.google.com> Message-ID: I'm puzzled: I wasn't aware that there were (how many?) nasty personal attacks on individuals against members of AWARE on the peace-discuss list. So I’m disappointed that Karen removed herself from that list. The “list" problems seem never to go away. Stuart has given his reasons for how the peace and peace-discusss lists have operated, and I thank him for his fair service managing those lists (if indeed he does). Evidently, many don’t know the reasons why there have been two lists, and some refuse to know. Stuart has enunciated the reasons many times, evidently to minor effect. I’ve found the peace-discuss list useful, valuable, despite its apparently limited(?) audience. …and the peace list for relevent announcements. On Apr 5, 2019, at 7:04 AM, Karen Aram via Peace > wrote: I don’t know what this discussion addressing Carl relates to, but most people have a delete button which they can use if they so desire. The fact that nasty personal attacks against members of AWARE have been allowed on the “Peace Discuss List” because of what is referred to as “freedom of speech, by those who have no interest in war or peace is offensive and one of the reasons I left the Peace Discuss List. When I signed people up, at the market, for the Peace List, during the four years of 2013 - 2016, I didn’t make a distinction between one list or the other, just suggested if people were interested in hearing more “in relation to politics” or “announcements” they sign our Peace List. The people I signed up were those who were interested in discussing political issues related to war or peace with whom I was conversing. We only have one sign up sheet, which does not distinguish between which list one wishes to be on. Preventing people from knowing what is happening is censorship. Of course many don’t want to know, as they prefer their cocoons of security, assuming that voting for the right Democrat every four years, will solve all, given the majority of people in Champaign/Urbana get their news from mainstream media, they have no idea that thousands marched in DC recently in opposition to US intervention in Venezuela, my postings announcing what had taken place were censored by the monitor. People have no idea that only last week hundreds marched in DC opposing Nato. If the good people of Champaign Urbana don’t want to acknowledge the humanitarian crisis in Yemen began in 2015 under the Obama Administration, along with our drone wars, interventions in Venezuela with sanctions killing thousands by Obama, and that our interventions under the Trump administration are a continuation of US foreign policy and will do so no matter which of the two Party’s is in power, then we are all doomed. Given how few events AWARE does other than our monthly demos, there seems little reason to have a peace list if we can’t post information related to war or peace. What it should not be is a “community announcement board” for events unrelated to “war or politics.” On Apr 4, 2019, at 21:30, kmedina67 via Peace > wrote: Dear Carl, If people want to get the discussions, they sign up for the peace-discuss list. - Karen Medina _______________________________________________ Peace mailing list Peace at lists.chambana.net https://lists.chambana.net/mailman/listinfo/peace _______________________________________________ Peace mailing list Peace at lists.chambana.net https://lists.chambana.net/mailman/listinfo/peace -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From cgestabrook at gmail.com Sat Apr 6 01:48:38 2019 From: cgestabrook at gmail.com (C G Estabrook) Date: Fri, 5 Apr 2019 20:48:38 -0500 Subject: [Peace] Flyer for tomorrow's AWARE demo Message-ID: <7A26C3A2-DE34-4F48-B15E-FC018931F5E7@gmail.com> [Flyer to be distributed at the monthly AWARE demonstration, 2-4pm Saturday 6 April 2019, Susan B. Anthony Memorial (Main and Neil) Champaign] WHILE WE ARE PREOCCUPIED WITH PRESIDENTIAL POLITICS, OUR GOVERNMENT IS KILLING PEOPLE AROUND THE WORLD ============================================== International polls show that it is the United States - not Russia, China, Iran, or Israel - that is by far the most feared government in the world. The wars the US is waging in eight countries, and its war provocations against Russia and China, risk a wider - even nuclear - war. ~ Although most Americans are not aware of it, the US government is today making war - killing people - in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Pakistan, Somalia, Syria, and Yemen. They’re doing so principally to control the flow of oil out of the Mideast and North Africa, which the US uses as a weapon against its economic rivals from Germany to China. ~ The ongoing US drone assassination program - called “the most extreme terrorist campaign of modern times” - has killed thousands of people (most of them not the presumed targets), including American citizens and hundreds of children. ~ More than a quarter of a million American troops are stationed in a thousand US bases on foreign soil, most of them surrounding Russia and China. ~ The 70,000 US troops in the ‘Special Operations Command’ are active in three-quarters of the countries of the world. Their activities have included kidnapping (the US government calls it ‘rendition’), torture, and murder. ~ The US is torturing the people of Venezuela - the country with the world’s largest reserve of oil - in order to overthrow their government, which isn’t following orders from Washington. Since 1945 the United States has killed between 20 and 30 million people in wars (in Korea, Vietnam, Latin America, the Mideast, and elsewhere) designed to maintain the world-wide economic dominance that the US inherited at the end of World War II - for the American 1%. It is unfortunately the basis of US foreign policy to use war and the threats of war to retard the economic development of Russia and China as competitors to American control of the world economy - from US support for a fascist coup in Ukraine to US naval provocations in the South China Sea and huge NATO military exercises in eastern Europe. The rest of the world recognizes that the US government is what Martin Luther King called it long ago - “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today.” With other peace groups around the world, we call upon the president and our government to close all foreign military bases, bring all US troops (and weapons) home, and provide social supports - including free medical care, education, and a universal basic income - for Americans, who have been made poorer by generations of our government’s wars. ~~~ AWARE, the ANTI-WAR ANTI-RACISM EFFORT (on Facebook at ) Write our representatives in Congress and demand US troops and weapons out of the Mideast ~ universal basic income ~ free education thru college ~ Medicare for all Senator Dick Durbin: Senator Tammy Duckworth: Representative Rodney Davis: ### From karenaram at hotmail.com Sat Apr 6 12:17:35 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Sat, 6 Apr 2019 12:17:35 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Flyer for tomorrow's AWARE demo In-Reply-To: <7A26C3A2-DE34-4F48-B15E-FC018931F5E7@gmail.com> References: <7A26C3A2-DE34-4F48-B15E-FC018931F5E7@gmail.com> Message-ID: Carl Two things bother me, in an otherwise excellent, comprehensive flyer: 1) Israel placed in the context of not being the greatest purveyor of violence along with China, Russia and Iran. China, Russia and Iran need to be mentioned because the USG and mainstream media would have us believe they are, when its us. but Israel? The USG supports Israel. Does the mainstream media as a result vilify them? Israel byway of AIPAC has bought off our government Representatives, they have Americans now obedient in respect to BDS. The American people, primarily the young, now recognize Israel as a US ally, along with the KSA, responsible for war crimes. Why have AWARE defend them? 2) UBI, included with that which should be provided to the American people, along with Single Payer Health Care, and Free College Education. Do all with AWARE support UBI? While it has many positives, I would love it personally, but most on the “left” do not support it for a reason. It’s a Trojan horse buying off mass movements and socialism, it will put many people out of work, all those government employees providing social services, plus its supported by the (right) Republican politicians, do we of AWARE really wish to identify with Milton Friedman, Nixon, or current politician/Presidential candidate Andrew Yang, who is now promoting it as part of his platform? > On Apr 5, 2019, at 18:48, C G Estabrook via Peace wrote: > > [Flyer to be distributed at the monthly AWARE demonstration, 2-4pm Saturday 6 April 2019, Susan B. Anthony Memorial (Main and Neil) Champaign] > > WHILE WE ARE PREOCCUPIED WITH PRESIDENTIAL POLITICS, > OUR GOVERNMENT IS KILLING PEOPLE AROUND THE WORLD > ============================================== > International polls show that it is the United States - not Russia, China, Iran, or Israel - that is by far the most feared government in the world. The wars the US is waging in eight countries, and its war provocations against Russia and China, risk a wider - even nuclear - war. > > ~ Although most Americans are not aware of it, the US government is today making war - killing people - in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Pakistan, Somalia, Syria, and Yemen. They’re doing so principally to control the flow of oil out of the Mideast and North Africa, which the US uses as a weapon against its economic rivals from Germany to China. > ~ The ongoing US drone assassination program - called “the most extreme terrorist campaign of modern times” - has killed thousands of people (most of them not the presumed targets), including American citizens and hundreds of children. > ~ More than a quarter of a million American troops are stationed in a thousand US bases on foreign soil, most of them surrounding Russia and China. > ~ The 70,000 US troops in the ‘Special Operations Command’ are active in three-quarters of the countries of the world. Their activities have included kidnapping (the US government calls it ‘rendition’), torture, and murder. > ~ The US is torturing the people of Venezuela - the country with the world’s largest reserve of oil - in order to overthrow their government, which isn’t following orders from Washington. > Since 1945 the United States has killed between 20 and 30 million people in wars (in Korea, Vietnam, Latin America, the Mideast, and elsewhere) designed to maintain the world-wide economic dominance that the US inherited at the end of World War II - for the American 1%. > > It is unfortunately the basis of US foreign policy to use war and the threats of war to retard the economic development of Russia and China as competitors to American control of the world economy - from US support for a fascist coup in Ukraine to US naval provocations in the South China Sea and huge NATO military exercises in eastern Europe. > > The rest of the world recognizes that the US government is what Martin Luther King called it long ago - “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today.” > > With other peace groups around the world, we call upon the president and our government to close all foreign military bases, bring all US troops (and weapons) home, and provide social supports - including free medical care, education, and a universal basic income - for Americans, who have been made poorer by generations of our government’s wars. > ~~~ > AWARE, the ANTI-WAR ANTI-RACISM EFFORT > (on Facebook at ) > > Write our representatives in Congress and demand US troops and weapons out of the Mideast > ~ universal basic income ~ free education thru college ~ Medicare for all > > Senator Dick Durbin: > Senator Tammy Duckworth: > Representative Rodney Davis: > > ### > _______________________________________________ > Peace mailing list > Peace at lists.chambana.net > https://lists.chambana.net/mailman/listinfo/peace From karenaram at hotmail.com Sat Apr 6 17:49:52 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Sat, 6 Apr 2019 17:49:52 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Join the call for "Medicare for All" Message-ID: Message from Nurses Campaign: Please share the link https://bit.ly/2VijFNi to join the call if you haven't already today. Please call and urge your elected representative to support H.R. 1384, the Medicare for All Act of 2019. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Sat Apr 6 17:49:52 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Sat, 6 Apr 2019 17:49:52 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Join the call for "Medicare for All" Message-ID: Message from Nurses Campaign: Please share the link https://bit.ly/2VijFNi to join the call if you haven't already today. Please call and urge your elected representative to support H.R. 1384, the Medicare for All Act of 2019. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From cgestabrook at gmail.com Mon Apr 8 06:31:20 2019 From: cgestabrook at gmail.com (C G Estabrook) Date: Mon, 8 Apr 2019 01:31:20 -0500 Subject: [Peace] Interesting new journal on the Left References: Message-ID: <5C1FC819-7D2C-448A-A625-12B35763BFD6@gmail.com> > Begin forwarded message: > > From: Current Affairs > Subject: 🐣 The Current Affairs Aviary is now open 🐣 > Date: April 7, 2019 at 2:47:38 PM CDT > To: > Reply-To: Current Affairs > > View this email in your browser > > We Now Have a Facebook Discussion Group > > Good news, everyone: the Current Affairs Aviary is now open on Facebook . Come join the interactive discussion group people are calling “very nice” and “much saner than your average internet web-forum.” Mingle with real, live Current Affairs editors, mavens, and podcast stars, and enjoy thoughtful discussions of vital left issues like immigration, racial justice, and excellent birds. Disagree with something we said on the podcast? Have a question about an article? Want to know what color cravat Nathan J. Robinson is wearing today? The Current Affairs Aviary is the perfect place to do some of those things! > A Selection of Fine Idea-Steaks > > Food for thought from Current Affairs editors, contributors and other scoundrels. > Always well done. > > Joe Biden, Glenn Greenwald, and Our Dear Friend Matt Yglesias > > Here’s the thing: The fact that a person’s touch, in a wholly different context, did not make you personally uncomfortable says literally nothing whatsoever about whether this person has ever made another person uncomfortable. > ~Vanessa A. Bee > > Joe Biden’s “tactile politics” have sparked one of the more baffling debates in recent memory. “How Not to Talk About Uncomfortable Shoulder Rubs ” by Current Affairs social media editor Vanessa A. Bee clarifies what shouldn’t need to be clarified: there’s no defense for Biden’s long history of unwanted sexualized actions. > > Glenn Greenwald of The Intercept is one of the distinguished—and controversial—journalists alive today. In “Glenn Greenwald Talks About Animals ,” he joins Current Affairs editor-in-chief Nathan J. Robinson to talk about industrial farming, hidden atrocities, and opening your heart to animals. > > “Why Bother Trying to Persuade Anyone? .” asked the congealed lump of oatmeal that writes about politics for Vox under the name of Matt Yglesias, following the publication of Robinson’s exhaustive deconstruction of presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg. Here, Robinson defends his controversial view that socialists should try to explain their ideas to people who don’t already share them. > The Editors Share Their Thoughts > > On the Topic of: > For the next mailbag, what question are you secretly hoping > a caller will ask? > > INTERNET HEARTTHROB OREN NIMNI (LEGAL EDITOR): I want people to ask cute personal questions about Nick > > LYTA GOLD (AMUSEMENTS EDITOR): I am secretly hoping a non-man will call in and ask literally anything! > > SPARKY ABRAHAM (FINANCE EDITOR): Yeah both of those combined please > > NICK SLATER (NEWSLETTER EDITOR): if any of our female fans would like to know the details of my cats’ napping habits, i would be happy to oblige > > AISLING MCCREA (CONTRIBUTING EDITOR):my dishonest answer would be: I hope someone will ask how they can make the world a better place. > > my honest answer would be: I hope someone will ask when the newer members of the crew will get a beautiful apocalizzy portrait to match the others > > BRIANNA RENNIX (SENIOR EDITOR): I am secretly hoping someone calls in to THREATEN US so that we can all make brave defiant speeches on the air, preferably in weird transatlantic accents > > SLATER: you don’t really think someone would want to steal the Current Affairs gold, do you? > > GOLD: we will DEFEND our jokes at the expense of men, whatever the cost may be > > RENNIX: We will fight on the beaches, in the swimwear that makes us feel most comfortable! Mine will cover every inch of my body! > > GOLD: we shall not flag or fail, we shall not cease being accused of alienating the left (which has been coded masculine for some reason) > > NATHAN J. ROBINSON (EDITOR-IN-CHIEF): Oren and I have been waiting years to be asked to explain the groundbreaking theories in our book "Blueprints For A Sparkling Tomorrow" but for some reason the phone never rings > The Current Affairs Cinematic Universe > > Editors Nathan J. Robinson and Brianna Rennix explain all the ways rightwing pundits like Carlson, Coulter, and Frum are wrong about immigration. > Hear Ye, Hear Ye! > > Organizing vs. Mobilizing and a Pleasant Chat With Virgil Texas  > > Legendary labor organizer and scholar Jane McAlevey has helped build successful grassroots labor movements around the world. Her conversation with Current Affairs podmaster general Pete Davis is a can’t-miss guide to left organizing (and a wildly entertaining look at the difference between performative activism and effective agitation). In other news, Chapo Trap House  co-host Virgil Texas swoops into the Bird Feed like a vengeful osprey of truth to talk with Davis about the origins of Chapo, the history of rightwing media, and the blurry lines betwen politics and comedy. > > “You want to read the news, you want to be informed, so OK, here’s the newspaper, here’s this fucking opinion columnist, and you don’t really get a choice in the matter… [but] when it becomes a matter of analytics, most of these people who are dogshit writers with bad opinions are not being read at all. Like, you don’t have to live in fear of these people, because they don’t matter.” > ~Virgil Texas > > A Friendly Reminder: Our Patreon subscribers get early bird access to all new episodes (plus a scrumptious feed of secret subscriber-only shows), but we can also be found on iTunes , Stitcher , and Simplecast . To listen on an Android device, search “Current Affairs podcast” on Google Podcasts. > Put the 'Socialist' > Back in 'Socialist Social Media' > > What Are The Good Things You’ll See When You Follow Us On Twitter? > > Many “news outlets” offer their social media followers nothing but sensational headlines, lazy thinkpieces, and never-ending FOMO. Current Affairs, on the other hand, can offer you sidesplitting reviews of fascist art , thoughtful musings on the topic of feminist utopias , and satirical CEO diaries so droll and uncannily accurate that you will weep for their nonexistent children. > The Loud and Irksome Hissings > of Our Beloved Readers > > > What Should the Left Do About the Federal Budget? > > We welcome all submissions at <>newsletter at currentaffairs.org . Please include “For the Newsletter” in your subject line. For especially urgent opinions, we encourage you to use 72-point all caps and multiple exclamation points, as our eyesight is rather poor. > > Dear Current Affairs, > > I wanted to get your thoughts on the federal budget. More specifically, what should the left say to those that call for a balanced budget? Should the left advocate for a balanced budget? Should the left be concerned about deficit spending or the national debt? Or are such concerns conservative boogeymen? In my experience, I have seen both parties lambast excessive government spending while in opposition only to conveniently forget such concerns while in government. I doubt that the national debt will be a large issue in the 2020 election; is this a good or bad thing? I'd love to see an article analyzing the impact and modern relevance of Heritage Foundation-esque budget hawks. > > Regards, > Jackson Burow > > Dear Jackson, > > These are all excellent questions, we think, and our resident civics expert Pete Davis is currently plotting some sort of accessible, comprehensive guide to the topic. Stay tuned and, if you like what you see, consider hectoring your friends and family into subscribing to our print magazine , where all our budget-related graphs and charts are up to 475% more readable than the leading competition. ~CA > > Min-terview of the Week: > Aisling McCrea, Contributing Editor > > Here are some facts about new Current Affairs contributing editor Aisling McCrea: her name is pronounced “ash-ling,” she speaks Japanese, and she has written eloquently about Starbucks , Dave Rubin , and the illusionary comforts of self-care .These are not the only facts about her, however — there are dozens, hundreds, perhaps even thousands of more Aisling-related information units that haven’t been covered in this paragraph. While sadly we cannot include all of them in this min-terview, we hope the following insights into her worldview will temporarily satiate your curiosity. > > 1) Using five song titles or fewer, how would you describe your personal vision of socialism? > I'm really bad at remembering songs, films, stuff like that on the spot. If people ask me for favourites, recommendations etcetera, I always go blank, and it makes me look very boring. But I'd say... > > Ants Invasion, by Adam and the Ants, because ants are small but incredibly intelligent and powerful when they team up; also because Adam Ant called his band Adam and the Ants and then wrote a bunch of songs with 'Ant' in the title, which shows he doesn't give a crap about looking cool so long as he gets to talk about ants, and I think that's a good attitude to have in life. > > Let's Stay Together by Al Green, because solidarity. > > Big A Little A by Crass, because everyone should be at least a little bit anarchist. > > Toy Solider by Britney Spears, because militarism is silly. > > And Firetruck by the K-Pop band NCT127, because the cornerstone of a good society is well-funded and thought out infrastructure and services. I know nothing about infrastructure, but I love hearing socialists who care about transport and the small details of how services work and stuff like that. Put those guys in charge. > > 2) Did you grow up on the left? What was the first thing that made you think, “Hmm, perhaps capitalism is not good?” > My family weren't political, no-one around me really was. I spent maybe two months of my life thinking I supported the Conservative Party - I was aged about 9 and didn't know anything about the parties except that 'Conservatives' was the longer name, and therefore to my mind, more sophisticated. Age 10 I read a copy of Stupid White Men by Michael Moore that I randomly found somewhere, and decided that I was probably a 'liberal'. Age 11 the Iraq war happened, and although my analysis was not massively insightful, I noticed lots of clever people on TV and in newspapers were saying it was bad, and no-one seemed to have a good answer to them. Age 16 the financial crash happened and I was angry and panicky for my future, but still more a Paul Krugman-type liberal who thought things just needed more regulation. I don't think I had a single 'a-ha' moment, but somewhere in my late teens and early twenties I joined the dots that in every stage and aspect of my life, the people who I thought were supposed to be in charge were massively failing me and the people around me, and that drove me left. I didn't read theory or know much about all the different schools until a few years later, I just stuck with 'general left'. > > 3) Are there are particular tendencies on the left that you adore, despise, or feel vaguely conflicted about? > I'm not massively fussy about tendencies - if someone's good to people, doesn't alienate others, has good basic ideas and doesn't believe anything too obviously egregious, I'm not going to be like "I can't believe their stance on Bakunin!" Whatever works for ya. > > I've come around a lot in recent years to religious leftism. I'm not religious and I went through a snotty atheist phase in my teens, but I've met a fair few people inspired by liberation theology and I think I've got a bit more of a nuanced view on it now. Also, Quakers are extremely solid. Especially in the UK, they were a huge part of securing workers' rights and women's rights, abolition of slavery, anti-poverty initiatives. Still are to this day. Never heard of a bad Quaker. > > 4) If you could telepathically beam the contents of one book into the minds of everyone on Earth, what would it be? > Oh god, I told you I'm bad at this, erm... > > oh I've got it > > Matt's Million > > It was one of my favourite books as a kid, they made a TV series out of it too. it's about a kid who invents a video game and becomes rich. and at first he buys all the toys he wants and stuff, but then he realises it's alienating him from his friends and family and he's not happy, so instead he pays off his mum's mortgage so she can go to college and lives a comfortable but basically normal life. > > 5) You’re a vocal supporter of adult-humans-meowing-like-cats-in-public-for-no-apparent-reason. Has it been difficult to speak your truth? > I wouldn't say I'm a 'vocal supporter' of adults meowing in public. I simply think it's important that people know their rights. It's not illegal to meow at people. Look it up. No court in the land can convict you. > Share This Newsletter With a Friend > Who Hasn’t Given Us Money Yet > > Should you have any left-leaning friends with some disposable income and a habit of making impulse purchases, please forward this newsletter to them, along with a humble plea to subscribe to our print magazine (or just donate for no particular reason). > > > > Copyright © 2019 Current Affairs, All rights reserved. > You are receiving this email because you opted in via our website. > > Our mailing address is: > Current Affairs > 631 St. Charles Aveneue > New Orleans, LA 70130 > > Add us to your address book > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Mon Apr 8 16:26:00 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Mon, 8 Apr 2019 16:26:00 +0000 Subject: [Peace] NO CARDS LEFT TO PLAY, EXCEPT ARMAGEDDON by Glen Ford of the BAR (Truthdig) Message-ID: There is no mystery to the ideological collapse of U.S. ruling class politics under late stage capitalism and imperial decline. Simply put, the corporate duopoly parties have nothing to offer the masses of people except unrelenting austerity at home and endless wars abroad. A shrunken and privatized Detroit serves as the model for U.S. urban policy; Libya and Syria are the scorched-earth footprints of a demented and dying empire. The lengthening shadow of economic eclipse by the East leaves the U.S. Lords of Capital with no cards left to play but the threat of Armageddon. As China reclaims its historic place at the center of the earth, alongside the huge and heavily armed landmass of Russia, Washington flails about in a frenzy of firewall-building, buying time with the blood of millions, hoping to somehow preserve its doomed hegemony. But the “exceptional” superpower has no Marshall Plan to rescue itself from the throes of systemic decay, and all that it can offer to the emerging nations of the world is a bad example and the threat of annihilation. Its own people tire of the “Great Game,” finally realizing that they are the ones who have been played. George Bush drawled the “last hurrah” of empire with his declaration of “Mission Accomplished,” 15 years ago—and was quickly contradicted. With the failure in Iraq, the pretense of “spreading democracy” came ingloriously undone. A refurbishing of the imperial brand was attempted, with a bright and shiny new face—a Black-ish one—plus a new logo to justify invasion and regime-change: “humanitarian” intervention. But Obama’s assault on Syria revealed that the U.S. and its junior partners could only project power in the region through an alliance with Islamic jihadist terror. The architects of the War on Terror were, in fact, the godfathers of al Qaida. “Do you realize now what you’ve done?” Vladimir Putin demanded of the Americans, at the United Nations, in 2015. “It is hypocritical and irresponsible to make loud declarations about the threat of international terrorism while turning a blind eye to the channels of financing and supporting terrorists, including the process of trafficking and illicit trade in oil and arms. It would be equally irresponsible to try to manipulate extremist groups and place them at one’s service in order to achieve one’s own political goals in the hope of later dealing with them or, in other words, liquidating them.” Cont. below: Washington’s jihadist strategy has rapidly unraveled ever since. The empire was unmasked in the world’s most public forum, revealing the utter depravity of U.S. policy and, more importantly, the weakness of Washington’s position in the region. The mighty fortress of global capital, the self-appointed defender of the world economic “order,” was revealed as, not just in collusion with head-chopping, women-enslaving, sectarian mass-murdering terrorists, but militarily dependent on the very forces it claims to wage a twilight, “generational” battle to destroy. The U.S. has been spouting The Mother of All Lies, and most of humanity knows it. Deep down, most Americans suspect as much, too. With its intervention in Syria as a stalwart foe of jihadism and in defense of the principle of national sovereignty, Russia spoke the language of international law and morality, presenting a fundamental challenge to U.S. imperial exceptionalism. By deploying his forces against Washington’s jihadist proxies, in a region infested with American bases, Putin put muscle behind his call for a “multi-polar” world order. China understands clearly that the ultimate U.S. aim is to block China’s access to the region’s energy and markets, at will. Beijing has praised Russia’s military role in the war, and stood with Moscow in vetoing western Security Council resolutions targeting Damascus. China routinely joins with Russia—and most other nations on the planet—in pursuit of a more “multi-polar world.” The U.S. now uses the desperate Kurdish militia as surrogates in Syria, in an attempt to justify its presence in the country, while continuing to arm, finance and train other “rebel” groups, reportedly including former ISIS fighters. The U.S. has always avoided targeting the al Qaida affiliate in Syria, formerly known as the al Nusra Front—which, with ISIS on the run, remains the most effective anti-government force in the country. The Trump administration declares that it will remain in Syria for the foreseeable future—without even a fig leaf of legal cover. Although there is now no possibility for a jihadist victory, Washington seems intent on drawing out the war as long as possible. The truth is, Washington doesn’t know how to extricate itself, because to do so would amount to yet another admission of defeat, and lead quickly to the dissolution of the jihadist networks the Pentagon has so long cultivated. Withdrawal from Syria—and, sooner rather than later, from Iraq, whose parliament this month called for a timetable for U.S. forces to vacate the country—would totally unravel U.S. strategy to dominate events in the oil-rich region. Obama launched the jihadist war against the Syrian government in 2011 to force his way into the country. ISIS’s seizure of Mosul, Iraq’s second largest city, gave the U.S. the opportunity to return to that country, militarily. There will be no third chances, in Syria or Iraq. The American people will not stand for another such adventure. They feel tainted by the experience in both Syria and Iraq, and don’t trust what their government says about the “good guys” and the “bad guys” in the Arab world. If only for reasons of racism, they want out. Everyone smells U.S. defeat, inside and outside the empire. It is a stink that only Americans that were conscious in the Vietnam era can remember. It makes folks anxious—like the loss of a cocoon. Just as whites reaped a “psychological wage” from Jim Crow privileges, according to W.E.B. Dubois, even if they were poor, so do citizens of empire feel psychological benefits, even when the cost of the war machine is impoverishing the country. U.S. politics in the era of imperial decline will be nasty, stupid, petty and racist—just as we are already experiencing. There must be scapegoats for the national de-exceptionalization. The Russians fit the bill, for now, and so does anybody that talks like a Russian, or a Chinese—for example, people that would like to live in a “multi-polar world.” Do not expect the Republicans or the Democrats to make any sense of a world of diminishing empire. The duopolists are incapable of seeing any future beyond their rich patrons’ vision—and the rich have no vision beyond continued accumulation of wealth, which requires a harsher and harsher austerity. Most dangerous, they cannot imagine a world in which they are not on top. We will have to fight to keep them from blowing us all up, in rich man’s despair. Glen Ford is the executive editor of Black Agenda Report. He can be contacted at Glen.Ford at BlackAgendaReport.com. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Mon Apr 8 16:26:00 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Mon, 8 Apr 2019 16:26:00 +0000 Subject: [Peace] NO CARDS LEFT TO PLAY, EXCEPT ARMAGEDDON by Glen Ford of the BAR (Truthdig) Message-ID: There is no mystery to the ideological collapse of U.S. ruling class politics under late stage capitalism and imperial decline. Simply put, the corporate duopoly parties have nothing to offer the masses of people except unrelenting austerity at home and endless wars abroad. A shrunken and privatized Detroit serves as the model for U.S. urban policy; Libya and Syria are the scorched-earth footprints of a demented and dying empire. The lengthening shadow of economic eclipse by the East leaves the U.S. Lords of Capital with no cards left to play but the threat of Armageddon. As China reclaims its historic place at the center of the earth, alongside the huge and heavily armed landmass of Russia, Washington flails about in a frenzy of firewall-building, buying time with the blood of millions, hoping to somehow preserve its doomed hegemony. But the “exceptional” superpower has no Marshall Plan to rescue itself from the throes of systemic decay, and all that it can offer to the emerging nations of the world is a bad example and the threat of annihilation. Its own people tire of the “Great Game,” finally realizing that they are the ones who have been played. George Bush drawled the “last hurrah” of empire with his declaration of “Mission Accomplished,” 15 years ago—and was quickly contradicted. With the failure in Iraq, the pretense of “spreading democracy” came ingloriously undone. A refurbishing of the imperial brand was attempted, with a bright and shiny new face—a Black-ish one—plus a new logo to justify invasion and regime-change: “humanitarian” intervention. But Obama’s assault on Syria revealed that the U.S. and its junior partners could only project power in the region through an alliance with Islamic jihadist terror. The architects of the War on Terror were, in fact, the godfathers of al Qaida. “Do you realize now what you’ve done?” Vladimir Putin demanded of the Americans, at the United Nations, in 2015. “It is hypocritical and irresponsible to make loud declarations about the threat of international terrorism while turning a blind eye to the channels of financing and supporting terrorists, including the process of trafficking and illicit trade in oil and arms. It would be equally irresponsible to try to manipulate extremist groups and place them at one’s service in order to achieve one’s own political goals in the hope of later dealing with them or, in other words, liquidating them.” Cont. below: Washington’s jihadist strategy has rapidly unraveled ever since. The empire was unmasked in the world’s most public forum, revealing the utter depravity of U.S. policy and, more importantly, the weakness of Washington’s position in the region. The mighty fortress of global capital, the self-appointed defender of the world economic “order,” was revealed as, not just in collusion with head-chopping, women-enslaving, sectarian mass-murdering terrorists, but militarily dependent on the very forces it claims to wage a twilight, “generational” battle to destroy. The U.S. has been spouting The Mother of All Lies, and most of humanity knows it. Deep down, most Americans suspect as much, too. With its intervention in Syria as a stalwart foe of jihadism and in defense of the principle of national sovereignty, Russia spoke the language of international law and morality, presenting a fundamental challenge to U.S. imperial exceptionalism. By deploying his forces against Washington’s jihadist proxies, in a region infested with American bases, Putin put muscle behind his call for a “multi-polar” world order. China understands clearly that the ultimate U.S. aim is to block China’s access to the region’s energy and markets, at will. Beijing has praised Russia’s military role in the war, and stood with Moscow in vetoing western Security Council resolutions targeting Damascus. China routinely joins with Russia—and most other nations on the planet—in pursuit of a more “multi-polar world.” The U.S. now uses the desperate Kurdish militia as surrogates in Syria, in an attempt to justify its presence in the country, while continuing to arm, finance and train other “rebel” groups, reportedly including former ISIS fighters. The U.S. has always avoided targeting the al Qaida affiliate in Syria, formerly known as the al Nusra Front—which, with ISIS on the run, remains the most effective anti-government force in the country. The Trump administration declares that it will remain in Syria for the foreseeable future—without even a fig leaf of legal cover. Although there is now no possibility for a jihadist victory, Washington seems intent on drawing out the war as long as possible. The truth is, Washington doesn’t know how to extricate itself, because to do so would amount to yet another admission of defeat, and lead quickly to the dissolution of the jihadist networks the Pentagon has so long cultivated. Withdrawal from Syria—and, sooner rather than later, from Iraq, whose parliament this month called for a timetable for U.S. forces to vacate the country—would totally unravel U.S. strategy to dominate events in the oil-rich region. Obama launched the jihadist war against the Syrian government in 2011 to force his way into the country. ISIS’s seizure of Mosul, Iraq’s second largest city, gave the U.S. the opportunity to return to that country, militarily. There will be no third chances, in Syria or Iraq. The American people will not stand for another such adventure. They feel tainted by the experience in both Syria and Iraq, and don’t trust what their government says about the “good guys” and the “bad guys” in the Arab world. If only for reasons of racism, they want out. Everyone smells U.S. defeat, inside and outside the empire. It is a stink that only Americans that were conscious in the Vietnam era can remember. It makes folks anxious—like the loss of a cocoon. Just as whites reaped a “psychological wage” from Jim Crow privileges, according to W.E.B. Dubois, even if they were poor, so do citizens of empire feel psychological benefits, even when the cost of the war machine is impoverishing the country. U.S. politics in the era of imperial decline will be nasty, stupid, petty and racist—just as we are already experiencing. There must be scapegoats for the national de-exceptionalization. The Russians fit the bill, for now, and so does anybody that talks like a Russian, or a Chinese—for example, people that would like to live in a “multi-polar world.” Do not expect the Republicans or the Democrats to make any sense of a world of diminishing empire. The duopolists are incapable of seeing any future beyond their rich patrons’ vision—and the rich have no vision beyond continued accumulation of wealth, which requires a harsher and harsher austerity. Most dangerous, they cannot imagine a world in which they are not on top. We will have to fight to keep them from blowing us all up, in rich man’s despair. Glen Ford is the executive editor of Black Agenda Report. He can be contacted at Glen.Ford at BlackAgendaReport.com. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Tue Apr 9 15:20:40 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Tue, 9 Apr 2019 15:20:40 +0000 Subject: [Peace] LIBYA ON THE BRINK OF ALL OUT CIVIL WAR Message-ID: * Home * Perspectives * World News * World Economy * Arts Review * History * Science * Philosophy * Workers Struggles * ICFI/Marxist Library * Chronology * Full Archive * Print * Leaflet * Feedback * Share » Libya on the brink of all-out civil war By Bill Van Auken 9 April 2019 As troops and tanks of the so-called Libyan National Army (LNA) of “Field Marshal” Khalifa Hifter advance on the capital of Tripoli, the internal conflicts that have been ripping the North African country apart are dramatically intensifying. Advancing from its base in the east, the LNA has captured the abandoned international airport south of the capital. On Monday, it carried out bombing raids against the country’s sole functioning airport in Tripoli’s eastern suburbs. The Pentagon responded on Sunday to the threatened siege of the city of 1.2 million people by withdrawing its military personnel by sea. The chief of the US Africa Command (AFRICOM), Marine Corps Gen. Thomas Waldhauser, said that the “security realities on the ground in Libya are growing increasingly complex and unpredictable.” He added that the US military command in Africa would “continue to remain agile in support of existing US strategy.” Whether the withdrawal signals US acquiescence to Hifter’s offensive or the preparations for American airstrikes against his forces remains to be seen. Hifter, a former general in the Libyan army, turned against the government of Muammar Gaddafi in the late 1980s after becoming a prisoner of war during a conflict with neighboring Chad. He was quickly picked up by the US Central Intelligence Agency and remained a CIA “asset” for decades, taking up residence near the agency’s headquarters in Langley, Virginia and becoming a US citizen. Sent back to Libya in advance of the 2011 regime-change operation mounted by Washington, Paris and London, he was overshadowed by the Islamist Al Qaeda-linked forces that served as ground troops for the US-NATO air war, which ended up claiming the lives of as many as 50,000 Libyan civilians. Unable to find a path to power, Hifter went back to the US, returning to Libya to mount a bloody campaign in 2014 to seize control of the eastern city of Benghazi from Islamist militias. He formed a military force comprised of various militias, which became the backbone of a regime based in the eastern city of Tobruk. His government has rivaled the US- and UN-recognized Government of National Accord in Tripoli, chaired by wealthy businessman Fayez al-Sarraj. A third rival for state power is the Islamist-dominated General National Congress, which proclaimed itself a Salvation Government and rejected Sarraj’s authority. Before his advance on Tripoli, Hifter managed to establish control in the summer of 2018 over oil facilities in central Libya, and, earlier this year, over a swathe of southern Libya that includes one of the country’s major oil fields. Casualties in the latest fighting reportedly include nearly 50 dead and over 80 wounded, while thousands of civilians have been forced to flee their homes. If Hifter’s forces enter the city, there is danger of a bloodbath and massive destruction, as disparate militia groups have vowed to resist Tripoli’s takeover. Humanitarian aid groups have warned of the threat to civilian lives and called particular attention to the fate of thousands of refugees being held against their will under appalling conditions in detention camps run by the militias that back Sarraj’s regime. The Libyan Coast Guard is lavishly funded and advised by the European imperialist powers, who utilize it in their efforts to halt the flow of refugees to Europe. It turns migrants over to the militias, which subject them to torture, rape, abuse and summary execution, while attempting to extract ransoms from their relatives. Hifter has enjoyed open support from Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, while France has provided covert backing, including military advisers. Italy and Qatar have backed the Tripoli-based regime. While US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo issued a statement declaring that “we oppose the military offensive of Khalifa Hifter’s forces and urge the immediate halt to these military operations against the Libyan capital,” Washington has established the closest alliance with the general’s principal backers in the Arab world, Saudi Arabia and Egypt. The latter’s dictator, Gen. Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, is to receive a red-carpet welcome at the White House today. On Friday, the United Nations Security Council, following a closed-door meeting, issued a statement to the press calling for Hifter’s LNA to “halt its military activity” near Tripoli. When Britain proposed a formal resolution along these lines, however, Russia opposed it, no doubt fearing that it could become the pretext for a fresh Western intervention in Libya. The British draft included a passage calling “for those who undermine Libya’s peace and security to be held to account.” What hypocrisy! There was no such call when the UK joined with France and the United States to overthrow the country’s government and inflict death upon its population and destruction upon its infrastructure. No one, from Barack Obama, Nicolas Sarkozy and David Cameron on down, was ever held accountable for a criminal war of aggression that turned the country into a living hell. Launched under the pretext of a UN resolution authorizing the imposition of a no-fly zone over Libya to halt the supposed (but non-existent) threat of a massacre in the eastern city of Benghazi, the war saw money and arms poured into Islamist militias and lavished on Al Qaeda operatives, who were backed by a relentless bombing campaign, which included nearly 30,000 sorties in the course of seven months. A war launched on the pretext of protecting civilians culminated in the carpet bombing of Sirte, a bastion of popular support for Gaddafi, and the lynch-mob torture and murder of the Libyan leader, over which then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton laughingly gloated, “We came, we saw, he died.” In the intervening eight years, the attempts to install a pro-Western puppet regime in a devastated country controlled by clashing Islamist, tribal and other militias have failed miserably. The regime headed up by Sarraj, recognized as Libya’s “legitimate” government, barely controls even Tripoli. Under its supposed rule, the country’s education and health systems have collapsed, while inflation is ravaging living standards, the unemployment rate has reached 30 percent, and fully a third of the population lives below the poverty line. Conditions of life for masses of Libyans have deteriorated dramatically since the overthrow of Gaddafi. In addition to the leaders of the major imperialist powers, which intervened to assert control over the largest oil reserves on the African continent, those who should be held to account include a whole layer of pseudo-left parties and spokesmen who echoed and amplified the imperialist pretexts of intervening to save lives (code-named R2P: Responsibility to Protect) and even to defend a “Libyan revolution.” Thus, Gilbert Achcar, the academic and prominent member of the French New Anti-capitalist Party (NPA), insisted that the defense of the “Libyan revolution” was the paramount issue, and declared that “You can’t in the name of anti-imperialist principles oppose an action that will prevent the massacre of civilians.” Similarly, the University of Michigan professor Juan Cole, whose “left” credentials stemmed from his limited opposition to the Iraq war, declared, “To make ‘anti-imperialism’ trump all other values in a mindless way leads to frankly absurd positions.” He added, “If NATO needs me, I’m there.” Similar arguments were advanced by, among others, the recently dissolved International Socialist Organization (ISO) in support of the even more bloody US regime change-operation in Syria. These forces, expressing the interests of privileged layers of the middle class, are totally exposed by the reality of Libya eight years after an intervention that was supposed to protect lives and promote “revolution.” As the World Socialist Web Site wrote at the time: “Far from a ‘revolution’ or struggle for ‘liberation,’ what the world is witnessing is the rape of Libya by a syndicate of imperialist powers determined to lay hold of its oil wealth and turn its territory into a neo-colonial base of operations for further interventions throughout the Middle East and North Africa.” With the latest escalation of Libya’s protracted civil war—between rival forces that are all the products of CIA conspiracies and imperialist interventions—the consequences of this rape and the political criminality of those who justified and promoted it have become all the more evident. WSWS.ORG -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Tue Apr 9 15:20:40 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Tue, 9 Apr 2019 15:20:40 +0000 Subject: [Peace] LIBYA ON THE BRINK OF ALL OUT CIVIL WAR Message-ID: * Home * Perspectives * World News * World Economy * Arts Review * History * Science * Philosophy * Workers Struggles * ICFI/Marxist Library * Chronology * Full Archive * Print * Leaflet * Feedback * Share » Libya on the brink of all-out civil war By Bill Van Auken 9 April 2019 As troops and tanks of the so-called Libyan National Army (LNA) of “Field Marshal” Khalifa Hifter advance on the capital of Tripoli, the internal conflicts that have been ripping the North African country apart are dramatically intensifying. Advancing from its base in the east, the LNA has captured the abandoned international airport south of the capital. On Monday, it carried out bombing raids against the country’s sole functioning airport in Tripoli’s eastern suburbs. The Pentagon responded on Sunday to the threatened siege of the city of 1.2 million people by withdrawing its military personnel by sea. The chief of the US Africa Command (AFRICOM), Marine Corps Gen. Thomas Waldhauser, said that the “security realities on the ground in Libya are growing increasingly complex and unpredictable.” He added that the US military command in Africa would “continue to remain agile in support of existing US strategy.” Whether the withdrawal signals US acquiescence to Hifter’s offensive or the preparations for American airstrikes against his forces remains to be seen. Hifter, a former general in the Libyan army, turned against the government of Muammar Gaddafi in the late 1980s after becoming a prisoner of war during a conflict with neighboring Chad. He was quickly picked up by the US Central Intelligence Agency and remained a CIA “asset” for decades, taking up residence near the agency’s headquarters in Langley, Virginia and becoming a US citizen. Sent back to Libya in advance of the 2011 regime-change operation mounted by Washington, Paris and London, he was overshadowed by the Islamist Al Qaeda-linked forces that served as ground troops for the US-NATO air war, which ended up claiming the lives of as many as 50,000 Libyan civilians. Unable to find a path to power, Hifter went back to the US, returning to Libya to mount a bloody campaign in 2014 to seize control of the eastern city of Benghazi from Islamist militias. He formed a military force comprised of various militias, which became the backbone of a regime based in the eastern city of Tobruk. His government has rivaled the US- and UN-recognized Government of National Accord in Tripoli, chaired by wealthy businessman Fayez al-Sarraj. A third rival for state power is the Islamist-dominated General National Congress, which proclaimed itself a Salvation Government and rejected Sarraj’s authority. Before his advance on Tripoli, Hifter managed to establish control in the summer of 2018 over oil facilities in central Libya, and, earlier this year, over a swathe of southern Libya that includes one of the country’s major oil fields. Casualties in the latest fighting reportedly include nearly 50 dead and over 80 wounded, while thousands of civilians have been forced to flee their homes. If Hifter’s forces enter the city, there is danger of a bloodbath and massive destruction, as disparate militia groups have vowed to resist Tripoli’s takeover. Humanitarian aid groups have warned of the threat to civilian lives and called particular attention to the fate of thousands of refugees being held against their will under appalling conditions in detention camps run by the militias that back Sarraj’s regime. The Libyan Coast Guard is lavishly funded and advised by the European imperialist powers, who utilize it in their efforts to halt the flow of refugees to Europe. It turns migrants over to the militias, which subject them to torture, rape, abuse and summary execution, while attempting to extract ransoms from their relatives. Hifter has enjoyed open support from Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, while France has provided covert backing, including military advisers. Italy and Qatar have backed the Tripoli-based regime. While US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo issued a statement declaring that “we oppose the military offensive of Khalifa Hifter’s forces and urge the immediate halt to these military operations against the Libyan capital,” Washington has established the closest alliance with the general’s principal backers in the Arab world, Saudi Arabia and Egypt. The latter’s dictator, Gen. Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, is to receive a red-carpet welcome at the White House today. On Friday, the United Nations Security Council, following a closed-door meeting, issued a statement to the press calling for Hifter’s LNA to “halt its military activity” near Tripoli. When Britain proposed a formal resolution along these lines, however, Russia opposed it, no doubt fearing that it could become the pretext for a fresh Western intervention in Libya. The British draft included a passage calling “for those who undermine Libya’s peace and security to be held to account.” What hypocrisy! There was no such call when the UK joined with France and the United States to overthrow the country’s government and inflict death upon its population and destruction upon its infrastructure. No one, from Barack Obama, Nicolas Sarkozy and David Cameron on down, was ever held accountable for a criminal war of aggression that turned the country into a living hell. Launched under the pretext of a UN resolution authorizing the imposition of a no-fly zone over Libya to halt the supposed (but non-existent) threat of a massacre in the eastern city of Benghazi, the war saw money and arms poured into Islamist militias and lavished on Al Qaeda operatives, who were backed by a relentless bombing campaign, which included nearly 30,000 sorties in the course of seven months. A war launched on the pretext of protecting civilians culminated in the carpet bombing of Sirte, a bastion of popular support for Gaddafi, and the lynch-mob torture and murder of the Libyan leader, over which then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton laughingly gloated, “We came, we saw, he died.” In the intervening eight years, the attempts to install a pro-Western puppet regime in a devastated country controlled by clashing Islamist, tribal and other militias have failed miserably. The regime headed up by Sarraj, recognized as Libya’s “legitimate” government, barely controls even Tripoli. Under its supposed rule, the country’s education and health systems have collapsed, while inflation is ravaging living standards, the unemployment rate has reached 30 percent, and fully a third of the population lives below the poverty line. Conditions of life for masses of Libyans have deteriorated dramatically since the overthrow of Gaddafi. In addition to the leaders of the major imperialist powers, which intervened to assert control over the largest oil reserves on the African continent, those who should be held to account include a whole layer of pseudo-left parties and spokesmen who echoed and amplified the imperialist pretexts of intervening to save lives (code-named R2P: Responsibility to Protect) and even to defend a “Libyan revolution.” Thus, Gilbert Achcar, the academic and prominent member of the French New Anti-capitalist Party (NPA), insisted that the defense of the “Libyan revolution” was the paramount issue, and declared that “You can’t in the name of anti-imperialist principles oppose an action that will prevent the massacre of civilians.” Similarly, the University of Michigan professor Juan Cole, whose “left” credentials stemmed from his limited opposition to the Iraq war, declared, “To make ‘anti-imperialism’ trump all other values in a mindless way leads to frankly absurd positions.” He added, “If NATO needs me, I’m there.” Similar arguments were advanced by, among others, the recently dissolved International Socialist Organization (ISO) in support of the even more bloody US regime change-operation in Syria. These forces, expressing the interests of privileged layers of the middle class, are totally exposed by the reality of Libya eight years after an intervention that was supposed to protect lives and promote “revolution.” As the World Socialist Web Site wrote at the time: “Far from a ‘revolution’ or struggle for ‘liberation,’ what the world is witnessing is the rape of Libya by a syndicate of imperialist powers determined to lay hold of its oil wealth and turn its territory into a neo-colonial base of operations for further interventions throughout the Middle East and North Africa.” With the latest escalation of Libya’s protracted civil war—between rival forces that are all the products of CIA conspiracies and imperialist interventions—the consequences of this rape and the political criminality of those who justified and promoted it have become all the more evident. WSWS.ORG -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Wed Apr 10 00:07:45 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Wed, 10 Apr 2019 00:07:45 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Film of Gloria LaRiva Event on Venezuela In-Reply-To: <1554851542457.12275@urbanaillinois.us> References: <499a8f8e63cf4c6dbce39db307a2f8e2@Zefram.city.urbana.il.us> <49D9A708-0717-41DA-AA7B-075E5A30332B@urbanaillinois.us> <1554851542457.12275@urbanaillinois.us> Message-ID: > > Here’s the link to the film - https://youtu.be/28Q7na2hfzI > >>> > From karenaram at hotmail.com Wed Apr 10 02:24:36 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Wed, 10 Apr 2019 02:24:36 +0000 Subject: [Peace] =?windows-1252?q?Prof=2E_Francis_Boyle_on_=22Who_Trump_Re?= =?windows-1252?q?ferred_To_As_A_Foreign_Terrorist_Group_=96_KPFA=22?= Message-ID: This could have serious consequences: https://kpfa.org/episode/flashpoints-april-9-2019/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Thu Apr 11 11:31:36 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Thu, 11 Apr 2019 11:31:36 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Breaking News: Julian Assange arrested. Message-ID: Breaking News: Julian Assange has been arrested after spending six years in the Ecuadorean Embassy. It was the current President of Equador who allowed the British police to enter the Embassy to arrest Assange. News has been released by Wikileaks that Assange was spied on while in the Embassy. RT. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Thu Apr 11 11:31:36 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Thu, 11 Apr 2019 11:31:36 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Breaking News: Julian Assange arrested. Message-ID: Breaking News: Julian Assange has been arrested after spending six years in the Ecuadorean Embassy. It was the current President of Equador who allowed the British police to enter the Embassy to arrest Assange. News has been released by Wikileaks that Assange was spied on while in the Embassy. RT. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Thu Apr 11 18:49:24 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Thu, 11 Apr 2019 18:49:24 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: Julian Assange Arrested References: <2ab5175e797cf44579dae2f21.24d5dd889d.20190411160318.bd47e26218.58a2ca66@mail63.atl91.mcsv.net> Message-ID: Reply-To: Lee Camp > [https://gallery.mailchimp.com/2ab5175e797cf44579dae2f21/images/bb2daefe-8834-4ef2-8587-b63c0ef190e4.png] Julian Assange has been arrested by British authorities after years in the Ecuadorian embassy. Keep in mind EVERY charge against him has been dropped except for evading arrest, and the UN put out a report calling his confinement "arbitrary and illegal." The U.S. will now try to get him extradited so they can lock him away in prison for the crime of journalism. If you value ANY kind of journalism or freedom of press - even independent reporting online - you should be standing up for Julian Assange. It doesn't matter whether he once said something you don't like. Journalism is on trial here and anyone in media telling you otherwise is a bought-off hack. There will be a protest at the British embassy in Washington DC today at 5pm.I will try to livestream from that event. You can watch it at Facebook.com/LeeCampComedian (if they don't block it). Hopefully we'll then put it up on Redacted Tonight's youtube page. If not now, when? Keep fighting, Lee -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Thu Apr 11 18:49:24 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Thu, 11 Apr 2019 18:49:24 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: Julian Assange Arrested References: <2ab5175e797cf44579dae2f21.24d5dd889d.20190411160318.bd47e26218.58a2ca66@mail63.atl91.mcsv.net> Message-ID: Reply-To: Lee Camp > [https://gallery.mailchimp.com/2ab5175e797cf44579dae2f21/images/bb2daefe-8834-4ef2-8587-b63c0ef190e4.png] Julian Assange has been arrested by British authorities after years in the Ecuadorian embassy. Keep in mind EVERY charge against him has been dropped except for evading arrest, and the UN put out a report calling his confinement "arbitrary and illegal." The U.S. will now try to get him extradited so they can lock him away in prison for the crime of journalism. If you value ANY kind of journalism or freedom of press - even independent reporting online - you should be standing up for Julian Assange. It doesn't matter whether he once said something you don't like. Journalism is on trial here and anyone in media telling you otherwise is a bought-off hack. There will be a protest at the British embassy in Washington DC today at 5pm.I will try to livestream from that event. You can watch it at Facebook.com/LeeCampComedian (if they don't block it). Hopefully we'll then put it up on Redacted Tonight's youtube page. If not now, when? Keep fighting, Lee -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Thu Apr 11 22:07:18 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Thu, 11 Apr 2019 22:07:18 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: RT NEWSLETTER (April 11, 2019) References: Message-ID: Begin forwarded message: From: RT in English > Subject: RT NEWSLETTER (April 11, 2019) Date: April 11, 2019 at 14:54:05 PDT If you do not see images or links do not work, open the message in your browser. [RT] QUESTION MORE 12 April RT NEWSLETTER (April 11, 2019) [Julian Assange arrested after Ecuador tears up asylum deal] World News 11 April Julian Assange arrested after Ecuador tears up asylum deal WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has been dragged out of the Ecuadorian Embassy in London where he has spent the last seven years. That's after Ecuador's president Moreno withdrew asylum. Read more on the site World News 11 April [‘No journalist will be safe from extradition to the US for doing his job’ – Wikileaks editor warns] ‘No journalist will be safe from extradition to the US for doing his job’ – Wikileaks editor warns WikiLeaks editor Kristinn Hrafnsson has said that Julian Assange is facing “political persecution” for “doing his job as a journalist,” and vowed to fight his extradition to the US. Read more on the site USA News 11 April [‘I know nothing about Wikileaks. It’s not my thing,’ says Trump following Assange’s arrest] ‘I know nothing about Wikileaks. It’s not my thing,’ says Trump following Assange’s arrest US President Donald Trump, who said he loved WikiLeaks during his election campaign, tried to distance himself from the arrest of Julian Assange, which was carried out by Britain on the request of the US. Read more on the site World News 11 April [Bolivian president condemns ‘persecution of Assange over US’ murders & spying’] Bolivian president condemns ‘persecution of Assange over US’ murders & spying’ Bolivian President Evo Morales has condemned the arrest and detention of Julian Assange, who he said is being “persecuted” for revealing US “human rights violations, murders of civilians and diplomatic espionage.” Read more on the site World News 11 April [Every charge against Julian Assange, explained] Every charge against Julian Assange, explained WikiLeaks co-founder Julian Assange has been arrested by British police inside the Ecuadorian embassy in London, and faces jail time in the UK, extradition to the US, and possibly even charges in Sweden. For what? RT explains. Read more on the site World News 11 April [Exposing ‘collateral murder’ and mass surveillance: Why the world should be grateful to Assange] Exposing ‘collateral murder’ and mass surveillance: Why the world should be grateful to Assange Julian Assange is a pioneering whistleblower in the digital-age, speaking truth to power like no one before him managed on such a significant scale. As he sits in a London jail cell, here’s why we should be grateful for his... Read more on the site World News 11 April [Israel fails attempted Moon landing as comm with spacecraft lost] Israel fails attempted Moon landing as comm with spacecraft lost Israel’s private spacecraft Beresheet crashed into the Moon on Thursday after being hit with problems during descent, denying the Jewish state a place in the elite club of nations that mastered a lunar landing. Read more on the site Business News 11 April [Corrupt central banks ‘print money every time they make a mistake’ – RT’s Keiser Report] Corrupt central banks ‘print money every time they make a mistake’ – RT’s Keiser Report The European Central Bank’s corporate bond buying program has led to extreme malinvestment and misallocation of capital, allowing companies to make questionable decisions. Read more on the site Sport News 11 April [‘My pain is not your entertainment’: US gymnast addresses fans who shared video of horrible injury] ‘My pain is not your entertainment’: US gymnast addresses fans who shared video of horrible injury US gymnast Samantha Cerio, who broke both legs during a regional gymnastics contest, has called on her followers to stop sharing the video of her gruesome injury, as it makes her go through intolerable pain again. Read more on the site Russia News 11 April [Everyone except US: Experts praise joint efforts at Arctic Forum] Everyone except US: Experts praise joint efforts at Arctic Forum The Arctic Forum highlighted collaboration between participant countries despite political differences, because Arctic development and preservation is their common goal, experts have told RT. Read more on the site [facebook] [twitter] [youtube] [gplus] [instagram] [vk] Borovaya 3/1, Moscow, Russia, 111020 Cancel subscription -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Thu Apr 11 22:12:47 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Thu, 11 Apr 2019 22:12:47 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Protesting the British Embassy in DC with Medea Benjamin, Lee Camp, Popular Resistance. Message-ID: https://www.facebook.com/N2Sreports/videos/596698024072957/?notif_id=1555016813366235¬if_t=live_video_share -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From naiman at justforeignpolicy.org Fri Apr 12 18:01:03 2019 From: naiman at justforeignpolicy.org (Robert Naiman) Date: Fri, 12 Apr 2019 13:01:03 -0500 Subject: [Peace] IPA/Francis Boyle: Contrary to Reports, USG Can Add Charges After Assange Extradition In-Reply-To: <5cb0d0256cc11_60c564b8c40987103673@ip-10-0-0-225.mail> References: <5cb0d0256cc11_60c564b8c40987103673@ip-10-0-0-225.mail> Message-ID: ---------- Forwarded message --------- From: Institute for Public Accuracy Date: Fri, Apr 12, 2019 at 12:51 PM Subject: Contrary to Reports, the U.S. Gov. Can Add Charges After Assange Extradition To: Contrary to Reports, the U.S. Gov. Can Add Charges After Assange Extradition [on Twitter ] In "Julian Assange Arrested in London as U.S. Unseals Hacking Conspiracy Indictment ," Charlie Savage, Adam Goldman and Eileen Sullivan of the *New York Times* state: "If Mr. [Julian] Assange is convicted on the conspiracy to hack offense alone, he could face up to five years in prison. The government could later seek to charge him with additional offenses, but because of extradition practices, any such superseding indictment would most likely need to come soon, before Britain formally decides whether to transfer custody of him." FRANCIS BOYLE, fboyle at illinois.edu Boyle is professor of international law at the University of Illinois College of Law. His books include *Foundations of World Order* (Duke University Press). He said today: "The *New York Times* report is wrong and understates the dangers to Assange. What it states is normally the case in extradition treaties, but it's not the case in the relevant U.S.-British extradition treaty . "Once the U.S. government has Assange over here, they can concoct whatever charges they want to against him for anything and then ask the British to waive what's called the Rule of Specialty. That could add up to much more than the current five years Assange is facing. The British government will almost certainly consent, unless Jeremy Corbyn becomes prime minister. "I'd expect that Assange's lawyers will try to use the European Court of Human Rights to stop the extradition and in any event, they would need to ensure that the British government receives assurance from the U.S. government that the death penalty will not be sought." Also see from the Freedom of the Press Foundation: "The Trump administration’s indictment of Julian Assange threatens core press freedom rights ." Also see: Daniel Ellsberg, who exposed the Pentagon Papers, was just interviewed by The Real News . (As Assange was forced out of the Ecuadorian embassy, he was holding a book -- *Gore Vidal: History of the National Security State* -- based on a collection of interviews Vidal did with The Real News .) For more information, contact at the Institute for Public Accuracy: Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; David Zupan, (541) 484-9167 April 12, 2019 Institute for Public Accuracy 980 National Press Building, Washington, D.C. 20045 (202) 347-0020 * accuracy.org * ipa at accuracy.org -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From naiman at justforeignpolicy.org Fri Apr 12 19:21:30 2019 From: naiman at justforeignpolicy.org (Robert Naiman) Date: Fri, 12 Apr 2019 14:21:30 -0500 Subject: [Peace] JFP alert: Block Extradition of Julian Assange for 1st Amendment-Protected Journalism In-Reply-To: References: <4367671930.-1963819762@org.orgDB.reply.salsalabs.com> Message-ID: I shouldn't have to say this here, but *U.S. opponents of the U.S. Empire need the First Amendment to be strong.* Therefore, when the U.S. Empire is on one side, and the First Amendment and the ACLU are on the other, *U.S. opponents of the U.S. Empire need to stand strong with the ACLU.* ---------- Forwarded message --------- From: Robert Reuel Naiman, Just Foreign Policy Date: Fri, Apr 12, 2019 at 2:11 PM Subject: Block Extradition of Julian Assange for 1st Amendment-Protected Journalism To: [image: Just Foreign Policy] * Urge Congress to block the extradition & prosecution of Julian Assange for actions protected in the U.S. by the First Amendment.* * Sign the petition * Dear Robert, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has been arrested in London and threatened with extradition to the United States to stand trial on charges related to publishing U.S. government documents that exposed U.S. government war crimes. In response to the arrest, the *ACLU* said : “*Any prosecution by the United States of Mr. Assange for Wikileaks’ publishing operations would be unprecedented and unconstitutional*, and would open the door to *criminal investigations of other news organizations*. Moreover, prosecuting a foreign publisher for violating U.S. secrecy laws would set an *especially dangerous precedent for U.S. journalists*, who *routinely violate foreign secrecy laws to deliver information vital to the public's interest*. In response to the unsealed indictment, the *ACLU* said : "*Criminally prosecuting a publisher for the publication of truthful information would be a first in American history, and unconstitutional.* The government did not cross that Rubicon with today’s indictment, but the worst case scenario cannot yet be ruled out. *We have no assurance that these are the only charges the government plans to bring against Mr. Assange. *Further, while there is no First Amendment right to crack a government password, *this indictment characterizes as ‘part of’ a criminal conspiracy the routine and protected activities journalists often engage in as part of their daily jobs, such as encouraging a source to provide more information*. Given President Trump’s and his administration’s well-documented attacks on the freedom of the press, such characterizations are especially worrisome.” All American journalists, publishers and editors need the protections of the First Amendment to be strong in order to do their jobs. *All Americans need the protections of the First Amendment to be strong*, not only to protect our rights to speak and write, but to *protect our right to know*, particularly to know about actions of U.S. government officials that U.S. government officials might be hiding. Some secret U.S. government actions might be against the interests of the majority of Americans. *Some secret U.S. government actions might be unconstitutional or otherwise illegal.* This is especially important with respect to *ending and preventing unconstitutional wars*. There’s *no way* Americans can fulfill our responsibilities to hold U.S. government officials accountable for what they are doing in other people’s countries *if we can’t find out what the U.S. government is doing*. *The Pentagon lied for years to Congress and the American people about its unconstitutional role in the Saudi war in Yemen.* It took opponents of the war *three years* just to prove to the satisfaction of the majority of Congress that *the Pentagon was lying* about its participation in the war. *If we could have exposed the U.S. role in the war sooner, we could have ended the war sooner.* *This is why protecting the First Amendment is so important to opponents of unconstitutional war* - and why the apologists for unconstitutional war have the First Amendment in their crosshairs. They want to chill national security reporting,* because they don’t want the American people to know what they are doing.* This is why the Congress that just voted to end unconstitutional U.S. participation in the Saudi war in Yemen should vote to *prohibit the Department of Justice from spending any of our tax dollars to extradite or prosecute Julian Assange for alleged actions which would be protected by the First Amendment if Julian Assange had been a U.S. journalist standing on U.S. soil* when he performed the alleged action. For example, the Department of Justice authorization or appropriation could be amended thus: *"No money in this bill shall be used for the extradition of Julian Assange or any WikiLeaks employee or volunteer to the United States, nor for the prosecution of Julian Assange or any WikiLeaks employee or volunteer in the United States, for any alleged action which would be protected by the First Amendment if performed by a U.S. citizen journalist, publisher, or editor while standing on U.S. soil." * *Urge Congress to block the Trump Administration’s attempts to leverage the Assange case to undermine First Amendment protections for journalists, publishers, editors, and the American people's right to know by signing our petition . * Thanks for all you do to help U.S. foreign policy become a bit more just, Hassan El-Tayyab, Sarah Burns, and Robert Reuel Naiman Just Foreign Policy *If you think our work is important, please support us with a donation.* We hear that 18 is lucky. http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/donate [image: Please support our work. Donate for a Just Foreign Policy] © 2019 Just Foreign Policy -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From naiman at justforeignpolicy.org Sat Apr 13 07:35:57 2019 From: naiman at justforeignpolicy.org (Robert Naiman) Date: Sat, 13 Apr 2019 02:35:57 -0500 Subject: [Peace] Jonathan Turley: Julian Assange Will Be Punished for Embarrassing the DC Establishment In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Given who Jonathan Turley is, this is a devastating assault on the persecution of Julian Assange. One thing I disagree with Turley on: his pessimism. If we can get Congress to vote to end the Saudi war in Yemen - and we did, it only took four years - we can get Congress to vote against the extradition of Julian Assange to stand trial for publishing actions protected by the First Amendment. Who knows - in two years, we might have a different President of the U.S. A new President of the United States could quash this case with the stroke of a pen. Jonathan Turley was the attorney representing the plaintiffs in the lawsuit of Dennis Kucinich, Walter Jones, and eight other Members of Congress against the Obama Administration for the unconstitutional war in Libya. Block Extradition & Prosecution of Julian Assange for First Amendment-Protected Journalism https://www.change.org/p/block-extradition-prosecution-of-julian-assange-for-first-amendment-protected-journalism ---------- Forwarded message --------- From: Portside Date: Fri, Apr 12, 2019 at 10:45 PM Subject: Julian Assange Will Be Punished for Embarrassing the DC Establishment [image: The key to the prosecution of Assange has always been to punish him without again embarrassing the powerful figures he made mockeries of] Julian Assange Will Be Punished for Embarrassing the DC Establishment Jonathan Turley April 11, 2019 USA Today - - - - * The key to the prosecution of Assange has always been to punish him without again embarrassing the powerful figures he made mockeries of * WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in London on April 11, 2019, Stringer/epa-EFE He is our property .” Those celebratory words of Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., came on CNN soon after the news of the arrest of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London. It was a sentiment shared by virtually everyone in Washington from Congress to the intelligence services. Assange committed the unpardonable sins of embarrassing the establishment — from members of Congress to intelligence officials to the news media. And he will now be punished for our sins. Despite having significant constitutional arguments to be made, it is likely that he will be stripped of those defenses and even barred from raising the overall context of his actions in federal court. What could be the most important free speech and free press case in our history could well be reduced to the scope and substance of an unauthorized computer access case . For years, the public has debated what Assange is: journalist, whistleblower, foreign agent, dupe. The problem is that Assange is first and foremost a publisher. Moreover, he was doing something that is usually heralded in the news media. WikiLeaks disclosed disclosed controversial intelligence and military operations. It later published emails that showed that the Democratic National Committee and the campaign of Hillary Clinton lied in various statements to the public, including the rigging of the primary for her nomination . No one has argued that any of these emails were false. They were embarrassing. Of course, there is not crime of embarrassing the establishment, but that is merely a technicality. The criminal charge against Assange filed in a federal court was crafted to circumvent the obvious constitutional problems in prosecuting him. The charge is revealing. He is charged with a single count for his alleged involvement in the hacking operation of Chelsea Manning in 2010 . By alleging that Assange actively played a role in the hacking operation, the government is seeking to portray him as part of the theft rather than the distribution of the information. The prosecutors say Assange helped Manning secure a password to gain access to additional information. If true, that would be a step that most news organizations would not take. It's likely there will be a superseding indictment once Assange is successfully extradited to the United States. Moreover, the Justice Department is likely to move aggressively to strip Assange of his core defenses. Through what is called a motion in limine , the government will ask the court to declare that the disclosure of intelligence controversies is immaterial. This would leave Assange with only the ability to challenge whether he helped with passwords and little or no opportunity to present evidence of his motivations or the threat to privacy. For the jurors, they could simply be faced with some Australian guy who helped with passwords in hacking national security information. It would be like trying a man for breaking and entering while barring evidence that the house was on fire and he thought he was rescuing people instead. They will punish Assange for their sins The key to prosecuting Assange has always been to punish him without again embarrassing the powerful figures made mockeries by his disclosures. That means to keep him from discussing how the U.S. government concealed attacks and huge civilian losses, the type of disclosures that were made in the famous Pentagon Papers case. He cannot discuss how Democratic and Republican members either were complicit or incompetent in their oversight. He cannot discuss how the public was lied to about the program. A glimpse of that artificial scope was seen within minutes of the arrest. CNN brought on its national security analyst, James Clapper, former director of national intelligence. CNN never mentioned that Clapper was accused of perjury in denying the existence of the National Security Agency surveillance program and was personally implicated in the scandal that WikiLeaks triggered. Clapper was asked directly before Congress, “Does the NSA collect any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans?” Clapper responded, “No, sir. … Not wittingly .” Later, Clapper said his testimony was “the least untruthful” statement he could make. That would still make it a lie, of course, but this is Washington and people like Clapper are untouchable. In the view of the establishment, Assange is the problem. Washington needs to silence Assange So on CNN, Clapper was allowed to explain (without any hint of self-awareness or contradiction) that Assange has “caused us all kinds of grief in the intelligence community.” Indeed, few people seriously believe that the government is aggrieved about password protection. The grief was the disclosure operations and controversies long unknown to the American people. Assange will be convicted of the felony of causing embarrassment in the first degree. Notably, no one went to jail or was fired for the surveillance programs. Those in charge of failed congressional oversight were reelected. Clapper was never charged with perjury. Even figures shown to have lied in the Clinton emails, like former CNN commentator Donna Brazile (who lied about giving Clinton’s campaign questions in advance of the presidential debates), are now back on television. Assange, however, could well do time. With Assange’s extradition, all will be well again in Washington. As Sen. Manchin declared, Assange is their “property” and will be punished for his sins. Once he is hoisted as a wretch, few will again entertain such hubris in the future. *Jonathan Turley, a member of USA TODAY's Board of Contributors, is the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University. Follow him on Twitter: @JonathanTurley * - - - - Interpret the world and change it Submit via web Submit via email Frequently asked questions Manage subscription Visit portside.org Twitter Facebook -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From naiman at justforeignpolicy.org Sat Apr 13 15:34:33 2019 From: naiman at justforeignpolicy.org (Robert Naiman) Date: Sat, 13 Apr 2019 10:34:33 -0500 Subject: [Peace] Let's all go visit Julian in the clink In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: https://www.facebook.com/robert.naiman/posts/10158171605082656 I had an idea - "*ow, don't hurt yourself!*" - for a small thing I could try to do to help Julian. I could try to go visit him, do a "wellness check." Of course, they don't have to allow it, I'm not "immediate family." But then I could try to make a fuss out of the fact that I'm not being allowed to visit him. I could gather some London masses together, we could do a "surprise inspection" of the prison, like UN inspectors looking for Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. Hi, we're here from Global Civil Society and the International Community, we just wanted to make sure that our friend Julian is being treated ok in your prison. Is he getting enough to eat? Has he seen a doctor? Is he getting exercise, sunlight? Does he have interesting reading material? Does he have visitors? You're not keeping him in solitary confinement, are you? Because as we all know, that's "torture." Even if they're trying to isolate him, if we made a big enough show, I think he would find out that we came to visit him, which would be like visiting him. "Lafayette, we are here." Word travels in a prison; I was in prison twice. I figure, I have to go to Europe in early July anyway; I might as well pop by London using my blue passport and try to stir the pot, "fan the flames of discontent." And if the British authorities get wind of my plan and detain me in the airport - well, that wouldn't be the first time I was ever detained in an airport. The longer they detained me, the more it would bring attention to the ever-expanding crackdown on the protections of the First Amendment. Look, I'm a U.S. citizen, born in Arkansas. My uncle was a U.S. Congressman and Bush's Secretary of Agriculture. And here I am, detained in Britain without just cause, no charge, no appearance before a judge, in Britain, home of the *Magna Carta*, birthplace of *habeas corpus*, all because I tried to visit my friend Julian in the clink, just to see if he's ok. What's wrong with this picture? This is democracy? This is human rights? This is the rule of law? === Robert Reuel Naiman Policy Director Just Foreign Policy www.justforeignpolicy.org naiman at justforeignpolicy.org (202) 448-2898 x1 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From susanroseparenti at gmail.com Sat Apr 13 21:44:35 2019 From: susanroseparenti at gmail.com (Susan Parenti) Date: Sat, 13 Apr 2019 16:44:35 -0500 Subject: [Peace] 2 ODD Educational Experiences (a good 'odd') offered by School for Designing a Society Message-ID: Hello Friends, We have three weeks in July in West Virginia, and three months in the autumn in Urbana, IL Participate! [image: Humanism-poster-2019-toSend2.jpg] [image: Cassandra One Sheet (2).jpg] -- *Susan Parenti* *Educational Coordinator * *The School for Designing a Society *www.designingasociety.net *Like us on Facebook !* -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Humanism-poster-2019-toSend2.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 1387259 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Cassandra One Sheet (2).jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 634291 bytes Desc: not available URL: From naiman at justforeignpolicy.org Sat Apr 13 22:27:50 2019 From: naiman at justforeignpolicy.org (Robert Naiman) Date: Sat, 13 Apr 2019 17:27:50 -0500 Subject: [Peace] John Kiriakou: The Railroad That Awaits Julian Assange In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: *John Kiriakou is a former CIA counterterrorism officer and a former senior investigator with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. John became the sixth whistleblower indicted by the Obama administration under the Espionage Act – a law designed to punish spies. He served 23 months in prison as a result of his attempts to oppose the Bush administration's torture program.* https://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/56007-rsn-the-railroad-that-awaits-julian-assange The Railroad That Awaits Julian Assange By John Kiriakou, Reader Supported News 13 April 19 he Justice Department said Thursday that it was charging Julian Assange with one felony count of conspiring to hack into a computer. In the greater scheme of things, that’s a nonsensical charge. There are probably 10,000 fat, lonely guys, living in their parents’ basements who the government could charge with that crime on any given day. Assange’s attorneys in the UK say the extradition process might last five years because it will likely end up in the European Court of Justice. If true, conceivably Assange could be detained for five years awaiting extradition, or roughly the same amount of time he might be sentenced to if convicted on the computer hacking charge. Justice Department policy defines time in detention under almost any circumstance as time served. So if there ever were a trial in the US for the computer hacking charge it would likely be nothing more than a show trial. Additional charges after the application for extradition has been filed are unlikely, due to limitations in extradition treaties requiring full disclosure of all charges prior to an extradition being considered. But that’s not the issue here. No matter what happens, no matter what the charges, Julian cannot and will not get a fair trial in the Eastern District of Virginia. The Eastern District of Virginia is known as the “Espionage Court” for a reason. No national security defendant has ever won a case there. Never. And Judge Leonie Brinkema reserves all national security cases for herself. She has Julian’s case, she judged my case, as well as the case of CIA whistleblower Jeffrey Sterling, and we know that she has also reserved what will be the Ed Snowden case for herself. At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I’ll tell you about what I went through in Judge Brinkema’s courtroom. None of it was good. And Julian should expect exactly the same. When I was arrested after blowing the whistle on the CIA’s torture program, I was charged with five felonies – three counts of espionage, one count of violating the Intelligence Identities Protection Act of 1981, and one count of making a false statement. Of course, I hadn’t committed espionage, nor had I made any false statement. (I’m still not exactly sure what the false statement was supposed to have been.) But those charges were used as leverage to eventually force me to take a plea. When I said that I wasn’t interested in a plea and that I wanted to go to trial, the prosecutors threatened to add a second false statements charge and a charge of obstruction of justice – two throwaway felonies that could be used as additional leverage. I told them to bring it on, but they never did add those charges. The government will invoke something in Julian’s case called CIPA – the Classified Information Protection Act. That means that the court must do everything possible to “protect” classified information from being revealed, even to the jury. The first thing that’s done in a CIPA trial is that the courtroom is sealed. The only people allowed inside are the defendant and the defendant’s attorneys, the prosecutors, the bailiff, the clerk, and the judge. The jury also would be there in the event of a jury trial, but it gets a little more complicated in that case. The bailiff will lock the courtroom doors and put tape around them, and he’ll cover the windows with plastic or canvas, all so that nobody outside can hear anything. If there’s a jury trial, the judge will insist that “classified” words or phrases not be uttered, but instead must be replaced by unclassified words. For example, “Did you hack into NSA’s computers and download documents from Operation Widget?” becomes “Did you hack into Castle’s computers and download documents from Operation Pilates?” It sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it? Well, it is ridiculous. More importantly, it’s very confusing for jurors, many of whom may conclude, “Wow, there are so many classified words that are being discussed! He must be guilty!” Julian’s attorneys also will make a number of motions, both for discovery and for the declassification of documents necessary for his defense. Judge Brinkema is unlikely to approve any of them. Again, in my case, my attorneys made 70 motions to declassify 70 separate classified documents necessary for my defense. We blocked off two full days for the hearings, as did the prosecutors. But when we got to the courtroom, Judge Brinkema began by saying, “I’m going to make this easy for everyone. I’m going to deny all 70 of these motions.” Her thinking was that I either did it (committed a crime) or I didn’t. There was no reason to “jeopardize national security” if she was going to eventually convict me anyway. So my attorneys had literally nothing to present in my defense. We didn’t roll over, of course. My attorneys objected and were overruled. The prosecution then asked for an in-camera conversation with the judge. That’s a private conversation between the judge and the prosecutors without my attorneys present. My attorneys objected strenuously. The judge overruled them again and she went into chambers with prosecutors. As crazily unconstitutional as this may sound, it is permitted in a national security case. To this day I have no idea what was said in that room. But when she came out, the judge looked at my attorneys and reiterated her decision to overrule the objection. And then, much to my shock, she looked at me and said, “This case better not go to trial.” The hearing ended. It had begun only 15 minutes earlier. As we walked out of the courtroom, I asked my attorneys, “What just happened in there?” “We just lost the case,” was the response. “What do we do now?” I asked. “Now we take a plea.” A week later I changed my plea to “guilty.” The government had come down from an offer of 10 years to one of two-and-a-half. I would do 23 months. My attorneys thought that if I had gone to trial, I would have lost and I would have realistically gotten 12-18 years. I had no choice. At sentencing, the judge said that she was glad the case hadn’t gone to trial. She didn’t want “more classified information out there in the public domain.” But then she said, “I don’t like this deal. I don’t like it at all. If I could, Mr. Kiriakou, I would give you 10 years. But my hands are tied.” I left for federal prison six weeks later. Julian is likely in for the same kind of treatment. There no justice to be found at the Justice Department. There’s only punishment for unpopular opinions and actions. Julian has a great soapbox now. The stakes are high, but he has to defend his actions and talk about the freedoms of speech and the press that are so basic and important to the survival of our country. The Justice Department may have finally bitten off more than it can chew. We can only hope. === Robert Reuel Naiman Policy Director Just Foreign Policy www.justforeignpolicy.org naiman at justforeignpolicy.org (202) 448-2898 x1 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Sun Apr 14 19:14:26 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Sun, 14 Apr 2019 19:14:26 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Sustainable transportation and the Climate Crisis Message-ID: Message from Rich Whitney: "The transportation sector is responsible for nearly 30 percent of green house gas emissions in the U.S.,making it the largest single contributor. Our country’s reliance on petroleum-fueled vehicles and planes as our primary means of moving cargo is the main cause. It also contributes to a number of other avoidable environmental health and safety issues. In this presentation, Rich Whitney will review the reliance, review some alternatives, and propose a much healthier approach to meeting our transportation needs. " "Join us and other concerned community members for an informative presentation and opportunity to share ideas about issues that impact us all." [https://scontent-ort2-2.