Chris Hedges's Blog, page 297

House Fails to Override Trump Veto of His Border Emergency

WASHINGTON—The Democratic-controlled House fell short Tuesday in its effort to override President Donald Trump’s first veto, handing him a victory in his drive to spend billions more for constructing barriers along the Southwest border than Congress has approved.

Lawmakers voted 248-181 in favor of overturning his veto, mostly along party lines, but that was 38 votes shy of the number needed for the required two-thirds majority.

The outcome, not a surprise, enabled Trump to move forward on an issue that was a hallmark of his 2016 presidential campaign and of his presidency. Yet the vote also gave Democrats a way to refocus on policy differences with Trump, days after Attorney General William Barr gave the president a political boost by saying special counsel Robert Mueller had concluded that Trump had not colluded with Russia to influence his election.

Congress sent Trump a resolution this month annulling the national emergency that Trump had declared at the US-Mexico border. That included passage by the Republican-led Senate, in which 12 GOP senators — nearly 1 of every 4 — voted with Democrats to block him.

Trump vetoed that measure almost immediately.

Trump had declared the border emergency under a law that lets him shift budget funds to address dire situations. His plan is to shift an additional $3.6 billion from military construction projects to work on border barriers. Congress voted this year to limit spending on such barriers to less than $1.4 billion, and Democrats called his declaration a gambit for ignoring lawmakers’ constitutional control over spending.

“We take an oath that we must honor” to protect the Constitution, said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., speaking on her 79th birthday. “The choice is simple, between partisanship and patriotism. Between honoring our sacred oath or hypocritically, inconsistently breaking this oath.”

Rep. Joaquin Castro, D-Texas, called Trump’s declaration “constitutional vandalism.”

Republicans said Trump was merely acting under a law that gives presidents emergency powers, and was trying to head off Democrats with little concern about border security.

Rep. Tom McClintock, R-Calif., said Trump was acting against the “radical left in this House that would dissolve our borders entirely if given the chance” — a stance that no Democrat has taken.

Rep. Paul Mitchell, R-Mich., called the veto override effort “a partisan whack job” because of its certain defeat.

Fourteen Republicans, a mix of conservatives plus moderates from swing districts, joined all voting Democrats in favor of the override. It was the same 13 who opposed the veto in last month’s House vote plus Rep. John Katko, R-N.Y., who missed that roll call.

In a symbolic move by Democrats, presiding over the debate and vote was freshman Rep. Veronica Escobar, D-Texas, representing a district surrounding El Paso along the Mexican border.

Tuesday’s vote was the legislative finale of a showdown that’s been building for months.

Even with his veto remaining intact, Trump may not be able to spend the money for barriers quickly because of lawsuits that might take years to resolve.

Democrats were hoping to use the border emergency battle in upcoming campaigns, both to symbolize Trump’s harsh immigration stance and claim he was hurting congressional districts around the country.

The Pentagon sent lawmakers a list last week of hundreds of military construction projects that might be cut to pay for barrier work. Though the list was tentative, Democrats were asserting that GOP lawmakers were endangering local bases to pay for the wall.

Opponents of Trump’s emergency warned that besides usurping Congress’ role in making spending decisions, he was inviting future Democratic presidents to circumvent lawmakers by declaring emergencies to finance their own favored initiatives.

Trump supporters said he was simply acting under a 1976 law that lets presidents declare national emergencies. Trump’s declaration was the 60th presidential emergency under that statute, but the first aimed at spending that Congress explicitly denied, according to New York University’s Brennan Center for Justice, which tracks the law.

The House approved the resolution blocking Trump’s emergency by 245-182 in February. On Tuesday, Trump opponents will need to reach 288 votes to prevail.

This month, the GOP-led Senate rebuked Trump with a 59-41 vote blocking his declaration after the failure of a Republican effort to reach a compromise with the White House. Republicans were hoping to avoid a confrontation with him for fear of alienating pro-Trump voters.

With the House override vote failing, the Senate won’t attempt its own override and the veto will stand.

Democrats Ignore a Progressive Foreign Policy at Their Peril

This piece originally appeared on anti-war.com.

The 2020 election will not turn on global issues – and more’s the pity. After all, thanks to decades upon decades of accumulating executive power in an increasingly imperial presidency, it is in foreign affairs that the commander-in-chief possesses near dictatorial power. Conversely, in domestic policy, a hostile Congress can – just ask Barry Obama – effectively block most of a president’s agenda.

Still, the vast majority of Americans don’t give a hoot about issues of war, peace, and international diplomacy. Why should they care? It’s not as though anything is asked of them as citizens. By cynically ditching the draft, Tricky Dick Nixon took the wind out of the sails of current and future antiwar movements, and permanently cleaved a gap between the U.S. people and their military. Mothers no longer lose sleep over their teenage sons serving their country and they – along with the rest of the family – quit caring about foreign policy. Such it is, and so it will be, that the 2020 presidential election is likely to be decided by “kitchen-table” affairs like healthcare, immigration, race, and taxes.

Be that as it may, serious observers should pay plenty of attention to international strategy. First, because the occupant of the Oval Office makes policy almost unilaterally – including the decision of whether or not to end the human race with America’s suicidal nuclear button. Second, because 2020 is likely to be another close contest, turning on the votes of a few hundred thousand swing state voters. As such, Trump’s opponent will need to win every vote on every issue – including foreign affairs. What’s more, there are still some folks who genuinely care about a potential commander-in-chief’s international bonafides. So, while Dems can’t win the White House with foreign policy alone, they can lose it by ignoring these issues or – oh so typically – presenting a muddled overseas strategy.

This is serious. Just in case there are any out there still underestimating Trump – I, for one, predict he’ll win in 2020 – make no mistake, he’s no pushover on foreign policy. Sure he doesn’t know much – but neither does the average voter. Nonetheless, Trump is no dope. He’s got the pulse of (white) voters across this country and senses that the populace is tired of spending blood and cash (but mostly its cash) on Mideast forever wars. In 2016, he (correctly) made Hillary”regime change” Clinton out to be the true hawk in the race. Trump, on the other hand, combined tough guy bravado (he’d “bomb the shit” out of ISIS) with earthy good sense (there’d be no more “stupid” Iraq invasions. And it worked.

So, with 2020 in mind, whether you’re a progressive, a libertarian, or just a Trump-hater, its vital that the opposition (most likely the Dems) nominate a candidate who can hang with Trump in foreign affairs. Mark my words: if the DNC – which apparently picks the party’s candidates – backs a conventional neoliberal foreign policy nominee, Trump will wipe the floor with him or her. And, if the Dems national security platform reads like a jumbled, jargon-filled sheet full of boring (like it usually does) than Joe the proverbial plumber is going to back The Donald.

That’s what has me worried. As one candidate after another enters an already crowded field, this author is left wondering whether any of them are commander-in-chief material. So far I see a huge crew (Liz, Kirsten, Kamala, Beto) that live and die by domestic policy; two potentially conventional foreign policy guys (Biden and Booker); and two other wildcards (Bernie and Tulsi). That’s not a comprehensive list, but you get the point. If they want to stand a chance in 2020, the Dems had better back a nominee with a clear, alternative progressive foreign policy or get one the domestic-focused candidates up to speed…and fast.

So here’s how my mental math works: a progressive candidate needs to win over libertarian-minded Republicans and Independents (think Rand Paul-types) by force of their commonsense alternative to Trump’s foreign policy. That means getting the troops out of the Mideast, pulling the plug from other mindless interventions and cutting runaway defense spending. Then, and only then, can the two sides begin arguing about what to do with the resultant cash surplus. That’s an argument for another day, sure, but here and now our imaginary Democratic (or Third Party?) nominee needs to end the wars and curtail the excesses of empire. I know many libertarians – some still nominally Republican – who could get behind that agenda pretty quickly!

Still, there’s more than a little reason for concern. Look at how “Nasty” Nancy Pelosi and the establishment Dems came down on Ilhan Omar for that representative’s essentially accurate tweets criticizing the Israel Lobby. Then there’s Joe Biden. Look, he’s definitely running. He’s also definitely been wrong time and again on foreign policy – like how he was for the Iraq War before he was against it (how’d that turn out for John Kerry in 2004?). And, for all the talk of a progressive “blue wave” in the party ranks, Biden still polls as the top choice for Democratic primary voters. Yikes.

Behind him, thankfully, is old Bernie – who sometimes shows potential in foreign affairs – the only candidate who has both backed Omar and been consistent in a career of generally antiwar votes. Still, Bernie won his household name with domestic policy one-liners – trashing Wall Street and pushing populist economic tropes. Whether he can transform into a more balanced candidate, one that can confidently compose and deliver a strong alternative foreign policy remains to be seen. Tulsi Gabbard, though she still looks the long shot, remains intriguing given here genuine antiwar (and combat veteran) credentials. Still, she’ll have her hands full overcoming problematic skeletons in her own closet: ties to Indian Hindu nationalists, opposition to the Iran deal, and sometime backing of authoritarians and Islamophobes. Then again, even Bernie has his foreign affairs flaws – such as reflexively denouncing the BDS movement and occasionally calling for regime change in Syria. Nevertheless, both Bernie and Tulsi demonstrate that there’s some promise for fresh opposition foreign policy.

Here’s (some) of what that would look like: speedily withdraw all U.S. troops from the (at least) seven shooting wars in the Greater Middle East; choke off excessive arms deals and expensive military handouts to Israel, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and other frenemies; quit bombing or enabling the bombing of impoverished civilians in places like Yemen and Gaza; begin dismantling America’s “empire of bases” overseas; seek firm détente rather than conflict with Russia and China; and cut defense and war-related spending down to size. Our imaginary candidate would need to convey this commonsense course to a war-weary American people as plainly and coherently as Trump can. No jargon, no Clintonian wonky crap – simple and to the point. Imagine it: a commonsense course for a clear-eyed country!

Less war and more investment at home. Less war and more middle-class tax cuts. Whatever. That fight will come and the progressives and independents/libertarians will fight it out. For now, though, what’s essential is checking the war machine and military-industrial behemoth before its too late (it may be already!).

None of this will be easy or likely, of course. But count on this much: the establishment Democrats, media-mogul “left,” and centrist DC think tanks won’t save us from the imperial monster or deliver a Trump-defeating strategy in foreign affairs. The Mueller-will-save-us, Mattis-was-a-hero, reflexively anti-Trump, born-again hawks like Rachel Maddow and the other disappointing chumps at MSNBC or CNN aren’t on our side. Worse yet, they’re born losers when it comes to delivering elections.

All of this may be far-fetched, but is not impossible. Neither libertarians nor progressives can countenance Trump. Nor should they. One of their only true hopes for compromise rest on foreign policy and a genuine antiwar message. It can be done.

Look, on a personal note, even America’s beloved and over-adulated soldiers are reachable on this issue – that’s how you know the foreign policy alliance has potential! For every rah-rah war-fever cheerleader in uniform, there’s an exhausted foot soldier on his Nth tour in the Mideast. There’s also a huge chunk (40%!) who are racial minorities – usually a reliably anti-Trump demographic. Finally, among the white men and women in uniform I’ve personally met a solid core of libertarians. And the data backs up my anecdotal observation – Ron Paul was highly popular among active-duty military members and their families. A progressive foreign policy alliance with the libertarian wing of Republicans and Independents would sell better with these such voters both in and out of uniform. You know the type: sick of war but justas sick of stereotypical liberal snowflakes.

So here’s a plea to the “opposition” such at it is: avoid the usual mistakes – don’t cede foreign affairs to the Trump and the Republicans; don’t nominate anyone remotely resembling Joe Biden; don’t alienate libertarians and independents with wonky or muddled international policy.

Try something new. Like winning…

Danny Sjursen is a retired U.S. Army officer and regular contributor to antiwar.com. He served combat tours with reconnaissance units in Iraq and Afghanistan and later taught history at his alma mater, West Point. He is the author of a memoir and critical analysis of the Iraq War, Ghostriders of Baghdad: Soldiers, Civilians, and the Myth of the Surge. Follow him on Twitter at @SkepticalVet.

[Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author, expressed in an unofficial capacity, and do not reflect the official policy or position of the Department of the Army, Department of Defense, or the U.S. government.]

Copyright 2019 Danny Sjursen

Prosecutors Abruptly Drop Criminal Charges Against Jussie Smollett

CHICAGO—Prosecutors on Tuesday abruptly dropped all charges against Jussie Smollett, the “Empire” actor who was accused of lying to police about being the target of a racist, anti-gay attack in downtown Chicago, his attorneys said.

Smollett’s attorneys said his record had “been wiped clean” of the 16 felony counts related to making a false report that he was assaulted by two men. The actor insisted that he had “been truthful and consistent on every single level since day one.”

“I would not be my mother’s son if I was capable of one drop of what I was being accused of,” he told reporters after a court hearing. He thanked the state of Illinois “for attempting to do what’s right.”

It was not immediately clear what prompted the decision to dismiss the case. Typically, a minimum condition of dropping cases is some acceptance of responsibility. In a statement, the Cook County prosecutors’ office offered no detailed explanation.

“After reviewing all of the facts and circumstances of the case, including Mr. Smollett’s volunteer service in the community and agreement to forfeit his bond to the City of Chicago, we believe this outcome is a just disposition and appropriate resolution to this case,” the statement from spokeswoman Tandra Simonton said.

Smollett paid $10,000 in bail to get out of jail after his arrest.

Among the unanswered questions was whether prosecutors still believe Smollett concocted the attack and whether new evidence emerged that altered their view of events.

Smollett was accused of falsely reporting to authorities that he was attacked around 2 a.m. on Jan. 29 in downtown Chicago. Authorities said he made the report because he was unhappy with his pay on “Empire” and believed it would promote his career.

The actor, who is black and gay, plays the gay character Jamal Lyon on the hit Fox TV show that follows a black family as they navigate the ups and downs of the recording industry.

He reported that he was assaulted on his way home from a sandwich shop. Smollett said two masked men shouted racial and anti-gay slurs, poured bleach on him, beat him and looped a rope around his neck. He claimed they shouted, “This is MAGA country” — a reference to President Donald Trump’s “Make America Great Again” campaign slogan. He asserted that he could see one of the men was white because he could see the skin around his eyes.

Police said Smollett hired two men, both of whom are black, to attack him. Smollett allegedly paid the men $3,500.

The men are brothers Abimbola “Abel” and Olabinjo “Ola” Osundairo, and one of them had worked on “Empire.” An attorney for them has said the brothers agreed to help Smollett because of their friendship with him and the sense that he was helping their careers.

Police have also said that before the attack, Smollett sent a letter that threatened him to the Chicago studio where “Empire” is shot. The FBI, which is investigating that letter, has declined to comment on the investigation.

The Dangerous and Unrelenting Extremism of Clarence Thomas

Do Republican-appointed Supreme Court justices get more liberal as they age? A formidable body of academic research suggests that they do. This idea offers a sliver of comfort to those alarmed by Donald Trump’s appointment of Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh to the nation’s most powerful judicial body, as well as by the even more disturbing prospect that if Trump is reelected, he may get to place additional conservatives on the court.

Although no one is sure what causes this liberalizing dynamic, it’s easy to track the process in the careers of such GOP appointees as the late Harry Blackmun, the author of the majority opinion in Roe v. Wade, and, more recently, in the records compiled by retired Justices David Souter, John Paul Stevens and Anthony Kennedy. As I have pointed out in this column before, we can even discern a modest move to the left by Chief Justice John Roberts.

As with most rules and research, however, there are exceptions. Enter Justice Clarence Thomas. Unlike some of his GOP counterparts, Thomas has demonstrated no migration to the ideological center. If anything, he’s become increasingly radical over time.

Thomas, who will turn 71 in June, was appointed by President George H.W. Bush in 1991 to replace the liberal stalwart Thurgood Marshall. Marshall was the first African-American to serve on the court. Thomas is the second.

In popular culture, Thomas is still best known for his rancorous confirmation hearing, which was famously marred by accusations of sexual harassment lodged by law professor Anita Hill.

To constitutional scholars, Thomas is best known as an inflexible right-wing “originalist.” In its current iteration, originalism asserts that the Constitution should be read according to the meaning it had for the Founding Fathers rather than as a “living” document that should be interpreted not only in light of its text but also in light of contemporary values and evolving traditions.

Since arriving at the court, according to several empirical studies, Thomas has ranked as the panel’s most conservative member. Time and again, he has deployed his originalist philosophy to produce downright reactionary opinions. He issues his opinions often in dissent or as idiosyncratic concurrences, geared toward upsetting liberal precedents, returning American law to the libertarian free-market jurisprudence of the Gilded Age, and neutralizing litigation as an instrument of progressive social and economic reform.

Once confirmed, Thomas methodically unveiled his extremist outlook. In U.S. v. Lopez (1995), for example, he authored a concurring opinion encouraging his colleagues to return to the “original understanding” of the commerce clause. If that view were adopted, it could lead to the invalidation of nearly all federal labor laws.

In 1997, in Printz v. United States, in which the court overturned parts of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act, Thomas argued in another solo concurrence that the Second Amendment guaranteed an individual right to own and bear arms. Eleven years later, in District of Columbia v. Heller, a 5-4 court majority embraced his analysis.

Over the years, Thomas has also staked out starkly retrograde positions on the death penalty, affirmative action, abortion, voting rights, campaign finance, gay marriage, environmental protection, religious freedom and the exclusionary rule (the principle that precludes illegally seized evidence from being introduced into evidence in criminal trials). As Thomas contended in a 2005 dissenting opinion (Gonzales v. Raich), the states, rather than the federal government or the Supreme Court, “should decide for themselves how to safeguard the health and welfare of their citizens.”

During this term, Thomas has doubled down on his efforts to turn back the judicial clock, advocating that longstanding and revered liberal precedents on freedom of the press and the right to counsel be reversed.

In Garza v. Idaho, dealing with the effective assistance of counsel in criminal cases, Thomas wrote a dissent insisting that Gideon v. Wainwright was wrongly decided. One of the pillars of modern American criminal procedure, Gideon recognized the Sixth Amendment right to court-appointed counsel at public expense for all criminal defendants facing possible prison sentences.

According to Thomas, the Sixth Amendment “as originally understood and ratified meant only that a defendant had a right to employ counsel, or to use volunteered services of counsel.”

In McKee v. Cosby, a defamation case filed by one of the many women who have accused comedian Bill Cosby of rape, Thomas maintained that the court’s unanimous 1964 landmark ruling in New York Times v. Sullivan should be overruled.

Prior to Sullivan, defamation lawsuits were governed exclusively by state law, and they were often slanted in favor of plaintiffs—especially rich ones who could afford expensive legal fees. Sullivan changed all that by establishing constitutional standards applicable throughout the country in defamation cases brought by public officials.

The justices wrote that in order to protect our “profound national commitment” to uninhibited, robust and wide-open debate that “may well include vehement, caustic and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks,” the First and 14th amendments must shield persons and publications sued for defamation. Public officials, they instructed, should not recover damages for allegedly defamatory statements related to official conduct unless they prove that such statements are made with “actual malice”—that is, that they are made with the knowledge that they are false or with reckless disregard for the truth.

In a series of subsequent decisions in the late ’60s and early ’70s, the court extended the actual malice standard to defamation lawsuits brought by “public figures” and celebrities.

In his opinion in the McKee case, Thomas wrote that Sullivan ran afoul of the original meaning of the First Amendment, terming it a policy decision “masquerading as constitutional law.” Coincidentally or not, Thomas’ dissent echoed the calls made by Trump during the last presidential campaign to “open up” the nation’s libel laws.

While there can be no doubt as to where Thomas stands on the ideological spectrum of the current court, commentators remain divided on the actual influence he wields on the bench and in wider conservative legal circles. As Ian Millhiser noted in a July 2018 column published by the website ThinkProgress, some observers continue to see Thomas as an intellectual lightweight or a clone of fellow-originalist Antonin Scalia, who died in February 2016. Critics have also maligned Thomas’ habit of remaining silent during the court’s oral arguments.

Millhiser, by contrast, sees Thomas as a trendsetter and a model for younger generations of conservative law students, lawyers, law professors and judges. That’s what makes Thomas, in Millhiser’s estimation, “the most important legal thinker in America.”

With Gorsuch and Kavanaugh, a new crop of conservatives has arrived at the court. If they and any other future Trump appointees follow in Thomas’ footsteps as unrelenting, inflexible originalists, we may have to throw out all the research about justices mellowing over time. In that event, Thomas won’t just go down as the most important legal thinker of the early 21st century. He’ll go down as the most dangerous.

Robert Reich: The Real Trump Scandal Was Never Collusion

We may never know for sure whether Donald Trump colluded with Vladimir Putin to obtain Russia’s help in the 2016 election, in return for, say, Trump’s help in weakening NATO and not interfering against Russian aggression in Ukraine.

Trump and his propaganda machine at Fox News have repeatedly conjured up a “witch hunt” and maintained a drumbeat of “no collusion,” which already has mired Robert Mueller’s report in a fog of alt-interpretation and epistemological confusion.

What’s “collusion?” What’s illegal? Has Trump obstructed justice? Has he been vindicated? What did Mueller conclude, exactly? What did he mean?

The real danger is that as attention inevitably turns to the 2020 campaign, controversy over the report will obscure the far more basic issues of Trump’s competence and character.

An American president is not just the chief executive of the United States, and the office he (eventually she) holds is not just a bully pulpit to advance policy ideas. He is also a moral leader, and the office is a moral pulpit invested with meaning about the common good.

A president’s most fundamental responsibility is to protect our system of government. Trump has weakened that system.

As George Washington’s biographer, Douglas Southall Freeman, explained, the first president believed he had been entrusted with something of immense intrinsic worth, and that his duty was to uphold it for its own sake and over the long term. He led by moral example.

Few of our subsequent presidents have come close to the example Washington set, but none to date has been as far from that standard as Trump.

In the 2016 presidential campaign, when accused of failing to pay his income taxes, Trump responded, “that makes me smart.” His comment conveyed a message to millions of Americans: that paying taxes in full is not an obligation of citizenship.

Trump boasted about giving money to politicians so they would do whatever he wanted. “When they call, I give. And you know what, when I need something from them two years later, three years later, I call them. They are there for me.”

In other words, it’s perfectly OK for business leaders to pay off politicians, regardless of the effect on our democracy.

Trump sent another message by refusing to reveal his tax returns during the campaign or even when he took office, or to put his businesses into a blind trust to avoid conflicts of interest, and by his overt willingness to make money off his presidency by having foreign diplomats stay at his Washington hotel, and promoting his various golf clubs.

These were not just ethical lapses. They directly undermined the common good by reducing the public’s trust in the office of the president.

A president’s most fundamental responsibility is to uphold and protect our system of government. Trump has weakened that system.

When, as a presidential nominee, he said a particular federal judge shouldn’t be hearing a case against him because the judge’s parents were Mexican, Trump did more than insult a member of the judiciary. He attacked the impartiality of America’s legal system.

When Trump threatened to “loosen” federal libel laws so he could sue news organizations that were critical of him and, later, to revoke the licenses of networks critical of him, he wasn’t just bullying the media. He was threatening the freedom and integrity of the press.

When, as president, he equated neo-Nazis and Ku Klux Klan members with counter-protesters in Charlottesville, Virginia, by blaming  “both sides” for the violence, he wasn’t being neutral. He was condoning white supremacists, thereby undermining equal rights.

When he pardoned Joe Arpaio, the former sheriff of Maricopa County, Arizona, for a criminal contempt conviction, he wasn’t just signaling it’s OK for the police to engage in brutal violations of civil rights. He was also subverting the rule of law by impairing the judiciary’s power to force public officials to abide by court decisions.

When he criticized NFL players for kneeling during the national anthem, he wasn’t really asking that they demonstrate their patriotism. He was disrespecting their—and, indirectly, everyone’s—freedom of speech.

In all these ways, Trump undermined core values of our democracy.

This is the essence of Trump’s failure—not that he has chosen one set of policies over another, or has divided rather than united Americans, or even that he has behaved in childish and vindictive ways unbecoming a president.

It is that he has sacrificed the processes and institutions of American democracy to achieve his goals.

By saying and doing whatever it takes to win, he has abused the trust we place in a president to preserve and protect the nation’s capacity for self-government.

Controversy over the Mueller report must not obscure this basic reality.

Military Joins Police as Yellow Vest Protesters March On in France

The weekly protests by the yellow vest movement (“Gilets Jaunes”) continued across France amid a heightened security presence in response to a resurgence of violence on the Champs-Élysées the week before.

Burnt debris litters the street following a March 23 clash between police and a group of yellow vest protesters near the 10th Arrondissement in Paris, France. (Donald Kaufman)

President Emmanuel Macron, along with French government officials, increased security, replaced Paris’ police chief and called in Opération Sentinelle, a counterterrorism unit of the army. More than 100 luxury shops, an exclusive restaurant, a bank and multiple small news kiosks were looted or set on fire the previous weekend.

Both police and military presence were felt throughout Paris on Saturday. Tanks stood by on the street while helicopters flew overhead. Even streets away from any gathering spots were blocked off by rows of police vehicles. Despite these measures, Gilets Jaunes protesters gathered and chanted against the government’s recent decision to involve the military.

Interior Minister Christophe Castaner estimated that 40,500 people took part in protests around France, including in Nice, Lille, Montpellier, Toulouse and Lyon, up from about 32,300 people who participated last week.

The Saturday protests in Paris were mostly peaceful, although tear gas was used late in the day when a small group walking from the 10th arrondissement to Place de la Republique (a central spot for political gatherings in Paris) started a small fire.

When protesters reached Place de la Republique, the police forced them to enter through small lines and take off their yellow vests. Without the vests, it was impossible to distinguish movement members from onlookers, and many demonstrators left the scene earlier than planned as a result.

Police officers gather on March 23 at the Place de Republique. Behind the blockade, a group of ambulances arrives to help an officer who had suffered a cardiac arrest at the scene. (Donald Kaufman)

The police also had barricaded the center of Place de la Republique, effectively stopping further demonstrations. No violent outsiders, known as “casseurs” (breakers), took part in the demonstrations Saturday.

Although protests remained mostly nonviolent throughout the country, photo and video footage appears to show cases of unnecessary police violence.

In Nice, a 73-year-old woman marching with a peace flag was assaulted by police and fell to the ground. Images circulating on social media show a cop holding her head as blood poured onto the concrete.

This is the most powerful picture of the century!

A elderly women badly injured by #Macron's #regime forces on the floor, stretching his fist to the skies for a better society!#GiletsJaunes #YellowVests #23March #ActeXIX #Resistance pic.twitter.com/RDbfgH2Whv

— Partisan FB (@PartisanDE) March 23, 2019

Another video appears to show a peaceful protester suffering a head injury after police hit her with batons.

U.K. Lawmakers Seize Brexit Agenda in Bid to Break Deadlock

LONDON — British lawmakers seized a measure of control over the stalled Brexit process from Prime Minister Theresa May’s foundering government Monday, setting up a series of votes that could dramatically alter the course of the U.K.’s departure from the European Union.

The move came after May conceded that Parliament would defeat her twice-rejected divorce deal with the EU again if she put it to a third vote.

With Brexit delayed and the new departure date up in the air, the House of Commons voted to give itself temporary control of the parliamentary timetable starting on Wednesday so lawmakers can vote on alternatives to May’s withdrawal deal. The government usually controls the scheduling of votes in Parliament.

Lawmakers who backed Monday’s motion, which passed 329-302, hope the planned “indicative votes” will narrow the options down to one that can secure majority support. Possible options include a “soft Brexit” that maintains close economic ties with the EU or scrapping Britain’s departure altogether.

Three government ministers quit their posts so they could back the motion. Richard Harrington, who resigned as a junior business minister, accused the government of “playing roulette with the lives and livelihoods of the vast majority of people in this country” by failing to resolve Britain’s Brexit impasse.

The government said it was disappointed by the vote, claiming it “upends the balance between our democratic institutions and sets a dangerous, unpredictable precedent for the future.”

But it also conceded that the new votes might be a way to break the months-long Brexit gridlock. May said she would “engage constructively” with the results of the process, though she said she was skeptical that it would produce a decisive result.

The move raises the chances that Britain will tack toward a softer Brexit, and is likely to be welcomed by the EU. Guy Verhofstadt, the European Parliament’s Brexit coordinator, tweet that it was an “opportunity to build a cross-party cooperation leading to an enhanced political declaration & a closer future relationship!”

Earlier in the day, May acknowledged, “with great regret,” that her deal still lacked “sufficient support” to be approved as of Monday.

She said she hoped to hold a third vote on the agreement later this week and was working to build support for the deal, which sets out the terms of withdrawing from the EU and the outline of future relations with the bloc.

May warned opponents that continuing to reject the deal could lead to a “slow Brexit” that postpones the country’s departure indefinitely.

With the March 29 Brexit day set almost two years ago days away and the withdrawal agreement lacking Parliament’s approval, European leaders agreed to a postponement last week to avoid a chaotic cliff-edge departure that would be disruptive for the world’s biggest trading bloc and deeply damaging for Britain.

However, the EU granted a shorter delay than May sought. It said if Parliament approves the proposed divorce deal, the U.K. would leave the EU on May 22. If not, the government has until April 12 to tell the 27 remaining EU countries what it plans to do – leave without a deal, cancel Brexit or chart a path to a new option.

In agreeing to the postponement, European leaders hoped Britain’s deadlocked politicians would find a solution to the crisis. But the EU isn’t counting on it. The European Commission said Monday it had completed planning for a no-deal Brexit, calling that outcome “increasingly likely.”

The EU said its members would be able to cope with a no-deal departure, although more remained to be done on ensuring an open border between EU member Ireland and the U.K.’s Northern Ireland — something both sides have agreed to. Checkpoints there were a source of tension and a target during the decades of sectarian violence before Northern Ireland’s 1998 peace accord.

An EU official said the bloc was in “in intense discussions with the Irish authorities about these matters.”

May stands little chance of getting the deal she struck with the EU approved unless she can win over Brexit-backing lawmakers in her Conservative Party and its Northern Irish ally, the Democratic Unionist Party. The DUP said Monday that the party’s “position remains unchanged.”

The prime minister has come under intensifying pressure in recent days to quit as the necessary price for winning support for the deal.

At a meeting Sunday at the prime minister’s country retreat, Chequers, prominent Brexiteers told May they might back the deal — if she agreed to step down so a new leader could take charge of the next phase of negotiations, which will settle Britain’s future relations with the EU.

Former Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, who attended the meeting and is likely to be a contender in any future Conservative leadership race, accused the government of lacking “gumption” and chickening out on delivering Brexit.

Britain’s best-selling newspaper, The Sun, put a call on its front page for the prime minister to resign under the headline “Time’s up, Theresa.”

May is hanging on, hoping she can persuade Brexit-backing lawmakers that rejecting her deal means Britain may never leave the EU.

She told lawmakers that Britain would not leave the EU without a deal unless Parliament — which has already rejected the idea — voted for it.

Opponents of Brexit feel the political tide may be turning in their favor. Hundreds of thousands of people marched through London on Saturday calling for a new referendum on whether to leave the EU or remain.

But with the deadline for a Brexit decision less than three weeks away, British politicians remain divided, and increasingly despairing about the country’s political gridlock.

“Brexit is like the Death Star of politics,” Conservative legislator George Freeman said. “I always feared it would be like this. It’s destroying and soaking up all the prime minister’s room for maneuver and political goodwill.

“I’ve never known this country so divided, so angry and in such a dangerous state,” he said.

___

Lorne Cook reported from Brussels. Danica Kirka contributed to this story.

Mueller Report Ends a Shameful Period for the Press

The Mueller report’s categorical statement that Donald Trump and his campaign did not collude with Russia ends one of the most shameful periods in modern American journalism, one that rivals the mindless cheerleading for the Iraq War by most of the press. It further erodes and may prove fatal to the credibility of a press that has steadfastly rendered most of the country invisible and functions as little more than an array of gossiping courtiers to the elites.

“ ‘[T]he investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities,’ ” the report by special counsel Robert Mueller says, according to a direct quotation given in an official letter by U.S. Attorney General William Barr.

The charge that Russia stole the 2016 presidential election, that Vladimir Putin has secret “pee tapes” of Trump cavorting in a Moscow hotel with prostitutes or that Trump has been a longtime “Kremlin agent,” repeated by reporters whose work I admired in the past, is demagoguery as pernicious as the vile taunts and racist tropes that come out of the White House. The press endlessly repeated such allegations while ignoring the expanding social inequality and suffering of a country where half the population lives in poverty, as well as the collapse of our democratic institutions. These facts, not Russian manipulation, saw enraged American voters elect a demagogue who at least belittles the elites, including those in the press, who sold them out. The charge that Trump was a tool of Russia is entertaining. It attracts billions in advertising dollars. It allows the press to posture as a moral crusader. But over the past three years this obsession blotted out most of the real crimes committed by this administration and the reality most Americans endure.

The mainstream press, owned by the corporations that have extinguished the democratic state and are fleecing the public, as well as destroying the ecosystem on which we depend for life, does not hold its employers to account. The empty chatter about Russia, including in The New York Times, exposes the bankruptcy of the U.S. media. MSNBC and CNN, which long ago abandoned journalism for entertainment, have breathlessly clogged the airwaves with ridiculous conspiracy theories and fantasies and used them to justify a faux crusade.

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Liberals Are Digging Their Own Grave With Russiagate



by Robert Scheer

Don’t expect any of this to change. Rachael Maddow, like Jack Tapper or any other fatuous news celebrity, will not be held to account for slogging through this fiction night after night. Maddow will still collect her $10-million-a-year salary. And the handful of reporters who exhibited journalistic integrity—Glenn Greenwald, Matt Taibbi, Aaron Maté, Robert Scheer, Max Blumenthal and Katrina vanden Heuvel—will continue to remain on the margins of the media landscape. The press is an arm of the corporate-funded burlesque that has replaced the country’s political life and turned civic debate into a vast reality show.

The more the big news outlets try to spin this report, arguing that they need to see the full report rather than the attorney general’s summary, or that Jared Kushner sought to use the communications systems of Russian diplomats, the more credibility they will lose. And they do not have much credibility left. The lurid details of the president’s alleged sexual relations with a porn star and a Playboy bunny, and of “Russiagate,” have replaced journalism. These stories have nothing to do with the lives of most Americans. This descent into the inane and the tawdry gives immunity to Trump. In attacking the press he attacks an institution most Americans loath. And with good reason. The press, unwittingly, enhances a president it seeks to destroy. And its decline, accelerated by its collaboration with liberal Democratic elites who scapegoat Russia to avoid confronting their responsibility for trashing the country in the service of corporate oligarchs, will get worse. Little the press says about Trump will now be believed.

There was, of course, massive interference in our election by a foreign power—Israel. But try saying this naked truth out loud and you will suffer the character assassination, chanted by the unified chorus in the press and the political hierarchy of both parties, that was unleashed on Rep. Ilhan Omar. The engine driving our animosity toward Russia comes from the arms industry, which with the expansion of NATO up to Russia’s border—despite assurances given upon the unification of Germany that this would not happen—is making billions of dollars selling weapons to countries in Eastern Europe. The situation is also exacerbating tensions between two of the world’s biggest nuclear powers. But this is just one more suppressed truth.

The Trump administration has carried out policies that, rather than serve Russian interests, have further antagonized our relationship with Moscow. It has imposed sanctions. It is openly attempting to overthrow the government of a country that Russia supports, Venezuela. It is attempting to block the sale of Russian natural gas to Europe. It has sold weapons to Ukraine, a foe of the Kremlin. It has armed insurgents in Syria and carried out airstrikes, even as Russian troops seek to prop up the Syrian regime. It has withdrawn from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty. But facts matter little to Russian-conspiracy theorists.

It is not only Trump who has obliterated the line between fact and fiction. It is the press. It hyped and reported allegations it never investigated or confirmed. And by doing this, repeating failures of the kind that appeared in its coverage of the invasion of Iraq, it has committed suicide. A nation that lacks a functioning press becomes a tyranny. This is not Trump’s fault, but our own.

Dems Grapple With Mueller’s Findings; GOP Exclaims ‘Move On’

WASHINGTON — Democrats grappled Monday with special counsel Robert Mueller’s findings, holding strategy sessions as Republicans gleefully called for them to “move on.” President Donald Trump accused those responsible for launching Mueller’s Russia probe of “treasonous things against our country” and said they “certainly will be looked into.”

Trump said the release of Mueller’s full report “wouldn’t bother me at all” as the Democrats clamored for the Justice Department to release the entire document and not just Sunday’s four-page summary from Attorney General William Barr.

Barr’s letter said Mueller did not find that Trump’s campaign “conspired or coordinated” with the Russian government to influence the 2016 presidential election — knocking down arguments from Democrats who have long claimed there was evidence of such collusion.

But Mueller reached no conclusion on whether Trump obstructed the federal investigation, according to Barr’s summary, instead setting out “evidence on both sides” of the question and stating that “while this report does not conclude the president committed a crime, it also does not exonerate him.” Absent a recommendation from Mueller, Barr stepped in and decided there wasn’t sufficient evidence to establish that the president obstructed justice.

Rep. David Cicilline, a Democratic member of the House Judiciary Committee, said he is among those “not willing to accept the Barr report as a substitute” for the special counsel’s findings. He said the Judiciary panel will make a formal request for Mueller’s report, with the expectation of a response from the Justice Department in “short order.” If one isn’t provided, he said, the committee will begin a subpoena process.

“People expect that this report be produced,” Cicilline said. “The longer we wait the worse it is for the American people.”

Trump, his spokesmen and leading congressional Republicans all claimed total vindication for the president anyway. Questioned by reporters, Trump said he welcomed Mueller’s results but complained he had been abused by the investigation occurring at all and taking too long.

“We can never let this happen to another president again,” he said. “There are a lot of people out there that have done some very evil things, very bad things, I would say treasonous things against our country.”

“Those people will certainly be looked at. I’ve been looking at them for a long time. And I’m saying why haven’t they been looked at. They lied to Congress. Many of them you know who they are.”

He didn’t name names, but Trump has spent months railing against former Justice Department officials, including former FBI Director James Comey, accusing them of an illegal witch hunt for the purpose of delegitimizing his presidency. He has also falsely claimed that the investigation was based on memos compiled by former British spy Christopher Steele, and even blamed former Sen. John McCain, who died last year, for passing the memos to the FBI.

The investigation began months before the FBI saw the dossier — and the FBI already had a copy by the time McCain turned it in.

On Monday, ahead of several strategy meetings, Democrats showed they will curtail some focus, at least, from their investigations of Trump and try to keep attention on their policy goals. The House intelligence panel postponed an open hearing with Felix Sater, a Russian-born former business adviser to Trump who helped him negotiate an ultimately unsuccessful deal for a Trump Tower in Moscow.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, meanwhile, was scheduled to hold a press conference Tuesday on health care legislation, Democrats’ top campaign issue.

Over the weekend, Democrats discussed strategy on the Russia investigation in a flurry of calls. Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer talked repeatedly, including several calls Sunday from her home in San Francisco. As soon as Barr’s letter arrived, Pelosi quickly convened a call Sunday with the Democratic chairmen of major House committees.

In a joint statement, Judiciary Committee chairman Jerrold Nadler, intelligence committee Chairman Adam Schiff and Oversight and Reform Committee chairman Elijah Cummings seemed to concede that collusion had not been found, saying they had confidence in Mueller, “notwithstanding the very public evidence of Trump campaign contact with and willingness to receive support from Russian agents.”

Still, they said, “it will be vital for the country and the Congress to evaluate the full body of evidence collected by the special counsel, including all information gathered of a counterintelligence nature.”

Monday on Capitol Hill, GOP lawmakers called for Congress to move on. “This is done with,” said House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy. “It is time for the country to move forward.”

At the same time, however, Republicans followed Trump’s lead in looking into how the investigation began. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham promised to “unpack the other side of the story” of the Russia investigation.

Graham, who spent the weekend with Trump in Florida, said his committee will probe the actions of the Justice Department. Still, he said the investigation was legitimate and had to happen in order to answer questions about Russian interference in the 2016 election.

The South Carolina Republican also had a warning for Trump using his pardon power to help those who were ensnared by Mueller’s investigation.

“If President Trump pardoned anybody in his orbit, it would not play well,” Graham said.

Among those whom Mueller charged during the course of his investigation were the president’s former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, and his first national security adviser, Michael Flynn. Five Trump aides pleaded guilty and a sixth, longtime confidant Roger Stone, is awaiting trial on charges that he lied to Congress and engaged in witness tampering.

Sunday evening, before most lawmakers had returned from a break, Pelosi and Schumer said in a joint statement, “The fact that Special Counsel Mueller’s report does not exonerate the president on a charge as serious as obstruction of justice demonstrates how urgent it is that the full report and underlying documentation be made public without any further delay.”

Democrats seem more likely to focus on their multiple investigations of the president, calls for transparency and frustrations with Barr rather than engaging in the talk of impeachment that has been amplified on Pelosi’s left flank. As the release of Mueller’s report loomed, she recently tried to scuttle that talk by saying she’s not for impeachment, for now.

But Mueller’s report hasn’t dissuaded some of Trump’s fiercest critics among the new Democratic lawmakers who helped flip the House from Republican control. By the end of the month, Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., is still planning to introduce her resolution calling for the Judiciary Committee to investigate grounds for Trump’s impeachment.

___

Associated Press writers Catherine Lucey, Jill Colvin, Alan Fram, Mike Balsamo and Lisa Mascaro contributed to this report.

Sandy Hook and Parkland Grieve Once Again, Following Three Suicides

Monday morning, Jeremy Richman, the father of one of the 20 first graders killed at Sandy Hook Elementary School in 2012, was found dead in an apparent suicide, according to Newtown, Conn., police. His death was the third suspected suicide in a week in which the victims were connected to a mass school shooting.

“He was a brokenhearted person, as we all are,” Neil Heslin, whose own son, Jesse, was killed at Sandy Hook, told the Hartford Courant. He added that the grief from losing a child never fully leaves.

Richman became a fierce advocate for mental health care following his daughter’s death, establishing a foundation in her name, committed to “exploring the underpinnings of the brain that lead to violent behaviors,” according to the Avielle Foundation’s website. Just weeks after his daughter’s murder he was at the Connecticut state legislature calling on elected officials to fix what he believed is a broken system for addressing mental health in America. He said, according to the Courant, “We must act to ensure this doesn’t happen again.”

Richman’s body was found at Edmond Town Hall, where the Avielle Foundation has office space. Many of the officers who responded at the scene were among those who responded to the shooting at Sandy Hook, Lt. Aaron Bahamonde of the Newtown Police Department told The New York Times. “This is devastating to our community. I can’t stress that enough,” he said.

In addition to his advocacy work running the Avielle Foundation, Richman and his wife, Jennifer Hensel, were one of the families that sued Alex Jones, of the radio show and website Infowars, who claimed the shooting was a hoax.

The lawsuit alleges that Jones promoted “abusive and outrageous false statements in which Jones and the other defendants have developed, amplified and perpetuated claims that the Sandy Hook massacre was staged and that the 26 families who lost loved ones that day are paid actors who faked their relatives’ deaths.”

Just last week, Richman spoke at Florida Atlantic University’s 2019 Violence Summit, and, according to the Courant, worked with Sandy Hook Promise, another organization founded after the shooting to combat gun violence.

“He had such a clear purpose of what he wanted to do to honor his daughter,” a family member of a Sandy Hook victim who requested anonymity, told the Courant.

Richman’s death comes just after Parkland, Fla., residents are once again grieving, this time following two apparent suicides of two students of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High, the site of a horrific school shooting in 2018.

One student apparently took his own life on Saturday. He is a minor, and according to The New York Times, his name has not yet been released. Sydney Aiello, 19, committed suicide last weekend. Her mother, Cara, told a local CBS affiliate that her daughter had received a diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder, and was struggling with survivors’ guilt following the shooting, in which one of her closest friends, Meadow Pollack, was killed.

The pain from both incidents are certain to reverberate for a long time. “Mental health professionals have told us the impact of Sandy Hook, you’re not gonna see the full impact of that incident until years later,” police Chief James Viadero told the Courant.

Ryan Petty, whose daughter Alaina died at Parkland, told the Times, regarding the suicides, “What we feared could happen is happening.”

He alluded to the two post-Parkland suicides in a Twitter post Saturday night, writing, 17+2 (in reference to the 17 Parkland deaths) accompanied by a broken heart emoji.

If you or a loved one are having suicidal thoughts, please call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 (TALK). Additional resources are available at SpeakingOfSuicide.com/resources.