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/c0.0.403.212a/56749349_1999424393697817_2969266141907648512_n.jpg?_nc_cat=106&_nc_ht=scontent-ort2-2.xx&oh=d47a3dc082dd3d4ee7fa5f6d6d49c7c4&oe=5D4F34EB] TUE, APR 30 AT 6:30 PM CDT Sustainable transportation and the Climate Crisis Charleston Carnegie Public Library · Charleston, IL 13 people interested Interested -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From naiman at justforeignpolicy.org Mon Apr 15 15:05:42 2019 From: naiman at justforeignpolicy.org (Robert Naiman) Date: Mon, 15 Apr 2019 10:05:42 -0500 Subject: [Peace] Noah Wall, FreedomWorks: It's Time for President Trump to Get America Out of Yemen In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Please forward this widely. Now it's all about people who have a path to President Trump, to sway him to sign the Sanders-Lee-Murphy Yemen War Powers Resolution into law or to let it pass into law without his signature. https://dailycaller.com/2019/04/14/wall-america-yemen/ OPINION: IT’S TIME FOR PRESIDENT TRUMP TO GET AMERICA OUT OF YEMEN 5:00 PM 04/14/2019 | OPINION Noah Wall | Vice President, Advocacy at FreedomWorks When President Trump stated, “Great nations do not fight endless wars” in his 2019 State of the Union address, he reaffirmed a central campaign promise that flies in the face of the Washington establishment’s status quo. President Trump should ignore the neoconservative national security advisers and sign the bipartisan Yemen resolution passed this week by both Houses of Congress. The resolution would end our involvement in a foreign war fought on behalf of untrustworthy state-actors who could care less about American lives and security. The United States has pursued a failed policy of nation-building for the better part of four decades. Many of our trade partners in the Middle East need to solve their own problems. Saudi Arabia in particular, which has no problem pursuing a policy of reckless interventionism against rebel groups in the Arabian peninsula, is certainly wealthy enough to go it alone in Yemen. Similar to how President Trump has urged our European allies to contribute more to their own defense, Trump should have no qualms with leaving Saudi Arabia to fight its own war. U.S. involvement in Yemen began in 2015 under the Obama administration without a congressional declaration of war. American troops are still deployed to Iraq more than 15 years after President George W. Bush’s 2003 invasion. The War in Afghanistan has gone on for so long that Americans born after 9/11 could now be sent there to serve. Our involvement in endless foreign wars is not a Democratic or Republican problem, it’s a Washington establishment problem decades in the making. Whether through its failure to support the anti-communist Hungarian revolution of 1956, or the disaster that was bringing “American Democracy” to Iraq post-2003, the Washington establishment has a history of broken promises. The United States must stop making these promises to intervene in conflicts that fail to advance national security objectives. Irresponsible promises lead to endless wars. President Trump should end U.S. involvement in Yemen before we become bogged down in yet another perpetual conflict that stretches our resources thin and puts American lives at risk. People die and our reputation suffers due to broken promises that would otherwise have the U.S. military deployed almost everywhere and fight nearly anywhere. By continuing to engage in interventionism for the sake of national security and nation building, the U.S. sets itself up for failure. Flawed decision making by the Washington establishment has made more enemies abroad and weakened U.S. national security. As an outsider, President Trump is far removed from the Washington establishment. Trump’s campaign promise to keep the U.S. out of endless wars is one he can actually keep. In fact, it’s probably the sort of promise that contributed greatly to Trump’s election, seeing as most Americans oppose U.S. involvement in Yemen. And for good reason. Yemen would rarely feature in the American media if not for our involvement in the Saudi-led war. Trump should capitalize on this widespread discontent and sign the Yemen resolution. As a man who cares deeply about his brand, Trump could go down in history as the anti-war President that put America first. In an era of big-government power grabs from both parties, true conservatives need a win that returns the power to make war to Congress where it belongs. By signing the Yemen resolution, President Trump could show his support for principled conservatives in Congress. Sens. Mike Lee (R-Utah) and Rand Paul (R-Ky.), as well as Freedom Caucus members like Reps. Mark Meadows (R-N.C.) and Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) all voted in favor of the measure. Unsurprisingly, some of President Trump’s most ardent supporters in Congress are anti-establishment Republicans who put principle over party in the best interests of the American people. The Yemen resolution is one of the few examples we’ve seen recently of Congress taking steps to reaffirm its constitutional role. For too long, Congress has delegated its authority to the executive branch, either to the president or to unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats. By passing the Yemen Resolution, Congress has taken an important step towards reclaiming its Article I powers. President Trump’s decision to sign the Yemen resolution would not only allow him to make good on a major campaign promise, but also deliver a well-deserved win to supporters of constitutional governance. Democrats and Republicans alike are responsible for our endless wars in the Middle East. President Trump has the unique opportunity to do what his predecessors could not. Trump should embrace his anti-establishment instincts and do what’s right for the country. If Trump wants to win re-election and continue making America great again, he should sign the Yemen resolution and avoid another endless war. *Noah Wall (@NoahwWall ) is vice president of advocacy at FreedomWorks , a nationwide grassroots organization dedicated to lower taxes, smaller government, individual liberty and the American rule of law.* === Robert Reuel Naiman Policy Director Just Foreign Policy www.justforeignpolicy.org naiman at justforeignpolicy.org (202) 448-2898 x1 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From naiman at justforeignpolicy.org Mon Apr 15 15:51:57 2019 From: naiman at justforeignpolicy.org (Robert Naiman) Date: Mon, 15 Apr 2019 10:51:57 -0500 Subject: [Peace] Intercept: Secret French report suggests Pentagon lying about scope of US role in Yemen References: Message-ID: "And it suggests that U.S. assistance with Saudi targeting in Yemen may go beyond what has previously been acknowledged." "the French report suggests that U.S. drones may also be helping with Saudi munitions targeting." 'A footnote after the word “targeting” specifies that the possible U.S. “advice” refers to “targeting effectuated by American drones.”' https://theintercept.com/2019/04/15/saudi-weapons-yemen-us-france/ SECRET REPORT REVEALS SAUDI INCOMPETENCE AND WIDESPREAD USE OF U.S. WEAPONS IN YEMEN Alex Emmons April 14 2019, 11:01 p.m. SINCE THE BRUTAL murder of Saudi dissident and Washington Post contributor Jamal Khashoggi last October, Congress has increasingly pressured the Trump administration to stop backing the Saudi Arabia-led coalition fighting in Yemen and halt U.S. arms sales to Riyadh. In response, President Donald Trump has repeatedly said that if the U.S. does not sell weapons to the Saudis, they will turn to U.S. adversaries to supply their arsenals. [...] But a highly classified document produced by the French Directorate of Military Intelligence shows that *Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates are overwhelmingly dependent on Western-produced weapon systems to wage their devastating war in Yemen*. Many of the systems listed are only compatible with munitions, spare parts, and communications systems produced in NATO countries, meaning that the Saudis and UAE would have to replace large portions of their arsenals to continue with Russian or Chinese weapons. [...] *And the coalition blockade, *which is aimed at cutting off aid to the Houthi rebels but has also* interfered with humanitarian aid shipments, relies on U.S.,* French, and German models of attack ships with, as well as two types of French naval helicopters. The catalogue of weapon systems is just one revelation in the classified report, which was obtained by the French investigative news organization Disclose and is being published in full by The Intercept, Disclose, and four other French media organizations. The report also harshly criticizes Saudi military capabilities in Yemen, describing the Saudis as operating “ineffectively” and characterizing their efforts to secure their border with Yemen as “a failure.” *And it suggests that U.S. assistance with Saudi targeting in Yemen may go beyond what has previously been acknowledged.* Since the beginning of the war, the U.S. has backed the coalition bombing campaign with weapons sales and, until recently, midair refueling support for aircraft. But *the French report suggests that U.S. drones may also be helping with Saudi munitions targeting.* “If the RSAF benefits from American support, in the form of advice in the field of targeting, the practice of Close Air Support (CAS) is recent and appears poorly understood by these crews,” the document says. *A footnote after the word “targeting” specifies that the possible U.S. “advice” refers to “targeting effectuated by American drones.”* Though the U.S. has denied engaging directly in hostilities against the Houthis, *American MQ-9 Reaper drones – a reconnaissance drone with hunt-and-kill capabilities – have flown over Houthi occupied territory.* After the Houthis shot down one of the drones in October 2017, it led to speculation that the U.S. could be using them to collect intelligence for the Saudis. *Targeting being effectuated by American drones could mean that U.S. drones play a more active role in coalition targeting, like laser-sighting precision-guided munitions drops, for example.* [...] The report opens with a discussion of the battle to retake Hodeidah, a port city on the Red Sea and the entry point for most commercial goods and humanitarian aid into Yemen. *The UAE predicted a decisive victory in Hodeidah, where fighting began last summer.* But the intelligence report assessed that the *“taking by force of [Hodeidah] appears still out of reach” for UAE-backed militias*, despite their having nearly twice as many forces on the ground as their adversaries at the time it was written. However, the report notes them *slowly moving to encircle and besiege the city* by trying to retake critical junctions on the road between Hodeidah and Sana’a, the capital, which the Houthis control. *Before the offensive began, humanitarian groups identified a protracted siege as a worst-case scenario because it could largely stop the flow of aid to some of the regions of the country most in need.* [...] === Robert Reuel Naiman Policy Director Just Foreign Policy www.justforeignpolicy.org naiman at justforeignpolicy.org (202) 448-2898 x1 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Tue Apr 16 15:26:54 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Tue, 16 Apr 2019 15:26:54 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: Special Report: Haitian Resistance is Rising; US Complicity in Atrocities (2/2) References: Message-ID: MARC STEINER: Welcome, everyone. This is Marc Steiner here for The Real News. And we’re talking with Margaret Prescod, whose show, Sojourner Truth, appears on Pacifica. She went to Haiti for The Real News and joins us now. We’re going to continue our conversation with her. And Margaret, let me just begin by showing this video of you walking into this home where they found a skeleton of a woman who was burned alive. MARC STEINER: So Margaret, I can hear from your own voice in this video, and what you saw, that it was just almost too difficult to watch. But I think it was important to be seen, to show the kind of level of violence taking place against the Haitian people. And this is a pregnant woman burned alive in her home. MARGARET PRESCOD: And smell was still there, Marc. Could you could you imagine that? So we not only had to enter a space that in many ways was a sacred space because this was a skeleton of a woman there, but still the smell of her death in the room and some of her bones were scattered. A lot of it was together, but some of it was scattered in other places. You could see the burn marks on some of the bones. I mean, I have never in my life had to witness something like that. And the residents of La Saline, they really wanted us to see that, they want the world to see it. And they were saying, “What can you do to get this message out?” And that’s why, Marc, what you’re doing and what The Real News is doing is so important. I think this is the first video footage, actually, likely to be seen of what happened in La Saline. But it was quite a moment, as you could well imagine; just devastating, just heartbreaking. MARC STEINER: So as we’re talking here, we’re also going to show our viewers this photo of a man, it’s a nude photo of a man who was killed and later cut up by the Haitian police. So let me–as we’re looking at this, Margaret, and these are not easy things to look at or watch, but let’s just talk about what, again, politically what’s behind this and why this is happening. We saw that in the last few weeks that five mercenaries were arrested in Haiti–Americans, former SEALs some of them, one is Serbian–and then sent back to United States, saying they were there to protect things in Haiti, they weren’t there to kill people. But the weapons they took were these major assault weapons. And is there a connection here? What politically is happening, why there are mercenaries in Haiti, why these scenes of horrendous violence are taking place against the Haitian people? What is underneath this? MARGARET PRESCOD: Yes. And if you see, and if your viewers see, some of the bullet holes, you’ll see that these were major weapons that were used. This isn’t just some small caliber bullet for the most part. And then, on the ground in Haiti, we saw teams of mercenaries–I can’t tell you. I mean, it seemed as though every time we paused to sit down somewhere to grab a cup of coffee or something to eat, here came a group of people, men, Americans speaking English perhaps with someone who looked like maybe they were Jordanian or Latinx in the mix. And the energy and the vibe you got, definitely these are teams of mercenaries. And as you know, the United Nations that had occupied Haiti for quite some time, they are in the process of withdrawing. And it seems to me, anyway, our thought and of our entire team, that these teams of mercenaries are basically replacing the UN troops. And we know, we heard of people being killed by expert sniper fire. You need training to be able to do something like that. We also know that Martine Moise, who is the First Lady of Haiti, a few days before the November massacre began, she went to La Saline with a lot of money, giving out money to the people. She met with a community leader in La Saline, and the deal was they wanted the protests to stop and for the people of La Saline to support her husband and her husband’s party. Of course, the people took the money, but then they and the leader, the community-based leader, made it clear that they would never support the government of her husband, that it was corrupt and that they were demanding accountability. What happened is that that community leader was arrested, he’s still in prison. The people of La Saline are demanding his release. But then, what they say is that that visit from the first lady was the trigger that began these massacres. Now, some of–even public radio in the United States and mainstream media, they’re reporting that what’s going on in La Saline a conflict between two gangs. That is not the case, all right. Because what the people–they name names of people in government, and they have made it clear that then, these paramilitary people come in to torture and kill, that they are led in by BOID. BOID are like the special Haitian police forces, specially trained by the UN, by the United States, likely by some of these very mercenaries that are in the country. How is that possible? And people, so many people have had to flee La Saline. One other quick point I should make also is that there were a few apartment-type buildings that were built for the people during the Aristide era because a lot of people there basically live in shacks. Now, those homes were also targeted. They were some of the first to be targeted, and people who lived in those homes had to flee. And they went to another place near the water, and they were sleeping on the concrete floor on pieces of cardboard. We interviewed a young mother there who had given birth in this place that they fled to. And honestly, I’m looking at her child, we knew she had no medical care, she had very little food, and we don’t have much hope that that child likely lived. But these are the conditions. And people are very, very angry about it, and they know that government forces are behind it and they know why. Nevertheless, as you could see from the video, they were ready to speak out about what is happening and who they think is responsible for this. MARC STEINER: So very quickly, just to conclude, I want to talk to you very quickly about what you think has to happen from this end. What are the measures we can take in this country to let people know, but also what this country has to do to not allow this to happen? MARGARET PRESCOD: That’s right. And I think it’s very important for a delegation to get down there, perhaps the Congressional Black Caucus leading a delegation to go as soon as possible; be on the ground in Haiti not only to meet with the present government, which we understand they likely will have to do, but also to meet with the people who survive La Saline, to meet with the leadership of Lavalas. The people in La Saline, by the way, made it very, very clear that if President Aristide or Lavalas was there, this would not be happening. And that’s another reason that they’re going after La Saline, because it is a stronghold of the party of President Aristide as well. So that urgently needs to happen. And more media going down there, perhaps another round from Real News, Pacifica, et cetera, going down there and getting the update as to what is happening, and documenting all of this. Because the people of La Saline say this has got to stop. And they made an appeal, actually, to the Congressional Black Caucus in the United States to say, “Please help us, please do something to stop these massacres.” MARC STEINER: Margaret Prescod, thank you so much for joining us. And thanks for going into Haiti for The Real News and Pacifica to get this story to us. The entire video will be shown when it’s finished editing and we look forward to your thoughts on this. And Margaret, thanks so much for joining us here on The Real News. MARGARET PRESCOD: Thank you so very much, Marc. MARC STEINER: And I’m Mark Steiner here for The Real News Network. Thanks for joining us. Take care. Related Bios Margaret Prescod Margaret Prescod is the host and producer of Sojourner Truth with Margaret Prescod. It is a public affairs program that airs Tuesday through Friday on KPFK Radio from 7 to 8 AM (PST). ________________________________ Marc Steiner -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Tue Apr 16 15:26:54 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Tue, 16 Apr 2019 15:26:54 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: Special Report: Haitian Resistance is Rising; US Complicity in Atrocities (2/2) References: Message-ID: MARC STEINER: Welcome, everyone. This is Marc Steiner here for The Real News. And we’re talking with Margaret Prescod, whose show, Sojourner Truth, appears on Pacifica. She went to Haiti for The Real News and joins us now. We’re going to continue our conversation with her. And Margaret, let me just begin by showing this video of you walking into this home where they found a skeleton of a woman who was burned alive. MARC STEINER: So Margaret, I can hear from your own voice in this video, and what you saw, that it was just almost too difficult to watch. But I think it was important to be seen, to show the kind of level of violence taking place against the Haitian people. And this is a pregnant woman burned alive in her home. MARGARET PRESCOD: And smell was still there, Marc. Could you could you imagine that? So we not only had to enter a space that in many ways was a sacred space because this was a skeleton of a woman there, but still the smell of her death in the room and some of her bones were scattered. A lot of it was together, but some of it was scattered in other places. You could see the burn marks on some of the bones. I mean, I have never in my life had to witness something like that. And the residents of La Saline, they really wanted us to see that, they want the world to see it. And they were saying, “What can you do to get this message out?” And that’s why, Marc, what you’re doing and what The Real News is doing is so important. I think this is the first video footage, actually, likely to be seen of what happened in La Saline. But it was quite a moment, as you could well imagine; just devastating, just heartbreaking. MARC STEINER: So as we’re talking here, we’re also going to show our viewers this photo of a man, it’s a nude photo of a man who was killed and later cut up by the Haitian police. So let me–as we’re looking at this, Margaret, and these are not easy things to look at or watch, but let’s just talk about what, again, politically what’s behind this and why this is happening. We saw that in the last few weeks that five mercenaries were arrested in Haiti–Americans, former SEALs some of them, one is Serbian–and then sent back to United States, saying they were there to protect things in Haiti, they weren’t there to kill people. But the weapons they took were these major assault weapons. And is there a connection here? What politically is happening, why there are mercenaries in Haiti, why these scenes of horrendous violence are taking place against the Haitian people? What is underneath this? MARGARET PRESCOD: Yes. And if you see, and if your viewers see, some of the bullet holes, you’ll see that these were major weapons that were used. This isn’t just some small caliber bullet for the most part. And then, on the ground in Haiti, we saw teams of mercenaries–I can’t tell you. I mean, it seemed as though every time we paused to sit down somewhere to grab a cup of coffee or something to eat, here came a group of people, men, Americans speaking English perhaps with someone who looked like maybe they were Jordanian or Latinx in the mix. And the energy and the vibe you got, definitely these are teams of mercenaries. And as you know, the United Nations that had occupied Haiti for quite some time, they are in the process of withdrawing. And it seems to me, anyway, our thought and of our entire team, that these teams of mercenaries are basically replacing the UN troops. And we know, we heard of people being killed by expert sniper fire. You need training to be able to do something like that. We also know that Martine Moise, who is the First Lady of Haiti, a few days before the November massacre began, she went to La Saline with a lot of money, giving out money to the people. She met with a community leader in La Saline, and the deal was they wanted the protests to stop and for the people of La Saline to support her husband and her husband’s party. Of course, the people took the money, but then they and the leader, the community-based leader, made it clear that they would never support the government of her husband, that it was corrupt and that they were demanding accountability. What happened is that that community leader was arrested, he’s still in prison. The people of La Saline are demanding his release. But then, what they say is that that visit from the first lady was the trigger that began these massacres. Now, some of–even public radio in the United States and mainstream media, they’re reporting that what’s going on in La Saline a conflict between two gangs. That is not the case, all right. Because what the people–they name names of people in government, and they have made it clear that then, these paramilitary people come in to torture and kill, that they are led in by BOID. BOID are like the special Haitian police forces, specially trained by the UN, by the United States, likely by some of these very mercenaries that are in the country. How is that possible? And people, so many people have had to flee La Saline. One other quick point I should make also is that there were a few apartment-type buildings that were built for the people during the Aristide era because a lot of people there basically live in shacks. Now, those homes were also targeted. They were some of the first to be targeted, and people who lived in those homes had to flee. And they went to another place near the water, and they were sleeping on the concrete floor on pieces of cardboard. We interviewed a young mother there who had given birth in this place that they fled to. And honestly, I’m looking at her child, we knew she had no medical care, she had very little food, and we don’t have much hope that that child likely lived. But these are the conditions. And people are very, very angry about it, and they know that government forces are behind it and they know why. Nevertheless, as you could see from the video, they were ready to speak out about what is happening and who they think is responsible for this. MARC STEINER: So very quickly, just to conclude, I want to talk to you very quickly about what you think has to happen from this end. What are the measures we can take in this country to let people know, but also what this country has to do to not allow this to happen? MARGARET PRESCOD: That’s right. And I think it’s very important for a delegation to get down there, perhaps the Congressional Black Caucus leading a delegation to go as soon as possible; be on the ground in Haiti not only to meet with the present government, which we understand they likely will have to do, but also to meet with the people who survive La Saline, to meet with the leadership of Lavalas. The people in La Saline, by the way, made it very, very clear that if President Aristide or Lavalas was there, this would not be happening. And that’s another reason that they’re going after La Saline, because it is a stronghold of the party of President Aristide as well. So that urgently needs to happen. And more media going down there, perhaps another round from Real News, Pacifica, et cetera, going down there and getting the update as to what is happening, and documenting all of this. Because the people of La Saline say this has got to stop. And they made an appeal, actually, to the Congressional Black Caucus in the United States to say, “Please help us, please do something to stop these massacres.” MARC STEINER: Margaret Prescod, thank you so much for joining us. And thanks for going into Haiti for The Real News and Pacifica to get this story to us. The entire video will be shown when it’s finished editing and we look forward to your thoughts on this. And Margaret, thanks so much for joining us here on The Real News. MARGARET PRESCOD: Thank you so very much, Marc. MARC STEINER: And I’m Mark Steiner here for The Real News Network. Thanks for joining us. Take care. Related Bios Margaret Prescod Margaret Prescod is the host and producer of Sojourner Truth with Margaret Prescod. It is a public affairs program that airs Tuesday through Friday on KPFK Radio from 7 to 8 AM (PST). ________________________________ Marc Steiner -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Tue Apr 16 15:33:24 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Tue, 16 Apr 2019 15:33:24 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Link to the Real News, warning its disturbing Message-ID: https://therealnews.com/stories/special-report-haitian-resistance-is-rising-us-complicity-in-atrocities-2-2 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From naiman at justforeignpolicy.org Wed Apr 17 04:46:58 2019 From: naiman at justforeignpolicy.org (Robert Naiman) Date: Tue, 16 Apr 2019 23:46:58 -0500 Subject: [Peace] Pelosi Statement on President Trump Veto of Bipartisan, Bicameral Yemen Resolution In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Please share widely. I've always been a big fan of Nancy Pelosi. I can't stand the haters who are constantly disparaging her. https://www.speaker.gov/newsroom/41619/ Pelosi Statement on President Trump Veto of Bipartisan, Bicameral Yemen Resolution APRIL 17, 2019 Washington, D.C. – Speaker Nancy Pelosi issued this statement after President Trump vetoed bipartisan and bicameral legislation led by Chairman Adam Smith and Congressman Ro Khanna to bring an end to America’s engagement in the war in Yemen: “The conflict in Yemen is a horrific humanitarian crisis that challenges the conscience of the entire world. Yet the President has cynically chosen to contravene a bipartisan, bicameral vote of the Congress and perpetuate America’s shameful involvement in this heartbreaking crisis. “This conflict must end, now. The House of Representatives calls on the President to put peace before politics, and work with us to advance an enduring solution to end this crisis and save lives.” === Robert Reuel Naiman Policy Director Just Foreign Policy www.justforeignpolicy.org naiman at justforeignpolicy.org (202) 448-2898 x1 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Sat Apr 20 19:17:37 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Sat, 20 Apr 2019 19:17:37 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: Join the webinar: Eyewitness Venezuela with Anti-war Leaders and Journalists/Live now!!! References: <5cbb6113bff8d_abc51078f5494781@asgworker-qmb3-9.nbuild.prd.useast1.3dna.io.mail> Message-ID: [ANSWER Coalition] Tune in for the webinar here! During the webinar submit questions for the panelists to answer on the Facebook Live link or by emailing: nycanswer at gmail.com When the webinar starts please share it on social media to help boost its important anti-war message! [Share on Facebook] [Share on Twitter] [https://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/answercoalition/mailings/2818/attachments/original/april20livestream.jpg?1555777325] This event is part of a day of action was initiated by the Alliance for Global Justice that is endorsed by dozens of organizations including the ANSWER Coalition. Join the ANSWER Coalition for a special Eyewitness Venezuela Livestream Panel featuring: * Ajamu Baraka — Black Alliance for Peace * Gloria La Riva — Cuba-Venezuela Solidarity Committee and ANSWER Coalition * Max Blumenthal — Editor at Grayzone Project * Medea Benjamin — CodePink * Anya Parampil — Grayzone Project * Claudia De La Cruz — Popular Education Project The webinar will be nationally broadcast from the Venezuelan Embassy building in Washington, D.C., on the Facebook page of the ANSWER Coalition. The panel presentation will feature prominent anti-war and peace activists, and progressive journalists based in the United States who have just returned from Venezuela or have firsthand knowledge. They will discuss the reality of the situation in Venezuela, taking on the myths portrayed in the corporate media, and explaining what lies behind the U.S. war drive. For the past several months Venezuela has resisted the immense pressure by the Pentagon and United States government led by Donald Trump. On January 23, 2019, Juan Guaidó proclaimed himself the indefinite “interim president” of Venezuela at the behest of United States Vice President Mike Pence. The U.S. government has illegally threatened Venezuela with outright invasion, funded right-wing paramilitaries, imposed sanctions and seized much of Venezuela’s wealth. The people of Venezuela are suffering repeated electricity outages due to sabotage, as Washington seeks to destabilize the country for regime change. Countering the Pentagon’s narrative in the U.S. media is the focus of this livestream by anti-war and peace activists, and progressive journalists. Anti-war U.S. activists have been mobilizing and holding protests, marches, direct actions and forums to stop the U.S. war drive against Venezuela. Organize a watch party of your own, tune in, share the link for friends to RSVP and if you can, please donate to support these anti-war efforts now. [Share on Facebook] [Share on Twitter] ANSWER Coalition · United States This email was sent to karenaram at hotmail.com. To stop receiving emails, click here. You can also keep up with ANSWER Coalition on Facebook. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Sat Apr 20 23:52:40 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Sat, 20 Apr 2019 23:52:40 +0000 Subject: [Peace] The Public I, Open Rebuttal Message-ID: Skip to content * About Us * Contributors * Sustainers * In Print (Archives) * UC-IMC * Have a comment, tip, photo or story idea? ← Courtwatch Corner: By Reason of Insanity No Time to Wait: Let’s Make a Green New Deal! → Open Rebuttal to Sen. Duckworth Posted on April 2019 by Sheri Daley [http://publici.ucimc.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/SheriDaleyPic-227x300.png] In a February 7 letter responding to my concerns about Senate Bill 1 (S.1), the Strengthening America’s Security in the Middle East Act of 2019, Senator Tammy Duckworth offered a defense of her support for this bill. I believe that through her support of this bill and the rationale she offers for such support, the Senator violates her oath to uphold the Constitution, demonstrates a failure of responsibility and ethics as a US senator, and displays inconsistent if not hypocritical attitudes regarding human rights abuses around the globe. The Senator’s support for three of the four S.1 provisions is suspect: (1) banning pro-Palestinian BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) activities violates the First Amendment; (2) applying sanctions to Syria on the basis of “human rights abusers” but disallowing the same against Israel is hypocritical; and (3) appropriating billions of taxpayer dollars to the Israeli military is not only unnecessary but unethical in supporting Israel’s ongoing violations of Palestinian human and civil rights. Banning BDS is unconstitutional. The Senator asserts that she “strongly” opposes the BDS movement, but nowhere explains her opposition, instead contending that BDS needs to be “addressed.” Whether or not the Senator approves of them, boycotts, divestments, and sanctions are protected under the First Amendment. Why would a constitutionally protected right need to be “addressed”? As a US senator, her response contains a threefold abrogation of her responsibilities. First, she acknowledges that restricting BDS is “rightly being litigated before Federal courts” (emphasis mine). This admission insinuates that her vote for an unconstitutional bill is acceptable, since the courts can strike it down. The senator took an oath to uphold the constitution, not an oath to violate the Constitution and leave the courts to right her wrong. Second, she passes the buck to the House, where S.1 would be “subject to further debate and amendment.” S.1 should not be going anywhere while containing an unconstitutional provision—already being litigated and (the Senator neglects to add) overturned in two states. Third, she backhandedly burdens “individual” citizens with litigating what she has irresponsibly voted to pass into law when she says “this bill does not protect a state or local BDS law from being challenged in court by an individual on constitutional grounds.” I don’t understand what this senator conceives are her responsibilities, as she discharges onto others her primary duty to safeguard our Constitution. I put it to the senator that it is her responsibility to ensure that all bills for which she votes are constitutional. Beyond violating our Constitution and the oath she took to uphold it, the senator demonstrates a lack of sincerity and ethics in casting her vote. She repeatedly suggests that S.1 won’t pass because the BDS provision is unconstitutional. If the Senator believes that S.1 should not pass, why then vote yea? Moreover, the US government’s support for sanctions anywhere but against Israel is duplicitous. The senator states that she voted for S.1 explicitly because of the provision to sanction Syria for “human rights abusers in the Assad regime.” How then can the senator justify voting for a bill that criminalizes Americans, American businesses, and federal, state and local governments for supporting sanctions against Israel, a country with the distinction of being cited in more than 100 UN resolutions for violating human rights and international law vis-à-vis Palestinians? For that matter, the US government applies sanctions against Venezuela, a country which has not violated any international laws or illegally invaded any nations, but has not sanctioned Saudi Arabia in the past four years for violating international law and human rights in Yemen as it bombed hospitals and obstructed aid from reaching the Yemenis in a war cited as the worst humanitarian disaster in the world. I would like to know why these two governments are not sanctioned for violating human rights and international law while others are sanctioned, even when not committing anything nearly as severe as these violations? The senator acknowledges she is “concerned that the bill as drafted could be interpreted to change [in a more permissive direction] longstanding US policy toward Israeli settlement activity.” Nothing the Senator writes is more misleading. While the US government engages in “politically correct” discourse (like the senator’s statement quoted here) over the illegal Israeli settlements, an adjunct to a colonization process that steals land from Palestinians, bulldozes their homes, and displaces them from their communities, clearly in violation of international law, the veto power of the US government at the UN Security Council speaks a wholly other language. The US government has been the predominant, and often the only, obstacle blocking one UN Security Council vote after another to sanction the transgressions of Israeli regimes. US government policy has consistently been to stand by, behind, over, and under Israel, no matter the injustices that have been committed against Palestinians since the ill-informed British idea, backed by the UN, was developed into the Partition Plan of 1947, to take away land from one people and give it to another. The senator is quite fond of the tired old trope that Israel is our only democratic ally in the Middle East, but conveniently silent over why we have so many allies that are not democratic (Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan) and why “democratic” Israel is allowed to control the lives of more than four million stateless Palestinians living in Gaza and the West Bank. These double standards smack of racism. The senator’s mixed heritage does not acquit her of being held accountable for racist attitudes and actions against a group of people she implicitly demonizes in justifying this vote. In fact, her response concerning the peaceful, constitutional Palestinian-inspired BDS movement is so anti-Palestinian that neither the word Palestine nor Palestinian is mentioned once! I, for one, would like to hear Tammy Duckworth say the words Palestine and Palestinian, and would like her to stop her participation in the erasure and cultural genocide of Palestinians. With a Master’s from the UI School of Social Work, Sheri has taught overseas in Malaysia and the United Arab Emirates. A mother of three children, she has been an activist in efforts to remedy the Middle Fork coal ash problem and for the past two years she has been a member of Jewish Voice for Peace. She is also a poet and gives local readings. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Sun Apr 21 13:54:23 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Sun, 21 Apr 2019 13:54:23 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: The Green New Deal committee/The Real News References: Message-ID: Read the transcript below: FacebookTwitterRedditEmailShare TRNN Executive Producer Sharmini Peries spoke with Steve Horn about this piece. by Steve Horn and Dharna Noor This past November, 150 young activists with the youth-led environmental advocacy group the Sunrise Movement and New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez occupied House Majority Leader Nancy Pelosi’s office. They held signs that read “Green Jobs For All” and demanded the creation of a new climate change select committee—the Select Committee on the Green New Deal. On April 4–nearly five months later–a different committee focused on climate change created by Pelosi and called the Select Committee on the Climate Crisis held its first hearing. Youth environmental activists testified. But neither Ocasio-Cortez nor the Sunrise Movement had a seat in the room. “We’re starting with the people who are the most affected by the climate crisis: young people who are growing up in it, who bear the costs and burdens, and who will help find the opportunities before us,” said Rep. Kathy Castor (D-FL), who chairs the committee, in heropening remarks. Among the witnesses was Aji Piper, an 18-year-old plaintiff in Juliana v. United States, a federal lawsuit filed in 2015 by 21 youth who allege that the federal government’s contributions to climate change threatens their constitutional rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. “My health, my community, and my future—and that of my generation—is at stake,” he said. “We were not invited to participate,” said Stephen O’Hanlon, co-founder and communications director of the Sunrise Movement. “We don’t have any comment on that.” Select Committee on the Green New Deal vs. Select Committee on the Climate Crisis Since late 2018, Sunrise has worked closely with U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) to push for a Green New Deal, a broad plan to reach net-zero greenhouse gas emissions within a decade and create millions of jobs in the process, outlined in a House resolution introduced by Ocasio-Cortez and backed by U.S. Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA). In November, the Sunrise Movement occupied House Democratic Majority Leader Nancy Pelosi’s office demanding she create a House Select Committee to work out the details of the plan. Instead, Pelosi created the Select Committee on the Climate Crisis. “This will be a committee clearly in the spirit of the Green New Deal,” Pelosi told The Hill in December. Sunrise and other environmental activists aren’t so sure. Unlike their proposed committee, the Select Committee on the Climate Crisis cannot draft legislation, and allows members to accept campaign contributions from the fossil fuel industry. [View image on Twitter][View image on Twitter] [https://pbs.twimg.com/profile_images/875424668798246912/GoSrApBL_normal.jpg] Sunrise Movement [🌅] ✔@sunrisemvmt The mandate for @NancyPelosi’s Climate Select Committee is out, and it’s everything we feared. [❌]No mandate to create a plan on the timeline mandated by top scientists [❌]No language on economic & racial justice, or a just transition [✅]Allows members to accept fossil fuel money 1,221 1:29 PM - Jan 2, 2019 954 people are talking about this Twitter Ads info and privacy The committee Pelosi created bears more resemblance to the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, which she instated in 2007. But the previous iteration had subpoena power, the legal ability to compel testimony and documents from individuals or entities, such as fossil fuel companies. Pelosi invited Ocasio-Cortez on as a member of the special committee, but Ocasio-Cortez declined the offer. “I didn‘t feel like I would be able to do it justice,” she told MSNBC. She said she would have liked to participate, but “timing and logistics” wouldn’t allow it. [Embedded video] [https://pbs.twimg.com/profile_images/929666076279017472/HSm8OUL7_normal.jpg] Meet the Press ✔@MeetThePress WATCH: Why is @AOC not on the Select Committee on Climate Change, despite being invited? “I do want to be on it… The speaker was gracious enough to invite me on it… I would have to give up doing my job well and I don’t want to give that up.” #MTPDaily 34 3:27 PM - Feb 7, 2019 20 people are talking about this Twitter Ads info and privacy “I’m really excited to support Representative Castor in her agenda,” Ocasio-Cortez said. The Sunrise Movement did not share that sentiment.. “This committee is toothless and weaker than the first climate select committee from a decade ago, and it does not get us meaningfully closer to solving the climate crisis or fixing our broken economy,” said Varshini Prakash, co-founder and Executive Director of the Sunrise Movement, in a statement in January. Pelosi’s recent comments have not eased activists’ fears. In February, Sunrise held a press conference to unveil a resolution on the Green New Deal, sponsored by Ocasio-Cortez and Markey. In response, Pelosi sarcastically referred to the Green New Deal as the “Green Dream or whatever they call it.” “Nobody knows what it is, but they’re for it, right?” she said. On 60 Minutes this past weekend, Pelosi further dismissed Ocasio-Cortez, dismissing her support as, “like, five people,” and claiming she is “a progressive.” Aaron Huertas, Communications Director for the Select Committee on the Climate Crisis, said the committee has had communication with Sunrise. “We talked to a lot of people and organizations in the youth climate movement, including at Sunrise,” he said. He also acknowledged that Sunrise did not receive an invitation to the committee’s first hearing and did not respond to requests for further explanation. Quantifying Impact The Select Committee on the Climate Crisis has a mandate to publish its climate policy proposals by March 31, 2020. Until then, the committee will hold hearings and investigate the climate crisis—but may not draft legislation. “The Select Committee shall not have legislative jurisdiction and shall have no authority to take legislative action on any bill or resolution,” reads the House Resolution creating the committee. “The sole authority of the Select Committee shall be to investigate, study, make findings, and develop recommendations on policies, strategies, and innovations to achieve substantial and permanent reductions in pollution and other activities that contribute to the climate crisis which will honor our responsibility to be good stewards of the planet for future generations.” Related Stories 01. Did The House’s New Climate Committee Snub the Sunrise Movement? 02. California Dreamin’ of Climate Action by Newsom, But Will He Deliver? 03. Push to Reverse Obscure Shipping Law Could Flood Puerto Rico with Fracked Gas 04. Baltimore Incinerator Could Lose Green Subsidies (UPDATED) 05. City Passes Law That Could Shutter Massive Trash Incinerator The Select Committee is bipartisan. At last week’s hearing, some Republican members denied the prevailing scientific consensus that climate change is human-caused and creating a global crisis. “Climate has a history, it’s always changing,” said U.S. Rep. Gary Palmer (R-AL) Not all Republican members have engaged in climate denial. During the committee’s first business meeting a week earlier, some Republican members suggested they incorporate measures into the report on potential economic and jobs impacts, the effectiveness of proposals in curbing greenhouse gas emissions, the impacts of halting sea-level rise, and the plan’s ability to lower global temperatures. Castor thanked U.S. Rep. Garret Graves (R-LA), the Select Committee’s Ranking Member for his proposed amendments and added that there will be more time for that later on. “So, as we develop committee reports, members will have an opportunity to provide input on what any given report will cover, so it’s premature at this point to include in our rules any specific analyses,” she said. [Image Credit: U.S. House of Representatives Committee Repository] Image Credit: U.S. House of Representatives Committee Repository Castor also said that members of congressional committees have the ability to file additional views to congressional reports, citing Rule 5(c) of the Rules of the Select Committee on the Climate Crisis in noting that. U.S. Rep. Huffman (D-CA) agreed with Castor and also said he would like to see some of the items that Graves and his colleagues proposed appear in a separate report created under the mandate of future legislation. “I’d like to see some of that stuff in there too, but I think it’s important as we try to understand the costs and trade-offs of some of the climate solutions we’ll be recommending, that we also really take a careful look at the cost of the status quo,” said Huffman. “Because otherwise, what’s the point of pretending that action is always expensive an inaction if always free? So, I don’t think this committee has the budget, or scope or timeframe to do the exhaustive economic analysis, especially to the level of certainty that seems to be requested in many of these amendments. Graves said he would take Huffman up on that offer. “Look, we can sit here and write a report that has utopian views, but they’ve got to be grounded,” he said. “One of the challenges with this issue is that, when you look historically, what’s happened is people just go to their corners. So what happens? Nothing. Nothing happens, largely. I think it’s really important that recommendations we make have some type of sideboard, some of criteria, or parameters to where we know what the net effects are going to be.” Graves expressed further skepticism about the committee’s ability to achieve bipartisan compromise in a statement provided to The Real News Network. “Rep. Graves joined the committee because he wants to make positive difference on this issue, believes that it is a forum to do that and is striving for bipartisan cooperation on meaningful adaptation and disaster reforms to make our communities and the ecosystem more resilient,” said Chief-of-Staff Kevin Roig. “Unfortunately, confidence in the Democrats’ desire to cooperate diminishes daily.” Staying in Paris Though the Select Committee cannot vote on legislation, Castor introduced the Climate Action Now Act (HR 9) in her capacity as a member of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce the day before the Select Committee’s first business meeting. That legislation calls for the U.S. to re-enter the 2015 Paris Agreement, from which Trump withdrew the U.S. in 2017. The Paris Agreement, a deal brokered at the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, proposes a plan for participating countries to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in order to limit global warming to 1.5-2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial temperatures. “I am proud to be chairing the Select Committee on the Climate Crisis and I am honored to introduce HR 9, the Climate Action Now Act,” said Castor. “It was with America’s leadership and engagement that so many nations committed to climate action in the international Paris Agreement.” At a press conference, Castor said it exemplifies how House Democrats will treat climate change with the seriousness it demands. “We will keep our commitments to fight the climate crisis,” she said. “This is just the start of action by House Democrats in this Congress.” Yet Graves, the Select Committee’s Republican Ranking Member, also said the Republicans were not consulted about the bill prior to its public introduction. “It seems—as evidenced by HR 9, which unilaterally came into existence without us even being notified much less given a chance for markup—that Democrats have a predetermined outcome in mind and are simply going the motions to achieve it,” said Graves. “We hope we are wrong.” Further, the Paris Agreement itself has faced criticism by climate advocates and scientists alike for not doing enough to tackle the climate crisis on a fast enough timeline. It is also a non-binding agreement, with no international legal consequences for falling short of the de facto voluntary commitments. “It’s a fraud really, a fake,” James Hansen, the first climate scientist to testify about the climate crisis in front of Congress in 1988, told The Guardian in the aftermath of the deal being signed. “It’s just bullshit for them to say: ‘We’ll have a 2°C warming target and then try to do a little better every five years.’ It’s just worthless words. There is no action, just promises. As long as fossil fuels appear to be the cheapest fuels out there, they will be continued to be burned.” Chasing Out Sunrise The choice to leave Sunrise out in the cold has faced criticism from outside observers. One of them is Jessy Tolkan, who co-founded the youth climate advocacy group Energy Action Coalition over a decade ago, which is now known as the Power Shift Network. “It is a disservice to this conversation to disclude—or rather to not go out of your way to invite these young leaders [from the Sunrise Movement] to speak,” said Tolkan, who also sits on the Board of Directors of the climate advocacy group 350.org, but spoke to The Real News in her personal capacity. “They have an important vision that is exactly what’s required in this moment.” As a youth activist, Tolkan testified in 2009 before the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming. Tolkan calls herself “Sunrise’s biggest fangirl” and praised the group for shifting the Overton window on federal climate policy beyond the Paris Agreement. “I think the role [of Sunrise] is to create new political space and to open new frontiers of a conversation,” said Tolkan. “And that’s exactly what I believe Sunrise is doing … I think they’re yanking the conversation to a more appropriate place, a more urgent place, a more just place and a more intersectional place.” Joshua Frank, Deputy Editor of the publication CounterPunch and co-author of the book The Big Heat: Earth on the Brink, said he sees the Sunrise incident as fitting within the broader battle ensuing within the Democratic Party today. “It’s because the old guard continues to be completely out of touch,” he said. “The Democratic Party right now is in crisis … The party establishment is definitely feeling pressure from a grassroots awakening, a progressive, radical awakening.” Though both Pelosi and Castor have implied that the new Select Committee will tackle Green New Deal-style proposals, Frank expects this will amount to little more than election season posturing. “Whatever comes out of committee will be promoted as an alternative to a Green New Deal. Or they might even call it a Green New Deal,” said Frank. He predicts that grassroots climate activists and their allies in Congress, like Ocasio-Cortez, will face pressure to back any policies that the Select Committee on the Climate Crisis deems worthy of its support. But ultimately, he said, the litmus test for the public should be whether or not the committee calls for a phase-out of fossil fuels. “I think people that are concerned about climate change and are looking to our representatives to come up with a plan a tangible plan to curb emissions, need to look at the finer points of the legislation that’s being proposed,” he said. “And I think they need to be very critical of whatever comes out of the committee and not just take their word for it that this is the best that they can do.” With all of the Select Committees apparent flaws, Tolkan said she still believes youth climate activists should use the new “platform” to advance the conversation on climate justice. “I guess my own view is not to abandon this committee that has been set up because there’s ways to use these platforms to continue to drive your conversation,” said Tolkan. “But never, ever stop asking for more.” -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From naiman at justforeignpolicy.org Sun Apr 21 21:02:55 2019 From: naiman at justforeignpolicy.org (Robert Naiman) Date: Sun, 21 Apr 2019 16:02:55 -0500 Subject: [Peace] JFP alert: Does the Passover story contribute to endless war? In-Reply-To: References: <4370333340.-928187205@org.orgDB.reply.salsalabs.com> Message-ID: Let's end the feud between the Jets and the Sharks. *Dayenu*. Enough is enough. I hear that $18 is lucky. ---------- Forwarded message --------- From: Robert Naiman, Just Foreign Policy Date: Sun, Apr 21, 2019 at 2:06 PM Subject: Does the Passover story contribute to endless war? To: [image: Just Foreign Policy] *Help me promote discussion of whether the Passover story contributes to endless war.* * Donate * Dear Robert, It is sometimes said that "politics is downstream from culture," suggesting that if we want to change "politics" in the future, we should try to change "culture" today. I’m working to host a free public theater screening of, and to publicize, a movie examining the Jewish tradition of Passover, with the goal of helping to end U.S. wars and blockades on civilians, which are rooted in an ideology of tormenting and abusing civilians which echoes the traditional Passover story. I’m working to host this free public screening on *May 8 at 7pm* at the *Virginia Theater* in downtown Champaign, Illinois. The Virginia is owned and operated by the Champaign Park District. Because the Virginia is owned by the *public*, by *us*, like the public library, there is no question that the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is Standing Tall at the Virginia. At the Virginia, I can question anything. At the Virginia, I can engage in "a ruthless criticism of all that exists." The movie I plan to show is "*Seder-Masochism* ," a film by animator Nina Paley, which critiques the traditional Passover story from an anti-war perspective. *You can donate to this effort here.* The Passover tradition celebrates the rescue by God of Jews from slavery in Egypt. So far, so good. Slavery is bad. Rescue from slavery is good. "They tried to kill us. We survived. Let's eat." But in the traditional Passover story, in order to rescue Jews from slavery, God employs *gratuitous violence* against Egyptian *civilians* who *aren't responsible* for the enslavement of Jews. No explanation is given in the traditional Passover story for why a just, omnipotent and omniscient God doesn't employ means of rescuing the Jews which leave innocent civilians unharmed, or why we should celebrate gratuitous violence against innocent civilians. When the U.S. government today emulates the God of Exodus in its actions in other people's countries, the U.S. government commits war crimes. *85,000 Yemeni children have starved to death* because of unconstitutional U.S. participation in the Saudi-UAE blockade of Yemeni civilians. The same ideology of tormenting and abusing civilians has enabled the blockade of civilians in Gaza and economic sanctions against civilians in Venezuela, Iran, Cuba, and Syria. Thus, the consequences of celebrating the Passover "victory" without asking why civilians were unnecessarily tormented and abused isn't only about Judaism, or even only about "religion." The ideology of "American Exceptionalism," which holds that the U.S. government is uniquely exempt from international law and norms in its foreign policy - laws and norms like protecting civilians from wars and sanctions - is enabling the persecution of foreign civilians by the U.S. government every day. Since 1945, "American Exceptionalism," a "secular" ideology, has killed far more civilians than any "religion" has. Many Americans who resonate with the simple "rescue from slavery" characterization of the Passover story are very open to anti-war critiques. Let's try to apply that openness to the traditional Passover story - to help free our minds for more empathy for the foreign victims of U.S. government policies. *Please help me campaign for more empathy for the civilian victims of U.S. foreign policy by donating to help me show and publicize the movie Seder-Masochism at the Virginia .* I hear that $18 is lucky. *Thanks for whatever you can toss in the hat* . And thanks for all you do to help U.S. foreign policy become more just, Robert Reuel Naiman Just Foreign Policy -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Mon Apr 22 20:22:09 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Mon, 22 Apr 2019 20:22:09 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: Mobilize to protect the Venezuelan Embassy from illegal seizure References: <5cbe030b6a6c5_1e710be2f58969df@asgworker-qmb3-1.nbuild.prd.useast1.3dna.io.mail> Message-ID: From: ANSWER Coalition > Subject: Mobilize to protect the Venezuelan Embassy from illegal seizure Date: April 22, 2019 at 11:08:11 PDT [ANSWER Coalition] Protect the Venezuelan Embassy from Illegal Seizure! Activists are staying in the Embassy around the clock and need back-up on Wednesday, April 24 Dear -- [https://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/answercoalition/mailings/2819/attachments/original/57313544_273633943539634_6512066222064926720_o.jpg?1555953981]The ANSWER Coalition is going all-out in defense of the Venezuelan Embassy in Washington, D.C., joining with others from the newly created Embassy Protection Collective. Activists are organizing events and staying inside the Embassy around the clock. We are making it clear that the Trump administration does not speak for the American people as it attempts to carry out a coup in Venezuela, while seizing the diplomatic compounds of the Venezuelan government. The diplomatic compounds of all countries are considered inviolable by international law. This week is critical. We are calling all people from around the country to come to the Venezuelan Embassy on Wednesday, April 24 and stay there in protection of it. There will be activities inside the Embassy and outside on the sidewalk in front of it. Please use the form here to join this effort. [VIDEO: Eyewitness Venezuela Webinar. If you missed Saturday's informative webinar with anti-war leaders and journalists, or want to re-watch it, the whole thing has been posted here. Please share with friends and family to get out the truth about Venezuela!] Please make a donation to support the anti-war movement's ongoing work to stop the Trump administration's regime change effort against Venezuela. [https://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/answercoalition/mailings/2251/attachments/original/download.png?1519519795] Here is the address to the Venezuelan Embassy: Embassy of Venezuela 1099 30th St NW Washington, DC 20007 United States Google map and directions ANSWER Coalition http://www.answercoalition.org/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Mon Apr 22 21:53:29 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Mon, 22 Apr 2019 21:53:29 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: Flyer for Concerning Violence movie References: Message-ID: > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Concerning Violence.pdf Type: application/pdf Size: 175774 bytes Desc: Concerning Violence.pdf URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Mon Apr 22 21:53:29 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Mon, 22 Apr 2019 21:53:29 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: Flyer for Concerning Violence movie References: Message-ID: > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Concerning Violence.pdf Type: application/pdf Size: 175774 bytes Desc: Concerning Violence.pdf URL: From naiman at justforeignpolicy.org Tue Apr 23 19:20:47 2019 From: naiman at justforeignpolicy.org (Robert Naiman) Date: Tue, 23 Apr 2019 14:20:47 -0500 Subject: [Peace] Hoyer has a primary challenger, who is hammering him on endless war References: Message-ID: Check this out. And then notice who else of your Twitter friends is following her on Twitter. This could be *very interesting*. Note that Adam Smith got a lot better on this because he was being hammered by a primary challenger for voting against our cluster bomb amendment. Hoyer's district in Maryland is very close to DC. It would be *so easy* for DC people to make trouble there. https://twitter.com/MeetMckayla/status/1120678976375152641 1. *Mckayla Wilkes*‏ @MeetMckayla FollowingFollowing @MeetMckayla More 6/10 Hoyer’s actions on ending U.S. involvement in the war crimes and humanitarian crises in Yemen have been tepid at best. While he did eventually vote in favor of S.J.Res.7, which I commend, his office previously resisted efforts to end our support for the atrocities. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From deb.pdamerica at gmail.com Wed Apr 24 12:05:04 2019 From: deb.pdamerica at gmail.com (Debra Schrishuhn) Date: Wed, 24 Apr 2019 07:05:04 -0500 Subject: [Peace] Hoyer has a primary challenger, who is hammering him on endless war In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: This example is why primary challenges are essential to the democratic process. A new DCCC rule (led by Rep Cheri Bustos) blacklists vendors and political consultants who help primary challengers, preventing them from getting contracts throughout the election season. With this rule in place, it would have been much harder for AOC to win, or for any progressive to challenge a sitting House Democrat effectively. Our Revolution, aided by Progressive Democrats of America and Justice Democrats, is heading an effort to get the DCCC to reverse this anti-democratic ruling. Stay tuned. Deb On Tue, Apr 23, 2019 at 2:21 PM Robert Naiman via Peace < peace at lists.chambana.net> wrote: > > Check this out. And then notice who else of your Twitter friends is > following her on Twitter. This could be *very interesting*. Note that > Adam Smith got a lot better on this because he was being hammered by a > primary challenger for voting against our cluster bomb amendment. Hoyer's > district in Maryland is very close to DC. It would be *so easy* for DC > people to make trouble there. > > https://twitter.com/MeetMckayla/status/1120678976375152641 > > > 1. > > *Mckayla Wilkes*‏ @MeetMckayla > FollowingFollowing @MeetMckayla > More > > 6/10 Hoyer’s actions on ending U.S. involvement in the war crimes and > humanitarian crises in Yemen have been tepid at best. While he did > eventually vote in favor of S.J.Res.7, which I commend, his office > previously resisted efforts to end our support for the atrocities. > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > Peace mailing list > Peace at lists.chambana.net > https://lists.chambana.net/mailman/listinfo/peace > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Thu Apr 25 11:12:58 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2019 11:12:58 +0000 Subject: [Peace] US-backed Saudi regime beheads 37 political prisoners Message-ID: US-backed Saudi regime beheads 37 political prisoners By Bill Van Auken 25 April 2019 The monarchical dictatorship of Saudi Arabia announced on Tuesday that it had carried out another killing spree, publicly executing 37 people in the cities of Riyadh, Medina and Mecca, as well as in central Qassim Province and in the kingdom’s Eastern Province. One of the headless corpses was then crucified and left hanging in public as a hideous warning to anyone who would even contemplate opposing the absolute power of the ruling royal family. The regime announced that those who were brought into public squares to be decapitated with swords had been punished “for adopting terrorist and extremist thinking and for forming terrorist cells to corrupt and destabilize security.” In Saudi Arabia, an antiterrorism law adopted in 2017 defines as a “terrorist” anyone “disturbing public order,” “shaking the security of the community and the stability of the State” or “exposing its national unity to danger.” The law essentially provides the death penalty for anyone daring to criticize the Saudi monarchy or its de facto ruler, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Under bin Salman, the Trump administration’s closest ally in the Arab world, the number of executions has doubled. While last year, the regime beheaded 149 people, it has already chopped off the heads of 105 people in 2019. It is known that at least 33 of the 37 put to death this week were Saudi Shias. In the case of 14 of them, their alleged “crimes” stemmed from the mass protests that swept Saudi Arabia’s predominantly Shiite Eastern Province in 2011, expressing popular demands for democratic reforms and an end to the discrimination and oppression of the Shiite population at the hands of a Sunni monarchy, whose rule is bound up with the official, state-sponsored religious doctrine of Wahhabism, an ultraconservative Sunni sect. Another 11 were accused of spying for Iran. None of these individuals were allowed to speak to lawyers during investigations that were carried out by means of torture. They were denied visits from their families and kept in solitary confinement during these ordeals, and were sentenced to death in sham mass trials that lacked even a modicum of due process. The barbaric mass state murders carried out by the regime in Riyadh constituted a calculated political act driven by both domestic and international objectives. Its immediate aim is to intimidate the Shia minority, which constitutes approximately 15 percent of the population and is concentrated in the Eastern Province, a key oil-producing region. At least three of those put to death were minors at the time of their alleged offenses, making their executions a flagrant violation of international law barring the death penalty for children. Abdulkarim al-Hawaj, was 16 when he was arrested and charged with participating in demonstrations and using social media to incite opposition to the monarchy. He also was alleged to have helped make banners with slogans denouncing the regime. He was convicted based on a confession extracted through torture, including electric shocks and being held with his hands chained above his head. Salman Qureish was arrested just after his 18th birthday for alleged crimes that took place when he was a juvenile. Denied his basic legal rights, he was sentenced to death in a mass trial. [https://www.wsws.org/asset/db127b61-ae38-4099-ab94-58712096959K/image.png?rendition=image480]Mujtaba al-Sweikat, arrested at 17 and executed Tuesday in Saudi Arabia Mujtaba al-Sweikat was 17 when he was arrested at King Fahd International Airport, grabbed as he prepared to board a plane to the United States to begin life as a student at Western Michigan University. He was severely tortured and beaten, including on the soles of his feet, until he provided his torturers with a confession. The faculty at Western Michigan University issued a statement in 2017 in response to the news of al-Sweikat’s imprisonment: “As academics and teachers, we take pride in defending the rights of all people, wherever they may be in the world, to speak freely and debate openly without hindrance or fear. We publicly declare our support for Mujtaba'a and the 13 others facing imminent execution. No one should face beheading for expressing beliefs in public protests. “Mujtaba'a showed great promise as an applicant for English language and pre-finance studies. He was arrested at the airport gates as he readied to board a plane to visit our campus. We were unaware that at the moment we were ready to welcome him, he was locked away, beaten and tortured and made to 'confess' to acts for which he was condemned to death.” The Saudi regime, headed by its de facto ruler Prince Mohammed bin Salman, ignored this protest along with others from United Nations and human rights organizations, convinced that it enjoys absolute impunity based upon the support it enjoys from Washington. The bloodbath organized by the Saudi regime on Tuesday was the largest since 2016, when it beheaded 47 men in a single day, including the prominent Shia cleric Sheikh Nimr Baqral-Nimr, a leading spokesman for Saudi Arabia’s oppressed Shiite minority. The state killings touched off angry protests in the region, including in Tehran, where crowds stormed the Saudi embassy. The furor was seized upon by Riyadh as the pretext for breaking diplomatic relations with Tehran and escalating its anti-Iranian campaign throughout the Middle East. Since then, relentless repression in the Eastern Province has been joined with the near-genocidal war that is being waged by Saudi-led forces against Yemen, claiming the lives of at least 80,000 Yemenis and leaving more than 24 million people—80 per cent of the population—in need of humanitarian assistance, many of them on the brink of starvation. The Sunni monarchy views the rise of the Houthi rebels in Yemen as a potential threat to its own internal situation, fearing that it could inspire the oppressed Shia population to revolt. The main responsibility for the crimes of the Saudi regime rests with its principal patron, US imperialism. The savage monarchy in Saudi Arabia, with its public beheadings, is not merely some remnant of feudal backwardness. It is rather the direct product of US imperialist intervention in the Middle East, from the concessions secured by Texaco and Standard Oil in the 1930s and 1940s to the current massive arms sales that make the Saudi monarchy today’s number one customer of the US military-industrial complex. Washington has responded to the mass beheadings in Saudi Arabia with a deafening silence. While the day before the beheadings were announced, the State Department issued a statement in connection with its severe tightening of punishing sanctions against Iran, demanding that it “respect the rights of its people,” there was no such appeal to Riyadh, much less any condemnation of minors having their heads chopped off in public squares. The Pentagon and the CIA are full partners in the Saudi monarchy’s repression at home, just as the US has provided the bombs and targeting information, along with the midair refueling of Saudi bombers, that have made possible the criminal war against Yemen. While the savage state murder and dismemberment of the dissident Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the monarchy’s consulate in Istanbul last October touched off a brief flurry of recriminations against Saudi Arabia, this heinous crime has largely been forgotten. While Riyadh is going through the motions of a trial of 15 state officials charged with carrying out the gruesome killing, no action is being taken against Crown Prince bin Salman, who ordered the killing, or his senior adviser, Saud al-Qahtani, who reportedly supervised the torture, murder and dismemberment of Khashoggi via a Skype connection from Riyadh. Barely a year ago, Crown Prince bin Salman was feted as a “reformer” by the US government, Harvard and MIT, as well as a host of US billionaires, from Bill Gates to Jeff Bezos and Oprah Winfrey. With the media’s attention to the Khashoggi murder grown cold, this myth is once again being revived, even in the face of the mass beheadings. The day after the executions, top Wall Street financiers took the stage with regime representatives at a financial conference sponsored by the monarchy in Riyadh. BlackRock CEO Larry Fink, HSBC CEO John Flint and JPMorgan's Chief Operating Officer Daniel Pinto were all present, along with Morgan Stanley's Asia managing director, Chin Chou, all of them anxious to cash in on a proposed initial public offering (IPO) by its national oil giant Aramco, were in attendance. BlackRock’s Fink brushed off a question about the mass executions, stating, “The fact that there are issues in the press does not tell me I must run away from a place. In many cases it tells me I should run to and invest because what we are most frightened of are things that we don’t talk about.” The executions in Saudi Arabia provide an appropriate prism for viewing the entire US policy in the Middle East. The bloodbath is a manifestation of the predatory aims pursued by US imperialism in the region. Washington’s defense of and reliance upon this ultrareactionary regime expose all of the pretexts given for successive US military interventions, from the so-called “war on terrorism” to the supposed promotion of “democracy” and “human rights.” In the end, a US foreign policy that is founded upon a strategic alliance with the House of Saud will inevitably prove to be a house of cards that will come crashing down with the revival of the class struggle in the Middle East, the United States and internationally. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Thu Apr 25 11:12:58 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2019 11:12:58 +0000 Subject: [Peace] US-backed Saudi regime beheads 37 political prisoners Message-ID: US-backed Saudi regime beheads 37 political prisoners By Bill Van Auken 25 April 2019 The monarchical dictatorship of Saudi Arabia announced on Tuesday that it had carried out another killing spree, publicly executing 37 people in the cities of Riyadh, Medina and Mecca, as well as in central Qassim Province and in the kingdom’s Eastern Province. One of the headless corpses was then crucified and left hanging in public as a hideous warning to anyone who would even contemplate opposing the absolute power of the ruling royal family. The regime announced that those who were brought into public squares to be decapitated with swords had been punished “for adopting terrorist and extremist thinking and for forming terrorist cells to corrupt and destabilize security.” In Saudi Arabia, an antiterrorism law adopted in 2017 defines as a “terrorist” anyone “disturbing public order,” “shaking the security of the community and the stability of the State” or “exposing its national unity to danger.” The law essentially provides the death penalty for anyone daring to criticize the Saudi monarchy or its de facto ruler, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Under bin Salman, the Trump administration’s closest ally in the Arab world, the number of executions has doubled. While last year, the regime beheaded 149 people, it has already chopped off the heads of 105 people in 2019. It is known that at least 33 of the 37 put to death this week were Saudi Shias. In the case of 14 of them, their alleged “crimes” stemmed from the mass protests that swept Saudi Arabia’s predominantly Shiite Eastern Province in 2011, expressing popular demands for democratic reforms and an end to the discrimination and oppression of the Shiite population at the hands of a Sunni monarchy, whose rule is bound up with the official, state-sponsored religious doctrine of Wahhabism, an ultraconservative Sunni sect. Another 11 were accused of spying for Iran. None of these individuals were allowed to speak to lawyers during investigations that were carried out by means of torture. They were denied visits from their families and kept in solitary confinement during these ordeals, and were sentenced to death in sham mass trials that lacked even a modicum of due process. The barbaric mass state murders carried out by the regime in Riyadh constituted a calculated political act driven by both domestic and international objectives. Its immediate aim is to intimidate the Shia minority, which constitutes approximately 15 percent of the population and is concentrated in the Eastern Province, a key oil-producing region. At least three of those put to death were minors at the time of their alleged offenses, making their executions a flagrant violation of international law barring the death penalty for children. Abdulkarim al-Hawaj, was 16 when he was arrested and charged with participating in demonstrations and using social media to incite opposition to the monarchy. He also was alleged to have helped make banners with slogans denouncing the regime. He was convicted based on a confession extracted through torture, including electric shocks and being held with his hands chained above his head. Salman Qureish was arrested just after his 18th birthday for alleged crimes that took place when he was a juvenile. Denied his basic legal rights, he was sentenced to death in a mass trial. [https://www.wsws.org/asset/db127b61-ae38-4099-ab94-58712096959K/image.png?rendition=image480]Mujtaba al-Sweikat, arrested at 17 and executed Tuesday in Saudi Arabia Mujtaba al-Sweikat was 17 when he was arrested at King Fahd International Airport, grabbed as he prepared to board a plane to the United States to begin life as a student at Western Michigan University. He was severely tortured and beaten, including on the soles of his feet, until he provided his torturers with a confession. The faculty at Western Michigan University issued a statement in 2017 in response to the news of al-Sweikat’s imprisonment: “As academics and teachers, we take pride in defending the rights of all people, wherever they may be in the world, to speak freely and debate openly without hindrance or fear. We publicly declare our support for Mujtaba'a and the 13 others facing imminent execution. No one should face beheading for expressing beliefs in public protests. “Mujtaba'a showed great promise as an applicant for English language and pre-finance studies. He was arrested at the airport gates as he readied to board a plane to visit our campus. We were unaware that at the moment we were ready to welcome him, he was locked away, beaten and tortured and made to 'confess' to acts for which he was condemned to death.” The Saudi regime, headed by its de facto ruler Prince Mohammed bin Salman, ignored this protest along with others from United Nations and human rights organizations, convinced that it enjoys absolute impunity based upon the support it enjoys from Washington. The bloodbath organized by the Saudi regime on Tuesday was the largest since 2016, when it beheaded 47 men in a single day, including the prominent Shia cleric Sheikh Nimr Baqral-Nimr, a leading spokesman for Saudi Arabia’s oppressed Shiite minority. The state killings touched off angry protests in the region, including in Tehran, where crowds stormed the Saudi embassy. The furor was seized upon by Riyadh as the pretext for breaking diplomatic relations with Tehran and escalating its anti-Iranian campaign throughout the Middle East. Since then, relentless repression in the Eastern Province has been joined with the near-genocidal war that is being waged by Saudi-led forces against Yemen, claiming the lives of at least 80,000 Yemenis and leaving more than 24 million people—80 per cent of the population—in need of humanitarian assistance, many of them on the brink of starvation. The Sunni monarchy views the rise of the Houthi rebels in Yemen as a potential threat to its own internal situation, fearing that it could inspire the oppressed Shia population to revolt. The main responsibility for the crimes of the Saudi regime rests with its principal patron, US imperialism. The savage monarchy in Saudi Arabia, with its public beheadings, is not merely some remnant of feudal backwardness. It is rather the direct product of US imperialist intervention in the Middle East, from the concessions secured by Texaco and Standard Oil in the 1930s and 1940s to the current massive arms sales that make the Saudi monarchy today’s number one customer of the US military-industrial complex. Washington has responded to the mass beheadings in Saudi Arabia with a deafening silence. While the day before the beheadings were announced, the State Department issued a statement in connection with its severe tightening of punishing sanctions against Iran, demanding that it “respect the rights of its people,” there was no such appeal to Riyadh, much less any condemnation of minors having their heads chopped off in public squares. The Pentagon and the CIA are full partners in the Saudi monarchy’s repression at home, just as the US has provided the bombs and targeting information, along with the midair refueling of Saudi bombers, that have made possible the criminal war against Yemen. While the savage state murder and dismemberment of the dissident Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the monarchy’s consulate in Istanbul last October touched off a brief flurry of recriminations against Saudi Arabia, this heinous crime has largely been forgotten. While Riyadh is going through the motions of a trial of 15 state officials charged with carrying out the gruesome killing, no action is being taken against Crown Prince bin Salman, who ordered the killing, or his senior adviser, Saud al-Qahtani, who reportedly supervised the torture, murder and dismemberment of Khashoggi via a Skype connection from Riyadh. Barely a year ago, Crown Prince bin Salman was feted as a “reformer” by the US government, Harvard and MIT, as well as a host of US billionaires, from Bill Gates to Jeff Bezos and Oprah Winfrey. With the media’s attention to the Khashoggi murder grown cold, this myth is once again being revived, even in the face of the mass beheadings. The day after the executions, top Wall Street financiers took the stage with regime representatives at a financial conference sponsored by the monarchy in Riyadh. BlackRock CEO Larry Fink, HSBC CEO John Flint and JPMorgan's Chief Operating Officer Daniel Pinto were all present, along with Morgan Stanley's Asia managing director, Chin Chou, all of them anxious to cash in on a proposed initial public offering (IPO) by its national oil giant Aramco, were in attendance. BlackRock’s Fink brushed off a question about the mass executions, stating, “The fact that there are issues in the press does not tell me I must run away from a place. In many cases it tells me I should run to and invest because what we are most frightened of are things that we don’t talk about.” The executions in Saudi Arabia provide an appropriate prism for viewing the entire US policy in the Middle East. The bloodbath is a manifestation of the predatory aims pursued by US imperialism in the region. Washington’s defense of and reliance upon this ultrareactionary regime expose all of the pretexts given for successive US military interventions, from the so-called “war on terrorism” to the supposed promotion of “democracy” and “human rights.” In the end, a US foreign policy that is founded upon a strategic alliance with the House of Saud will inevitably prove to be a house of cards that will come crashing down with the revival of the class struggle in the Middle East, the United States and internationally. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Thu Apr 25 11:35:54 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2019 11:35:54 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Gender Identity Law Declares War on Women, Forces Trans Men to be Accepted as Female In-Reply-To: <65917DFF-C5A3-4915-AE57-8A9EBF70CEB3@gmail.com> References: <1552a91a8a3126e772671645cf27134d@pr.judicialwatch.org> <65917DFF-C5A3-4915-AE57-8A9EBF70CEB3@gmail.com> Message-ID: Another, “keep Americans focused on nonsense,” so we don’t notice the perpetual wars we are conducting, the austerity being imposed upon the working class, political prisoners being incarcerated, and continuing mass incarceration, shootings, and global warming. Liberal Democrats were out demonstrating against the firing of Jeff Sessions, one of the worse racists in government, yet took little or no notice of the greatest transfer of wealth from the working class, upward to the 1%. On Apr 25, 2019, at 01:42, C G Estabrook > wrote: Begin forwarded message: From: "JW Corruption Chronicles" > Subject: Gender Identity Law Declares War on Women, Forces Trans Men to be Accepted as Female Date: April 24, 2019 at 12:31:38 PM CDT To: carl at newsfromneptune.com Reply-To: media at pr.judicialwatch.org [CORRUPTION CHRONICLES] Gender Identity Law Declares War on Women, Forces Trans Men to be Accepted as Female House Democrats have reintroduced a bill that would make “gender identity” a protected class under federal civil rights law and force men who identify as women to be treated and accepted as female. If the measure, known as the Equality Act, becomes law, it would drastically impact numerous sectors. Hospitals and insurance companies will have to provide costly sex-reassignment therapies, employers and workers who don’t conform to new sexual norms will lose their businesses and jobs and women would lose female-only facilities and sports. The only requirement for protection under the bill is a self-declared “gender identity.” In a statement celebrating the Equality Act’s reintroduction last month, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said this: “To dismantle the discrimination undermining our democracy, we must ensure that all Americans, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity, are treated equally under the law — not just in the workplace, but in education, housing, credit, jury service and public accommodations as well.” The veteran California congresswoman claims the measure has strong bipartisan support even though two Republicans that supported it when it was first introduced in the last Congress are no longer in office. Florida’s Ileana Ros-Lehtinen retired and Virginia’s Scott Tayler failed to win reelection. Fortunately, the bill is likely to encounter serious resistance in the Republican-majority Senate as well as the White House. Nevertheless, the transgender movement has become a dangerous war on women and girls and the law floating around in Congress will be detrimental to both. The Equality Act would be a setback to women’s rights in several areas. American women would be stripped of single-sex accommodations in public multi-stall bathrooms, domestic violence or rape crisis shelters, drug rehabilitation centers, jails, juvenile detention facilities, homeless shelters, locker rooms or group showers. Judicial Watch recently wrote about a separate law that aims to defund women’s shelters that don’t allow transgender men who self-identify as women. The Equality Act goes further by also stripping a woman’s right to have a person of the same sex conduct security searches on their body, supervise drug tests, handle intimate medical care and supervise children on overnight trips. This is because the language in the proposed law replaces sex with gender identity, open to the claimant’s interpretation, as a protected category. This would be especially harmful to females in areas such as competitive sports. A decades-old federal measure known as Title IX prohibits discrimination in all federally funded education programs, including sports. It ensures that boys and girls in elementary through high school and men and women in college have athletic opportunities. If the Equality Act passes males will have the right to compete against females, an atrocity that even the most liberal women and feminists reject. Among them is tennis legend Martina Navratilova, an 18-time Grand Slam champion who encountered lots of discrimination for coming out as gay during the peak of her professional tennis career in the 1980s. “You can’t just proclaim yourself a female and be able to compete against women,” Navratilova said. “It’s insane and it’s cheating. I am happy to address a transgender woman in whatever form she prefers, but I would not be happy to compete against her. It would not be fair.” A recent public high school case in Georgia supports the tennis great’s assessment. At a track competition, a transgender athlete easily beat all the females. The mother of one of the demoralized athletes reached out to several women’s rights groups for help but her concerns fell on deaf ears. A conservative public policy women’s organization in Washington D.C. helped the mother express her concerns to Congress. In a letter to the House Judiciary Committee the mother writes this: “To say that my daughter, as well as the other female athletes, were humiliated and had a sense of defeatism is an understatement. In the words of my daughter, ‘What’s the point Mom, we can’t win.’ Hearing this broke my heart, for my daughter and for all the female athletes, who train so hard, but no matter how hard they work and train they will never be able to beat a biological male. … What are we doing to our girls by forcing them to race biological males?” Concerned Women for America, the group that assisted the Georgia mother, has conducted extensive research on the Equality Act and recently published a document outlining the measure’s dangerous consequences for women and girls. Shea Garrison, the organization’s vice president of international affairs, says the bill wrongfully “redefines civil rights law” and “elevates the interests of one group over another.” An esteemed academic, Garrison’s work and research focuses on women’s economic and social empowerment, religious freedom and human rights. Daywatch Updates [32x32x1] [32x32x2] [32x32x3] [32x32x3] Judicial Watch, Inc. 425 3rd St Sw Ste 800 Washington, DC 20024 202.646.5172 ©2017-2019, All Rights Reserved Manage Email Subscriptions | Unsubscribe VIEW IN BROWSER -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Thu Apr 25 11:52:05 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2019 11:52:05 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Leaked-report-western-arms-are-essential-to-saudi-arabias-war-in-yemen Message-ID: https://therealnews.com/stories/leaked-report-western-arms-are-essential-to-saudi-arabias-war-in-yemen -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Thu Apr 25 11:52:05 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2019 11:52:05 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Leaked-report-western-arms-are-essential-to-saudi-arabias-war-in-yemen Message-ID: https://therealnews.com/stories/leaked-report-western-arms-are-essential-to-saudi-arabias-war-in-yemen -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Fri Apr 26 13:25:27 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Fri, 26 Apr 2019 13:25:27 +0000 Subject: [Peace] New study documents over 1, 600 killed in US siege of Raqqa, Syria Message-ID: For those focused on the horrors of “he said, she said” and something to do with peoples genitals. We know how anything related to sex gets one’s attention, and keeps people distracted from USG actions. Try focusing on the true horrors inflicted by our government, by both Party’s and Administrations. Raqqa is only one city in Syria, and the figure 1,600 admitted to is very low. * Print * Leaflet * Feedback * Share » New study documents over 1,600 killed in US siege of Raqqa, Syria By Bill Van Auken 26 April 2019 “Indiscriminate” US air strikes and artillery bombardment of the Syrian city of Raqqa between June and October of 2017 claimed the lives of at least 1,600 civilians according to a comprehensive new report issued jointly by the human rights group Amnesty International and the conflict monitoring organization Airwars. The real death toll is unquestionably far higher—reports from Raqqa residents place it at over 3,000. The 1,600 figure provided by Amnesty and Airwars is based upon extensive corroborating evidence, including the naming of 1,000 of the victims and Amnesty’s verification of the deaths of 641 of these named casualties during two months of investigation and interviews on the ground in Raqqa. [https://www.wsws.org/asset/1eb54367-c037-4597-855b-30c75fc3e15B/image.jpg?rendition=image480]Image courtesy of Amnesty International Thus far, the US-led “coalition” that has carried out the nearly five-year-long war in Iraq and Syria in the name of combating the Islamic State (ISIS) has admitted to killing just 159 civilians in the four-month siege of Raqqa—less than one-tenth the number of fatalities verified by the new report. The Pentagon’s figure is ludicrous on its face. The city was subjected to a relentless bombardment that left at least 11,218 buildings destroyed, over 70 percent of the city in ruins. Both ISIS, and more decisively, the US bombing campaign, cut off escape routes for civilians trying to flee the carnage. The campaign recalls nothing so much as the infamous statement of a Vietnam War-era US officer that “It became necessary to destroy the town to save it.” In this case, however, it was a city inhabited since remote antiquity, with a population of over 220,000 before the onset of the US-orchestrated war for regime change in Syria. In addition to the tens of thousands of munitions dropped on Raqqa by US and allied warplanes, the report cites the boasting of a US military official that US Marine Corps units fired some 30,000 artillery rounds into the city during the siege—the equivalent of one strike every six minutes over the course of four straight months. The rounds fired by the Marines’ 155mm howitzers into Raqqa’s crowded urban neighborhoods have a targeting margin of error of 100 meters, roughly the length of an American football field. The use of such an indiscriminate weapon in a populated city itself constitutes a war crime. The report includes an interactive web site Rhetoric versus Reality: How the ‘most precise air campaign in history’ left Raqqa the most destroyed city in modern times providing photographs, videos, 360-degree views of the devastation, satellite imagery and gut-wrenching testimony of civilians who survived the US bombardment. The report quotes Munira Hashish, whose family lived in Dara’iya, a low-income neighborhood in western Raqqa. While the family made repeated attempts to flee the city, it lost 18 members over a two-week period in August 2017. Nine of them were killed in a coalition air strike, seven died trying to flee down a road that had been mined by ISIS and two more were killed in a mortar attack by the US proxy ground troops of the so-called Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). “Those who stayed died and those who tried to run away died. We couldn’t afford to pay the smugglers; we were trapped,” Munira Hashish said. What remained of the family, she said, managed to escape “by walking over the blood of those who were blown up as they tried to flee ahead of us.” Ayat Mohammed Jasem spoke of a September 25, 2017 airstrike that destroyed an entire five-story residential building, killing 32 civilians, including 20 children and virtually her entire family. “Planes were bombing and rockets were falling 24 hours a day,” she said. “I saw my son die, burnt in the rubble in front of me. I’ve lost everyone who was dear to me. My four children, my husband, my mother, my sister, my whole family. Wasn’t the goal to free the civilians? They were supposed to save us, to save our children.” Taha Mohammed Othman recounted arriving at the scene of a June 28, 2017 airstrike that destroyed his family’s apartment building, where they had sought to hide in the basement from unrelenting shelling: “The first thing that I saw when I went to the collapsed building was my brother—Mohammed Mahmoud Othman [50]. He was dead. Then I saw his son, 17-year-old Mahmoud, trapped under a pillar. We tried but we couldn’t drag the pillar off him. Then I saw his 12-year-old brother Anas, who was dead. I couldn’t see their sister Amal, 13, but I could hear her. My brother’s wife Fatima was in there as well. I didn’t see her but later we dug out her body and buried her.” In the crowded central Raqqa neighborhood of Harat al-Badu, Mohammed told Amnesty investigators how an October 3, 2017 airstrike wiped out his entire family. The attack came in the final days of the siege, after the US military and the SDF had already reached a deal with ISIS allowing 4,000 of its fighters and family members to flee the city. Mohammed lost his wife Aya and their two young daughters, as well as his father and mother, his sister, her husband and their four children. “I was with my family less than two hours before the strike,” he said. “We were all sheltering in the same apartment—but I left to help an injured neighbor. At about 10.30 other neighbors came to inform me that my entire family had been killed. I ran to the building and found it collapsed. Almost everyone was dead; only my brother was still alive—the explosion had thrown him across the road. “My neighbors and I dug in the rubble with our bare hands. We had no tools. I found my daughters’ bodies—Rimas and Kafah. Kafah was only 11 days old. I buried them in a nearby house. My brother was left paralyzed. A year has passed but I have not been able to get a wheelchair for him. I have asked many organizations, but none has helped. My brother remains confined to bed.” Ahmad, a resident of the Darai’ya neighborhood of Raqqa described the terror of a June 10, 2017 US artillery bombardment: “The first artillery shell landed right behind the house where I was. Instinctively I fled across the road to the home of another relative, but the next shell struck that house, killing Mahmoud and his grandson; more shells hit other houses nearby. One killed two women and two children; another killed Ibrahim, his baby son, and his friend Rahmoun; another killed Hisham, and another still killed the daughters of Hsein Kenjo. It all happened in the space of a few minutes. The shells struck one after the other. It was indescribable, it was like the end of the world—the noise, people screaming. If I live 100 years I won’t forget this carnage.” Among the survivors of this attack was 11-year-old Fatima Hussein Ahmad, who described how she lost her mother, Aziza, and her three younger sisters in the artillery barrage that morning. “I was thrown over there by the explosion,” she told Amnesty International. She lost her right leg and her left leg was badly injured and she still cannot stand on it, almost two years later. She uses a wheelchair donated by an NGO to get around and her only wish is to go to school, a wish that is denied to most of Raqqa’s children, with the majority of the city’s schools destroyed. A spokesman for the US-led “coalition” insisted that the testimony of the survivors of the attack was “non-credible” and that “there is insufficient evidence to find that civilians were harmed in this strike.” An equally horrific artillery strike took place in the same neighborhood a month later, on July 16, 2017, killing five women, six children and one man, with the youngest victim seven months old and the oldest 55. A man who lost his wife and three daughters in the attack—with two other children, ages six and 10 suffering terrible injuries—told Amnesty that there was no way to get away from the shelling. “With all due respect, how did they know who they were hitting? They don’t even know our neighborhood or the people they hit and killed,” he said. Amnesty and Airwars called upon the Pentagon and its anti-ISIS “coalition” to “end their denial about the shocking scale of civilian deaths and destruction caused by their offensive in Raqqa.” They appealed for “transparency” and for the US military to establish “an independent, impartial mechanism to investigate all reports of civilian harm, including violations of international humanitarian law, and make the findings public.” That these appeals will fall on deaf ears goes without saying. The cover-ups and lies about what the former US defense secretary, Gen. James Mattis, described as a war of “annihilation” extend well beyond Raqqa. In Mosul, once a city of two million in Iraq, the devastation was equal if not greater, with an estimate by Iraqi Kurdish intelligence putting the number of civilian victims as high as 40,000. The lies extend not only to the scale of the carnage unleashed by US imperialism in its latest Middle East war, but also its purpose. Washington’s strategic aim has never been that of “annihilating ISIS,” itself the product of the 2003 US invasion and occupation of Iraq, followed by Washington’s utilization of Islamist fighters as proxy ground forces in the regime-change wars in both Libya and Syria. Rather than fighting “terrorism,” US imperialism’s central strategic objectives remain what they have been for decades: consolidating US hegemony over the oil-rich Middle East and preparing for war against the principal obstacles to this goal, Iran, Russia and China. These predatory aims are the source of war crimes that over the past quarter century have claimed “collateral damage” that includes the lives of millions of Iraqi, Libyan, Syrian and Yemeni civilians. It is certain that the devastating report issued by Amnesty and Airwars will be essentially ignored by the same US corporate media that churned out endless propaganda for a “humanitarian” war to oust the Syrian government of President Bashar al-Assad. A similar silence will inevitably be observed by the various pseudo-left organizations that portrayed the CIA-orchestrated war in Syria as a “revolution”, while demanding a far more aggressive US intervention. WSWS.ORG -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Fri Apr 26 13:25:27 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Fri, 26 Apr 2019 13:25:27 +0000 Subject: [Peace] New study documents over 1, 600 killed in US siege of Raqqa, Syria Message-ID: For those focused on the horrors of “he said, she said” and something to do with peoples genitals. We know how anything related to sex gets one’s attention, and keeps people distracted from USG actions. Try focusing on the true horrors inflicted by our government, by both Party’s and Administrations. Raqqa is only one city in Syria, and the figure 1,600 admitted to is very low. * Print * Leaflet * Feedback * Share » New study documents over 1,600 killed in US siege of Raqqa, Syria By Bill Van Auken 26 April 2019 “Indiscriminate” US air strikes and artillery bombardment of the Syrian city of Raqqa between June and October of 2017 claimed the lives of at least 1,600 civilians according to a comprehensive new report issued jointly by the human rights group Amnesty International and the conflict monitoring organization Airwars. The real death toll is unquestionably far higher—reports from Raqqa residents place it at over 3,000. The 1,600 figure provided by Amnesty and Airwars is based upon extensive corroborating evidence, including the naming of 1,000 of the victims and Amnesty’s verification of the deaths of 641 of these named casualties during two months of investigation and interviews on the ground in Raqqa. [https://www.wsws.org/asset/1eb54367-c037-4597-855b-30c75fc3e15B/image.jpg?rendition=image480]Image courtesy of Amnesty International Thus far, the US-led “coalition” that has carried out the nearly five-year-long war in Iraq and Syria in the name of combating the Islamic State (ISIS) has admitted to killing just 159 civilians in the four-month siege of Raqqa—less than one-tenth the number of fatalities verified by the new report. The Pentagon’s figure is ludicrous on its face. The city was subjected to a relentless bombardment that left at least 11,218 buildings destroyed, over 70 percent of the city in ruins. Both ISIS, and more decisively, the US bombing campaign, cut off escape routes for civilians trying to flee the carnage. The campaign recalls nothing so much as the infamous statement of a Vietnam War-era US officer that “It became necessary to destroy the town to save it.” In this case, however, it was a city inhabited since remote antiquity, with a population of over 220,000 before the onset of the US-orchestrated war for regime change in Syria. In addition to the tens of thousands of munitions dropped on Raqqa by US and allied warplanes, the report cites the boasting of a US military official that US Marine Corps units fired some 30,000 artillery rounds into the city during the siege—the equivalent of one strike every six minutes over the course of four straight months. The rounds fired by the Marines’ 155mm howitzers into Raqqa’s crowded urban neighborhoods have a targeting margin of error of 100 meters, roughly the length of an American football field. The use of such an indiscriminate weapon in a populated city itself constitutes a war crime. The report includes an interactive web site Rhetoric versus Reality: How the ‘most precise air campaign in history’ left Raqqa the most destroyed city in modern times providing photographs, videos, 360-degree views of the devastation, satellite imagery and gut-wrenching testimony of civilians who survived the US bombardment. The report quotes Munira Hashish, whose family lived in Dara’iya, a low-income neighborhood in western Raqqa. While the family made repeated attempts to flee the city, it lost 18 members over a two-week period in August 2017. Nine of them were killed in a coalition air strike, seven died trying to flee down a road that had been mined by ISIS and two more were killed in a mortar attack by the US proxy ground troops of the so-called Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). “Those who stayed died and those who tried to run away died. We couldn’t afford to pay the smugglers; we were trapped,” Munira Hashish said. What remained of the family, she said, managed to escape “by walking over the blood of those who were blown up as they tried to flee ahead of us.” Ayat Mohammed Jasem spoke of a September 25, 2017 airstrike that destroyed an entire five-story residential building, killing 32 civilians, including 20 children and virtually her entire family. “Planes were bombing and rockets were falling 24 hours a day,” she said. “I saw my son die, burnt in the rubble in front of me. I’ve lost everyone who was dear to me. My four children, my husband, my mother, my sister, my whole family. Wasn’t the goal to free the civilians? They were supposed to save us, to save our children.” Taha Mohammed Othman recounted arriving at the scene of a June 28, 2017 airstrike that destroyed his family’s apartment building, where they had sought to hide in the basement from unrelenting shelling: “The first thing that I saw when I went to the collapsed building was my brother—Mohammed Mahmoud Othman [50]. He was dead. Then I saw his son, 17-year-old Mahmoud, trapped under a pillar. We tried but we couldn’t drag the pillar off him. Then I saw his 12-year-old brother Anas, who was dead. I couldn’t see their sister Amal, 13, but I could hear her. My brother’s wife Fatima was in there as well. I didn’t see her but later we dug out her body and buried her.” In the crowded central Raqqa neighborhood of Harat al-Badu, Mohammed told Amnesty investigators how an October 3, 2017 airstrike wiped out his entire family. The attack came in the final days of the siege, after the US military and the SDF had already reached a deal with ISIS allowing 4,000 of its fighters and family members to flee the city. Mohammed lost his wife Aya and their two young daughters, as well as his father and mother, his sister, her husband and their four children. “I was with my family less than two hours before the strike,” he said. “We were all sheltering in the same apartment—but I left to help an injured neighbor. At about 10.30 other neighbors came to inform me that my entire family had been killed. I ran to the building and found it collapsed. Almost everyone was dead; only my brother was still alive—the explosion had thrown him across the road. “My neighbors and I dug in the rubble with our bare hands. We had no tools. I found my daughters’ bodies—Rimas and Kafah. Kafah was only 11 days old. I buried them in a nearby house. My brother was left paralyzed. A year has passed but I have not been able to get a wheelchair for him. I have asked many organizations, but none has helped. My brother remains confined to bed.” Ahmad, a resident of the Darai’ya neighborhood of Raqqa described the terror of a June 10, 2017 US artillery bombardment: “The first artillery shell landed right behind the house where I was. Instinctively I fled across the road to the home of another relative, but the next shell struck that house, killing Mahmoud and his grandson; more shells hit other houses nearby. One killed two women and two children; another killed Ibrahim, his baby son, and his friend Rahmoun; another killed Hisham, and another still killed the daughters of Hsein Kenjo. It all happened in the space of a few minutes. The shells struck one after the other. It was indescribable, it was like the end of the world—the noise, people screaming. If I live 100 years I won’t forget this carnage.” Among the survivors of this attack was 11-year-old Fatima Hussein Ahmad, who described how she lost her mother, Aziza, and her three younger sisters in the artillery barrage that morning. “I was thrown over there by the explosion,” she told Amnesty International. She lost her right leg and her left leg was badly injured and she still cannot stand on it, almost two years later. She uses a wheelchair donated by an NGO to get around and her only wish is to go to school, a wish that is denied to most of Raqqa’s children, with the majority of the city’s schools destroyed. A spokesman for the US-led “coalition” insisted that the testimony of the survivors of the attack was “non-credible” and that “there is insufficient evidence to find that civilians were harmed in this strike.” An equally horrific artillery strike took place in the same neighborhood a month later, on July 16, 2017, killing five women, six children and one man, with the youngest victim seven months old and the oldest 55. A man who lost his wife and three daughters in the attack—with two other children, ages six and 10 suffering terrible injuries—told Amnesty that there was no way to get away from the shelling. “With all due respect, how did they know who they were hitting? They don’t even know our neighborhood or the people they hit and killed,” he said. Amnesty and Airwars called upon the Pentagon and its anti-ISIS “coalition” to “end their denial about the shocking scale of civilian deaths and destruction caused by their offensive in Raqqa.” They appealed for “transparency” and for the US military to establish “an independent, impartial mechanism to investigate all reports of civilian harm, including violations of international humanitarian law, and make the findings public.” That these appeals will fall on deaf ears goes without saying. The cover-ups and lies about what the former US defense secretary, Gen. James Mattis, described as a war of “annihilation” extend well beyond Raqqa. In Mosul, once a city of two million in Iraq, the devastation was equal if not greater, with an estimate by Iraqi Kurdish intelligence putting the number of civilian victims as high as 40,000. The lies extend not only to the scale of the carnage unleashed by US imperialism in its latest Middle East war, but also its purpose. Washington’s strategic aim has never been that of “annihilating ISIS,” itself the product of the 2003 US invasion and occupation of Iraq, followed by Washington’s utilization of Islamist fighters as proxy ground forces in the regime-change wars in both Libya and Syria. Rather than fighting “terrorism,” US imperialism’s central strategic objectives remain what they have been for decades: consolidating US hegemony over the oil-rich Middle East and preparing for war against the principal obstacles to this goal, Iran, Russia and China. These predatory aims are the source of war crimes that over the past quarter century have claimed “collateral damage” that includes the lives of millions of Iraqi, Libyan, Syrian and Yemeni civilians. It is certain that the devastating report issued by Amnesty and Airwars will be essentially ignored by the same US corporate media that churned out endless propaganda for a “humanitarian” war to oust the Syrian government of President Bashar al-Assad. A similar silence will inevitably be observed by the various pseudo-left organizations that portrayed the CIA-orchestrated war in Syria as a “revolution”, while demanding a far more aggressive US intervention. WSWS.ORG -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Fri Apr 26 14:34:34 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Fri, 26 Apr 2019 14:34:34 +0000 Subject: [Peace] The attacks on Sri Lanka Message-ID: https://21stcenturywire.com/2019/04/25/sri-lanka-supposed-isis-attack-targets-another-ally-of-china/?fbclid=IwAR0otBHs4oAlfSifzYmfwR -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Fri Apr 26 21:40:42 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Fri, 26 Apr 2019 21:40:42 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Anti-War Activists occupying the Venezuelan Embassy in DC, attempting a USG takeover. Message-ID: Popular Resistance, Code Pink, ANSWER, The Greens, and other political activists, are there and have been there. Heroes all, facing arrest, though they have permission of the nation of Venezuela. I have been posting this link on FB and its being disseminated by Chinese friends in Asia, proving not all Americans are asleep. https://therealnews.com/stories/defense-of-venezuelas-us-embassy-activists-versus-us-government -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Fri Apr 26 21:40:42 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Fri, 26 Apr 2019 21:40:42 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Anti-War Activists occupying the Venezuelan Embassy in DC, attempting a USG takeover. Message-ID: Popular Resistance, Code Pink, ANSWER, The Greens, and other political activists, are there and have been there. Heroes all, facing arrest, though they have permission of the nation of Venezuela. I have been posting this link on FB and its being disseminated by Chinese friends in Asia, proving not all Americans are asleep. https://therealnews.com/stories/defense-of-venezuelas-us-embassy-activists-versus-us-government -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Fri Apr 26 22:48:05 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Fri, 26 Apr 2019 22:48:05 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Max Blumenthal on Russia Message-ID: https://youtu.be/J6m7uvcMrLk From karenaram at hotmail.com Fri Apr 26 22:48:05 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Fri, 26 Apr 2019 22:48:05 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Max Blumenthal on Russia Message-ID: https://youtu.be/J6m7uvcMrLk From karenaram at hotmail.com Sat Apr 27 13:50:28 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Sat, 27 Apr 2019 13:50:28 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Anti-War Activists occupying the Venezuelan Embassy in DC, preventing an attempted USG takeover. In-Reply-To: <1960440817.1261234.1556371411989@mail.yahoo.com> References: <1960440817.1261234.1556371411989.ref@mail.yahoo.com> <1960440817.1261234.1556371411989@mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: Sorry, my subject heading yesterday was misleading. Please see below: Popular Resistance, Code Pink, ANSWER, The Greens, and other political activists, are there and have been there. Heroes all, facing arrest, though they have permission of the nation of Venezuela. https://therealnews.com/stories/defense-of-venezuelas-us-embassy-activists-versus-us-government NEWS2Share, also has a VDO covering the demonstrations. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Sat Apr 27 14:39:40 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Sat, 27 Apr 2019 14:39:40 +0000 Subject: [Peace] "People are rallying in Paris and other French cities, holding Yellow Vests protests for a 24th week Message-ID: "People are rallying in Paris and other French cities, holding Yellow Vests protests for a 24th week; this comes shortly after President Emmanuel Macron held his first-ever full domestic news conference, where he pledged to cut the income tax in order to ease the economic issues in France." "Last weekend, the number of yellow vests protesters rose to 27,900, with 9,000 gatherings in Paris. According to police, at least 126 people were arrested in the French capital alone." -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Sat Apr 27 14:39:40 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Sat, 27 Apr 2019 14:39:40 +0000 Subject: [Peace] "People are rallying in Paris and other French cities, holding Yellow Vests protests for a 24th week Message-ID: "People are rallying in Paris and other French cities, holding Yellow Vests protests for a 24th week; this comes shortly after President Emmanuel Macron held his first-ever full domestic news conference, where he pledged to cut the income tax in order to ease the economic issues in France." "Last weekend, the number of yellow vests protesters rose to 27,900, with 9,000 gatherings in Paris. According to police, at least 126 people were arrested in the French capital alone." -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Sat Apr 27 18:58:36 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Sat, 27 Apr 2019 18:58:36 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: Webinar starts 3pm ET - live from emergency mobilization to protect the Venezuelan Embassy References: <5cc48d0de3b52_186e25f4f4c930ce@asgworker-qmb3-2.nbuild.prd.useast1.3dna.io.mail> Message-ID: [ANSWER Coalition] Webinar & Livestream from the Venezuelan Embassy Starting shortly 3pm ET / 2pm CT / 1pm MT / 12pm PT [https://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/answercoalition/mailings/2827/attachments/original/58728050_277059706530391_1257749407055478784_o.jpg?1556383883] Watch on the ANSWER site Watch on Facebook here Live from the April 27 Mobilization at the Embassy: Hands Off Venezuela! No Coup, No Sanctions, No War! No to Media Lies About Venezuela! This day of action was initiated by the ANSWER Coalition and is endorsed by Popular Resistance and CODEPINK. Join the ANSWER Coalition for a special Embassy Protection Collective Livestream Panel featuring: * Brian Becker — ANSWER Coalition * Mara Verheyden-Hilliard — Partnership for Civil Justice Fund * Eugene Puryear — Host, By Any Means Necessary * Kevin Zeese — Popular Resistance * Margaret Flowers — Popular Resistance * Ariel Gold — CODEPINK The livestream will be nationally broadcast from the Venezuelan Embassy building in Washington, D.C., on the Facebook page of the ANSWER Coalition. The panel presentation will feature prominent anti-war and peace activists, legal experts and progressive media based in the United States who have been serving as interim protectors for the Venezuelan embassy to prevent the US State Department from handing it over to the opposition led by Juan Guaido. They will provide an update on the US-led attempted coup on Venezuela, how to prevent the opposition from taking over the Embassy and why it matters. Please tune in and, if you can, please donate to support the anti-war efforts now: https://www.answercoalition.org/donate Watch on the ANSWER site Watch on Facebook here ANSWER Coalition · United States This email was sent to karenaram at hotmail.com. To stop receiving emails, click here. You can also keep up with ANSWER Coalition on Facebook. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Sat Apr 27 18:58:36 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Sat, 27 Apr 2019 18:58:36 +0000 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: Webinar starts 3pm ET - live from emergency mobilization to protect the Venezuelan Embassy References: <5cc48d0de3b52_186e25f4f4c930ce@asgworker-qmb3-2.nbuild.prd.useast1.3dna.io.mail> Message-ID: [ANSWER Coalition] Webinar & Livestream from the Venezuelan Embassy Starting shortly 3pm ET / 2pm CT / 1pm MT / 12pm PT [https://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/answercoalition/mailings/2827/attachments/original/58728050_277059706530391_1257749407055478784_o.jpg?1556383883] Watch on the ANSWER site Watch on Facebook here Live from the April 27 Mobilization at the Embassy: Hands Off Venezuela! No Coup, No Sanctions, No War! No to Media Lies About Venezuela! This day of action was initiated by the ANSWER Coalition and is endorsed by Popular Resistance and CODEPINK. Join the ANSWER Coalition for a special Embassy Protection Collective Livestream Panel featuring: * Brian Becker — ANSWER Coalition * Mara Verheyden-Hilliard — Partnership for Civil Justice Fund * Eugene Puryear — Host, By Any Means Necessary * Kevin Zeese — Popular Resistance * Margaret Flowers — Popular Resistance * Ariel Gold — CODEPINK The livestream will be nationally broadcast from the Venezuelan Embassy building in Washington, D.C., on the Facebook page of the ANSWER Coalition. The panel presentation will feature prominent anti-war and peace activists, legal experts and progressive media based in the United States who have been serving as interim protectors for the Venezuelan embassy to prevent the US State Department from handing it over to the opposition led by Juan Guaido. They will provide an update on the US-led attempted coup on Venezuela, how to prevent the opposition from taking over the Embassy and why it matters. Please tune in and, if you can, please donate to support the anti-war efforts now: https://www.answercoalition.org/donate Watch on the ANSWER site Watch on Facebook here ANSWER Coalition · United States This email was sent to karenaram at hotmail.com. To stop receiving emails, click here. You can also keep up with ANSWER Coalition on Facebook. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Sun Apr 28 11:57:31 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Sun, 28 Apr 2019 11:57:31 +0000 Subject: [Peace] FB warned me against posting this article, my acct. could be compromised. Here is the cut and paste edition. Message-ID: Voices from Inside the Besieged Venezuelan Embassy [https://cdn.minds.com/icon/481900930401316875/small/1554954510] MINTPRESS NEWSAPR 27, 2019, 9:16:19 PM keyboard_arrow_downrepeatthumb_up2thumb_down by Alexander Rubinstein and Wyatt Reed VENEZUELAN EMBASSY, WASHINGTON — A group of activists banding together as the “Embassy Protection Collective,” in defense of the sovereignty of the Venezuelan Embassy in Washington, defied orders by the U.S. government to vacate the premises by the 25th of April. Later in the morning, the Trump administration’s special envoy to Venezuela, Elliot Abrams, condemned the activists, saying that they would “have to leave.” The activists, Abrams argues, are “clearly breaking the law.” In interviews with MintPress News, Embassy Collective protesters argued the opposite: that an invasion of the Venezuelan Embassy by U.S. authorities would be illegal under international law as defined by Article 22 of the Vienna Convention. The article states: Article 22 confirms the inviolability of mission premises – barring any right of entry by law enforcement officers of the receiving State and imposing on the receiving State a special duty to protect the premises against intrusion, damage, disturbance of the peace or infringement of dignity. Even in response to abuse of this inviolability or emergency, the premises may not be entered without the consent of the head of mission. “Today is the last day that Venezuelan diplomats in the United States have to leave the country,” Medea Benjamin, co-founder of CODEPINK and member of the Embassy Protection Collective, told MintPress News. “There were a few diplomats left that work with the Organization of American States (OAS) and today they said they had to be out. So tomorrow there are no diplomats left in the embassy, which opens the way for the Guaido folks to come in.” After the OAS recognized the representatives of Venezuela’s self-appointed president, Juan Guaido, in violation of its own charter, the State Department issued the Venezuelan diplomats a two-week ultimatum to vacate the embassy. Meanwhile, the elected government of Venezuela has turned over the keys to the activists in hopes they may be able to safeguard the building. For the past two weeks, members of the collective have been protecting the building. Speaking via live stream, Venezuelan Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza repeatedly thanked the group: We are very honored because you are protecting the Venezuelan territory… And please, keep on doing it. It’s important, it’s really important for the Venezuelan people. You are an example to us, to all the Venezuelan people. You are an example to the American people as well. “How Dare You!?” Thursday morning, Embassy Protection Collective activists interrupted an address by Elliot Abrams, Trump’s point man for regime change in Venezuela, hosted by the Atlantic Council. The think tank is among the most powerful foreign policy influence shops in Washington and lobbies on behalf of NATO, Gulf State monarchies, and oil conglomerates. Bearing a sign reading “No coup in Venezuela,” CODEPINK activist Ariel Elyse Gold shouted over Abrams as he attempted to speak. Speaking to MintPress immediately after she was removed by security from the premises, Gold said: Elliot Abrams is a war criminal and responsible for the destabilization of entire regions. I spoke out while he was addressing the Atlantic Council and told him: ‘How dare you orchestrate a coup in Venezuela? How dare you impose sanctions that harm the people?' My government has no right to overthrow the government of another country. This is undermining the basic principle of democracy. Maduro was elected by 6 million people in Venezuela. Whether anybody likes Maduro or not, we need to respect the election. “We will not go out easily” Medea Benjamin, one of the lead organizers of the movement to protect the embassy, explained the motivations of the collective to MintPress News, saying they are “people who came together to say we cannot allow the fake, illegal quote ‘government’ of Juan Guaido to come in and take over this embassy.” She added: You can’t have an international community that doesn’t recognize real governments, that starts creating parallel governments, fake governments, and concedes them to take over embassies. It just can’t work like that. It’s against international law. So we’re the citizens that are protecting this embassy against a takeover that is part of a coup that is orchestrated by our government to get rid of a government that it doesn’t like in Venezuela. Benjamin explained how the U.S. demand that all Venezuelan diplomats leave the country by April 24th was a move designed to open the embassy to occupation by opposition squatters. In response, the collective has been living and working in the embassy 24/7 and hosting teach-ins and concerts every evening. They aim to hold the space for as long as possible, she says –“and we will not go out easily.” After reaching out to the Venezuelan government in late March, Benjamin says they were invited to hold the space when the Venezuelans realized the U.S. government was “egging on” the opposition to take it. They gave the collective keys to the building and, she says, their full support. Though many embassy protectors admire the accomplishments of socialist Venezuela, Benjamin says they aren’t there just to show support for the Venezuelan government. Instead, they want to reject another coup and the attempted social engineering of their leaders. She says the failure by coup plotters to turn the Venezuelan military against the government has done little to stop their U.S. handlers from plotting further aggression. She notes the hypocrisy of a U.S. establishment that has spent the past few years hyper-fixating on a supposed Russian interference threat now “overtly trying to overthrow governments.” Benjamin was adamant that international law was on the side of the collective even if the Trump administration “doesn’t care” about such formalities. “Now they have a place in their society” Max Blumenthal, founder of the Grayzone, visited Caracas in February and described to MintPress News a profound disconnect between Western perceptions of Venezuela and the reality on the ground. I was prepared to see something, to see an economic collapse, to even see a humanitarian crisis. And at least in Caracas, I didn’t see anything approaching that… it wasn’t a war situation. It wasn’t a conflict zone. Amidst ongoing economic warfare, life in Venezuela continues with relative normalcy, with residents taking full advantage of the free public gyms, salsa nights, and basketball courts, Blumenthal observed. He described a “sort of utopian” experience visiting a public housing development in Caracas. It’s one of many such projects that comprise 2,500,000 total housing units provided by the socialist government to working Venezuelans free of charge, Blumenthal told MintPress. He recounted that Venezuelan journalists he met with explained that they never could have become reporters without the socialist government, as prior to the Bolivarian revolution dark-skinned people weren’t allowed to go to college. “Now they have a place in their society.” By contrast, Blumenthal says the opposition strongholds were like a “bubble of affluence.” Despite repeated accusations of a supposed humanitarian crisis, the largely white, wealthy opposition is still enjoying yoga classes and sushi dinners. “They seem very comfortable, but at the same time feigning this humanitarian crisis.” Still, Blumenthal notes that there are of course real economic problems, but stresses the many ways they’re exacerbated by capitalist forces and “speculation.” Recently, the Grayzone exposed an off-the-record meeting in which 40-odd coup plotters discussed their plans for a military attack on Venezuela. Attendees included representatives from the U.S. State Department, the former commander of the United States Southern Command, Colombian diplomats, and emissaries of Brazil’s fascist government. With that context, their plan to invade the Venezuelan Embassy is par for the course, Blumenthal argued. As the property was purchased by the Venezuelan government, anyone occupying it without permission would be squatting, he said, joking that it is perhaps for that reason that “Juan Guaidó says he has so much in common with the Israeli government– because they like squatting on other people’s property.” “Don’t you think the Iraqis should design the new Iraqi flag?” John Kiriakou, a former CIA officer who blew the whistle on the agency’s torture program, was also on hand Wednesday to give a talk on ‘an insider’s persective on CIA coups.’ Afterwards, he spoke exclusively to MintPress News, saying that he also came to “show support for the sanctity of the Venezuelan Embassy.” It’s a world he’s intimately familiar with; as the executive assistant to the CIA’s deputy director for operations, Kiriakou had access to “literally everything that the CIA was doing around the world operationally.” After signing a number of secrecy agreements, he was finally informed what the job he’d agreed to was: “to assist in the overthrow of the Iraqi government.” He describes a specific intelligence office that oversees CIA coup operations — one so shrouded in secrecy that even its name is classified. Indeed, should Kiriakou reveal it, he would risk being sent back to prison for once again blowing the whistle on the agency. Kiriakou told MintPress that whenever a CIA agent expresses a desire to overthrow a government, the office creates a plan that is generally rubber-stamped by the Department of Justice and approved by the National Security Council. Once the president signs off, Kiriakou says the officer is given a blank check to carry out their sabotage and subterfuge. He goes on to describe an agency so arrogant that even before it finished destroying Iraq, when he once walked into the office of a senior officer in the unnamed coup department, that officer had already set about designing the new flag with colored markers. “Don’t you think the Iraqis should design the new Iraqi flag?” Kiriakou asked. The officer paused. “No.” The depth of their imperial hubris is matched by the depth of their pockets, Kiriakou argued: Their budgets are secret. Nobody knows what the CIA budget is. It’s been a secret since the founding of the CIA…. It’s just impossible to know what the CIA has to spend. I can tell you that it’s a lot. Kiriakou continued, “We’ve got this unwritten policy that if we don’t like the politics of a foreign leader, we just take him out and we put in our own guy.” It’s a policy that he says operates independently of long-term U.S. interests or human-rights considerations. Do the countries targeted by the CIA have something in common? “Natural resources,” he says. “It’s always been frowned up to say ‘we went into Kuwait for the oil. We went into Iraq for the oil. We went into Libya for the oil.’ But we did!” Kiriakou recounted the words of a friend of his in Kuwait, who asked him, if the country “had gravel instead of oil, do you think we would have given two shits about these people?” “Venezuela has oil, and Iran has oil, and Afghanistan has rare-earth metals, and we’re in all of those countries as well,” Kiriakou noted. “If you don’t bow down to us… we will take your embassy” This implicit threat to anyone who refuses to toe the State Department line is clear to Kevin Zeese as well. The peace activist, lawyer and co-director of Popular Resistance was similarly disturbed by the U.S. government’s threats to invade the sovereign territory of Venezuela: If they do this tomorrow, it will send a message to the world that no embassy is safe in the United States… it’s a message that ‘if you don’t bow down to us, do what we tell you, put in the government that we’d like, we will take your embassy.’ Though he’s skeptical that any international court could enforce a ruling against the U.S., Zeese insists that these actions render the U.S. a “renegade nation” in the eyes of the public and the international community. These rogue, aggressive actions characterize a nation whose once-hegemonic economic and military influence is waning, but which still has little trouble convincing its European and Latin American partners to go along with its imperialist agenda. “They all want to steal Venezuela’s wealth, and Venezuela’s very wealthy,” Zeese says. Aside from the world’s largest oil reserves, Venezuela also boasts the largest gold and diamond reserves, the fifth largest gas reserves, and many other extremely valuable mineral deposits, Zeese said. For its own sake, Zeese says, he seriously hopes the U.S. ruling class will reject the temptation to bring them under their control. Given the Chinese and Russian support for Venezuela, and a U.S. military still reeling from its failures in Iraq, he argues that an invasion of the Bolivarian Republic could be the straw that breaks the camel’s back. “The U.S. empire will be crumbling.” MintPress News will continue to keep a reporter at the Venezuelan Embassy in Washington D.C. in anticipation of a raid by U.S. authorities. Feature photo | CodePink co-founder Medea Benjamin sits for an interview in the shuttered Venezuelan Embassy in Washington, April 24, 2019. Patrick Semansky | AP Alexander Rubinstein is a staff writer for MintPress News based in Washington, DC. He reports on police, prisons and protests in the United States and the United States’ policing of the world. He previously reported for RT and Sputnik News. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From karenaram at hotmail.com Sun Apr 28 11:57:31 2019 From: karenaram at hotmail.com (Karen Aram) Date: Sun, 28 Apr 2019 11:57:31 +0000 Subject: [Peace] FB warned me against posting this article, my acct. could be compromised. Here is the cut and paste edition. Message-ID: Voices from Inside the Besieged Venezuelan Embassy [https://cdn.minds.com/icon/481900930401316875/small/1554954510] MINTPRESS NEWSAPR 27, 2019, 9:16:19 PM keyboard_arrow_downrepeatthumb_up2thumb_down by Alexander Rubinstein and Wyatt Reed VENEZUELAN EMBASSY, WASHINGTON — A group of activists banding together as the “Embassy Protection Collective,” in defense of the sovereignty of the Venezuelan Embassy in Washington, defied orders by the U.S. government to vacate the premises by the 25th of April. Later in the morning, the Trump administration’s special envoy to Venezuela, Elliot Abrams, condemned the activists, saying that they would “have to leave.” The activists, Abrams argues, are “clearly breaking the law.” In interviews with MintPress News, Embassy Collective protesters argued the opposite: that an invasion of the Venezuelan Embassy by U.S. authorities would be illegal under international law as defined by Article 22 of the Vienna Convention. The article states: Article 22 confirms the inviolability of mission premises – barring any right of entry by law enforcement officers of the receiving State and imposing on the receiving State a special duty to protect the premises against intrusion, damage, disturbance of the peace or infringement of dignity. Even in response to abuse of this inviolability or emergency, the premises may not be entered without the consent of the head of mission. “Today is the last day that Venezuelan diplomats in the United States have to leave the country,” Medea Benjamin, co-founder of CODEPINK and member of the Embassy Protection Collective, told MintPress News. “There were a few diplomats left that work with the Organization of American States (OAS) and today they said they had to be out. So tomorrow there are no diplomats left in the embassy, which opens the way for the Guaido folks to come in.” After the OAS recognized the representatives of Venezuela’s self-appointed president, Juan Guaido, in violation of its own charter, the State Department issued the Venezuelan diplomats a two-week ultimatum to vacate the embassy. Meanwhile, the elected government of Venezuela has turned over the keys to the activists in hopes they may be able to safeguard the building. For the past two weeks, members of the collective have been protecting the building. Speaking via live stream, Venezuelan Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza repeatedly thanked the group: We are very honored because you are protecting the Venezuelan territory… And please, keep on doing it. It’s important, it’s really important for the Venezuelan people. You are an example to us, to all the Venezuelan people. You are an example to the American people as well. “How Dare You!?” Thursday morning, Embassy Protection Collective activists interrupted an address by Elliot Abrams, Trump’s point man for regime change in Venezuela, hosted by the Atlantic Council. The think tank is among the most powerful foreign policy influence shops in Washington and lobbies on behalf of NATO, Gulf State monarchies, and oil conglomerates. Bearing a sign reading “No coup in Venezuela,” CODEPINK activist Ariel Elyse Gold shouted over Abrams as he attempted to speak. Speaking to MintPress immediately after she was removed by security from the premises, Gold said: Elliot Abrams is a war criminal and responsible for the destabilization of entire regions. I spoke out while he was addressing the Atlantic Council and told him: ‘How dare you orchestrate a coup in Venezuela? How dare you impose sanctions that harm the people?' My government has no right to overthrow the government of another country. This is undermining the basic principle of democracy. Maduro was elected by 6 million people in Venezuela. Whether anybody likes Maduro or not, we need to respect the election. “We will not go out easily” Medea Benjamin, one of the lead organizers of the movement to protect the embassy, explained the motivations of the collective to MintPress News, saying they are “people who came together to say we cannot allow the fake, illegal quote ‘government’ of Juan Guaido to come in and take over this embassy.” She added: You can’t have an international community that doesn’t recognize real governments, that starts creating parallel governments, fake governments, and concedes them to take over embassies. It just can’t work like that. It’s against international law. So we’re the citizens that are protecting this embassy against a takeover that is part of a coup that is orchestrated by our government to get rid of a government that it doesn’t like in Venezuela. Benjamin explained how the U.S. demand that all Venezuelan diplomats leave the country by April 24th was a move designed to open the embassy to occupation by opposition squatters. In response, the collective has been living and working in the embassy 24/7 and hosting teach-ins and concerts every evening. They aim to hold the space for as long as possible, she says –“and we will not go out easily.” After reaching out to the Venezuelan government in late March, Benjamin says they were invited to hold the space when the Venezuelans realized the U.S. government was “egging on” the opposition to take it. They gave the collective keys to the building and, she says, their full support. Though many embassy protectors admire the accomplishments of socialist Venezuela, Benjamin says they aren’t there just to show support for the Venezuelan government. Instead, they want to reject another coup and the attempted social engineering of their leaders. She says the failure by coup plotters to turn the Venezuelan military against the government has done little to stop their U.S. handlers from plotting further aggression. She notes the hypocrisy of a U.S. establishment that has spent the past few years hyper-fixating on a supposed Russian interference threat now “overtly trying to overthrow governments.” Benjamin was adamant that international law was on the side of the collective even if the Trump administration “doesn’t care” about such formalities. “Now they have a place in their society” Max Blumenthal, founder of the Grayzone, visited Caracas in February and described to MintPress News a profound disconnect between Western perceptions of Venezuela and the reality on the ground. I was prepared to see something, to see an economic collapse, to even see a humanitarian crisis. And at least in Caracas, I didn’t see anything approaching that… it wasn’t a war situation. It wasn’t a conflict zone. Amidst ongoing economic warfare, life in Venezuela continues with relative normalcy, with residents taking full advantage of the free public gyms, salsa nights, and basketball courts, Blumenthal observed. He described a “sort of utopian” experience visiting a public housing development in Caracas. It’s one of many such projects that comprise 2,500,000 total housing units provided by the socialist government to working Venezuelans free of charge, Blumenthal told MintPress. He recounted that Venezuelan journalists he met with explained that they never could have become reporters without the socialist government, as prior to the Bolivarian revolution dark-skinned people weren’t allowed to go to college. “Now they have a place in their society.” By contrast, Blumenthal says the opposition strongholds were like a “bubble of affluence.” Despite repeated accusations of a supposed humanitarian crisis, the largely white, wealthy opposition is still enjoying yoga classes and sushi dinners. “They seem very comfortable, but at the same time feigning this humanitarian crisis.” Still, Blumenthal notes that there are of course real economic problems, but stresses the many ways they’re exacerbated by capitalist forces and “speculation.” Recently, the Grayzone exposed an off-the-record meeting in which 40-odd coup plotters discussed their plans for a military attack on Venezuela. Attendees included representatives from the U.S. State Department, the former commander of the United States Southern Command, Colombian diplomats, and emissaries of Brazil’s fascist government. With that context, their plan to invade the Venezuelan Embassy is par for the course, Blumenthal argued. As the property was purchased by the Venezuelan government, anyone occupying it without permission would be squatting, he said, joking that it is perhaps for that reason that “Juan Guaidó says he has so much in common with the Israeli government– because they like squatting on other people’s property.” “Don’t you think the Iraqis should design the new Iraqi flag?” John Kiriakou, a former CIA officer who blew the whistle on the agency’s torture program, was also on hand Wednesday to give a talk on ‘an insider’s persective on CIA coups.’ Afterwards, he spoke exclusively to MintPress News, saying that he also came to “show support for the sanctity of the Venezuelan Embassy.” It’s a world he’s intimately familiar with; as the executive assistant to the CIA’s deputy director for operations, Kiriakou had access to “literally everything that the CIA was doing around the world operationally.” After signing a number of secrecy agreements, he was finally informed what the job he’d agreed to was: “to assist in the overthrow of the Iraqi government.” He describes a specific intelligence office that oversees CIA coup operations — one so shrouded in secrecy that even its name is classified. Indeed, should Kiriakou reveal it, he would risk being sent back to prison for once again blowing the whistle on the agency. Kiriakou told MintPress that whenever a CIA agent expresses a desire to overthrow a government, the office creates a plan that is generally rubber-stamped by the Department of Justice and approved by the National Security Council. Once the president signs off, Kiriakou says the officer is given a blank check to carry out their sabotage and subterfuge. He goes on to describe an agency so arrogant that even before it finished destroying Iraq, when he once walked into the office of a senior officer in the unnamed coup department, that officer had already set about designing the new flag with colored markers. “Don’t you think the Iraqis should design the new Iraqi flag?” Kiriakou asked. The officer paused. “No.” The depth of their imperial hubris is matched by the depth of their pockets, Kiriakou argued: Their budgets are secret. Nobody knows what the CIA budget is. It’s been a secret since the founding of the CIA…. It’s just impossible to know what the CIA has to spend. I can tell you that it’s a lot. Kiriakou continued, “We’ve got this unwritten policy that if we don’t like the politics of a foreign leader, we just take him out and we put in our own guy.” It’s a policy that he says operates independently of long-term U.S. interests or human-rights considerations. Do the countries targeted by the CIA have something in common? “Natural resources,” he says. “It’s always been frowned up to say ‘we went into Kuwait for the oil. We went into Iraq for the oil. We went into Libya for the oil.’ But we did!” Kiriakou recounted the words of a friend of his in Kuwait, who asked him, if the country “had gravel instead of oil, do you think we would have given two shits about these people?” “Venezuela has oil, and Iran has oil, and Afghanistan has rare-earth metals, and we’re in all of those countries as well,” Kiriakou noted. “If you don’t bow down to us… we will take your embassy” This implicit threat to anyone who refuses to toe the State Department line is clear to Kevin Zeese as well. The peace activist, lawyer and co-director of Popular Resistance was similarly disturbed by the U.S. government’s threats to invade the sovereign territory of Venezuela: If they do this tomorrow, it will send a message to the world that no embassy is safe in the United States… it’s a message that ‘if you don’t bow down to us, do what we tell you, put in the government that we’d like, we will take your embassy.’ Though he’s skeptical that any international court could enforce a ruling against the U.S., Zeese insists that these actions render the U.S. a “renegade nation” in the eyes of the public and the international community. These rogue, aggressive actions characterize a nation whose once-hegemonic economic and military influence is waning, but which still has little trouble convincing its European and Latin American partners to go along with its imperialist agenda. “They all want to steal Venezuela’s wealth, and Venezuela’s very wealthy,” Zeese says. Aside from the world’s largest oil reserves, Venezuela also boasts the largest gold and diamond reserves, the fifth largest gas reserves, and many other extremely valuable mineral deposits, Zeese said. For its own sake, Zeese says, he seriously hopes the U.S. ruling class will reject the temptation to bring them under their control. Given the Chinese and Russian support for Venezuela, and a U.S. military still reeling from its failures in Iraq, he argues that an invasion of the Bolivarian Republic could be the straw that breaks the camel’s back. “The U.S. empire will be crumbling.” MintPress News will continue to keep a reporter at the Venezuelan Embassy in Washington D.C. in anticipation of a raid by U.S. authorities. Feature photo | CodePink co-founder Medea Benjamin sits for an interview in the shuttered Venezuelan Embassy in Washington, April 24, 2019. Patrick Semansky | AP Alexander Rubinstein is a staff writer for MintPress News based in Washington, DC. He reports on police, prisons and protests in the United States and the United States’ policing of the world. He previously reported for RT and Sputnik News. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From cgestabrook at gmail.com Tue Apr 30 16:04:46 2019 From: cgestabrook at gmail.com (C G Estabrook) Date: Tue, 30 Apr 2019 11:04:46 -0500 Subject: [Peace] May the Fourth be with you - and you with us Message-ID: <9CC6AE30-6B6A-47B7-A46F-CB49C66736DE@gmail.com> AWARE's regular monthly anti-war demonstration will be held 2-4pm Saturday 4 May, at the Susan B. Anthony Memorial intersection (Main & Neil) in downtown Champaign. ### From cgestabrook at gmail.com Tue Apr 30 01:29:02 2019 From: cgestabrook at gmail.com (C G Estabrook) Date: Mon, 29 Apr 2019 20:29:02 -0500 Subject: [Peace] Flyer for regular anti-war demonstration, 2-4pm Saturday 4 May (Main & Neil in Champaign) Message-ID: <9134C1F1-EB31-4247-9B28-222AF7ECBF69@gmail.com> RESIST OUR GOVERNMENT’S WAR-MAKING Demand all U.S. troops (and weapons) be brought home, U.S. military bases in foreign countries be closed, and social supports - including Medicare for all, free education, and a universal basic income - be provided for Americans made poorer by generations of our government’s wars. ~~~ Although most Americans are not aware of it, the US government is today making war - killing people - in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Pakistan, Somalia, Syria, and Yemen. They’re doing so principally to control the flow of oil out of the Mideast and North Africa, which the US uses as a weapon against its economic rivals from Germany to China. ~ The ongoing US drone assassination program - called “the most extreme terrorist campaign of modern times” - is killing thousands of people (most of them not the presumed targets), including American citizens and hundreds of children. ~ More than a quarter of a million American troops are stationed in a thousand US bases on foreign soil, most of them surrounding Russia and China. ~ The 70,000 US troops in the ‘Special Operations Command’ are active in three-quarters of the countries of the world. Their activities have included kidnapping (the US government calls it ‘rendition’), torture, and murder. ~ The U.S. is forbidding countries around the world - including China - from importing oil from Iran. A similar attempt to prevent Japan from importing oil from southeast Asia led to World War II in the Pacific. U.S. sanctions today threaten an even wider - even nuclear - war. ~ The US is torturing the people of Venezuela - the country with the world’s largest reserve of oil - in order to overthrow their government, which isn’t following orders from Washington. ~~~ Since 1945 the United States has killed between 20 and 30 million people in wars (in Korea, Vietnam, Latin America, the Mideast, and elsewhere) designed to maintain the world-wide economic dominance that the US inherited at the end of World War II - for the American 1%. It is unfortunately the basis of US foreign policy to use war and the threats of war to retard the economic development of Russia and China as competitors to American control of the world economy - from US support for a fascist coup in Ukraine to US naval provocations in the South China Sea and huge NATO military exercises in eastern Europe. The rest of the world recognizes that the US government is what Martin Luther King called it long ago - “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today.” ~~~ Write your representatives in Congress-- ~ Senator Dick Durbin: ~ Sen. Tammy Duckworth: ~ Representative Rodney Davis: AWARE, the Anti-War Anti-Racism Effort of Champaign-Urbana, Illinois ### From naiman at justforeignpolicy.org Tue Apr 30 20:46:37 2019 From: naiman at justforeignpolicy.org (Robert Naiman) Date: Tue, 30 Apr 2019 15:46:37 -0500 Subject: [Peace] JFP alert: The Saudi regime is committing genocide in Yemen In-Reply-To: References: <4374714289.-202818781@org.orgDB.reply.salsalabs.com> Message-ID: ---------- Forwarded message --------- From: Robert Reuel Naiman, Just Foreign Policy Date: Tue, Apr 30, 2019 at 3:33 PM Subject: The Saudi regime is committing genocide in Yemen To: [image: Just Foreign Policy] *Sign the petition for the "veto" override , so children in Yemen may live. * Dear Robert, The Saudi regime is committing genocide in Yemen. The U.S. government is an accomplice to the genocide. This crime against humanity didn’t start in January 2017. It started in March 2015, on the watch of Barack Obama, Joe Biden, John Brennan, and Ben Rhodes. 85,000 children have already been starved to death in Yemen. Two hundred thousand human beings have already been killed since March 2015 in Yemen by the Saudi regime's war and blockade. Another thirty thousand human beings will be killed by the end of the year in Yemen, if the Saudi regime’s war and blockade isn’t stopped. On May 17, 2017, *Connecticut Senator Chris Murphy* said on the Senate floor : *"The Saudis are deliberately trying to create a famine inside Yemen in order to essentially starve the Yemenis to the negotiating table."* That was almost two years ago. Senator Murphy wasn’t just referring to the previous four months. He was talking about the war that started in March 2015, on the watch of the Obama-Biden Administration. *“Deliberate famine” is genocide.* *John Brennan* was director of the CIA during the Obama-Biden Administration, from *March 2013 to January 2017*. In that role, Brennan was one of the most influential “national security” lieutenants in the Obama-Biden Administration. On October 12, 2018, Brennan had an op-ed in the *Washington Post*, in which he referred to the Saudi regime’s “disastrous military foray into Yemen .” The Saudi regime’s “disastrous military foray into Yemen” – with unconstitutional U.S. military participation - *began on John Brennan’s watch*. So John Brennan – who was once CIA station chief in Saudi Arabia - knows more about the Saudi regime’s “disastrous military foray into Yemen” than most Americans. Brennan’s op-ed linked to a press report that the Saudi regime’s de facto dictator Mohammed bin Salman had “threatened to target women and children in Yemen irrespective of international criticism that the Saudi-led alliance attacking Yemen is targeting civilian facilities and critical infrastructure.” According to the report Brennan linked to , MbS said: *“Do not care about international criticism. We want to leave a big impact on the consciousness of Yemeni generations. We want their children, women and even their men to shiver whenever the name of Saudi Arabia is mentioned.”* This is genocide, with the active participation of the government of the United States. *There’s only one way to stop the genocide right now, and that’s for Senate Republicans to override the “veto” of the Bernie Sanders – Mike Lee – Chris Murphy Yemen War Powers Resolution.* *Urge Senate Republicans to Do the Right Thing to Save the Children by Signing Our Petition.* Thanks for all you do to help U.S. foreign policy become more just, Robert Reuel Naiman - whose grandfather was born in Grodno , Just Foreign Policy *If you think our work is important, please make a donation to support it. *$18 means "life." http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/donate [image: Please support our work. Donate for a Just Foreign Policy] © 2019 Just Foreign Policy -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: