Chris Hedges's Blog, page 45

Feds Plan to Move Epstein Warden to Prison Leadership Job

WASHINGTON—The warden in charge when Jeffrey Epstein ended his life in his jail cell is being moved to a leadership position at another federal correctional facility, putting him back in the field with inmates despite an ongoing investigation into the financier’s death, two people familiar with the matter told The Associated Press.

The agency is planning to move Lamine N’Diaye to the role at FCI Fort Dix, a low-security prison in Burlington County, New Jersey, the people said. The move comes months after Attorney General William Barr ordered N’Diaye be reassigned to a desk post at the Bureau of Prisons’ regional office in Pennsylvania after Epstein’s death as the FBI and the Justice Department’s inspector general investigated.

One of the people said the agency planned to move N’Diaye into the new role on Feb. 2. The people spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity to discuss an internal personnel matter.

Related Articles


[image error]







The Jeffrey Epstein Scandal Is Much Bigger Than Jeffrey Epstein



by








[image error]







Confounding New Details Emerge in Epstein Case



by








[image error]







Video of Jeffrey Epstein's Suicide Attempt Is Lost, Attorneys Say



by

It was unclear why the agency was planning to return N’Diaye to a position supervising inmates and staff members, even though multiple investigations into Epstein’s death remain active. The inspector general’s investigation is continuing, and the Justice Department is still probing the circumstances that led to Epstein’s death, including why he wasn’t given a cellmate.

Epstein took his own life in August while awaiting trial on charges he sexually abused girls as young as 14 and young women in New York and Florida in the early 2000s.

Epstein’s suicide cast a spotlight on the federal Bureau of Prisons and highlighted a series of safety lapses inside a high-security unit of one of the most secure jails in America. Barr said Epstein’s ability to take his own life in federal custody had raised “serious questions that must be answered.” He said in an interview with the AP in November that the investigation revealed a “series” of mistakes made that gave Epstein the chance to take his own life and that his suicide was the result of “a perfect storm of screw-ups.”

Two guards responsible for watching Epstein have pleaded not guilty to charges alleging they lied on prison records to make it seem as though they had checked on Epstein, as required, before his death. Instead, investigators say they appeared to sleep for two hours and had been browsing the internet — shopping for furniture and motorcycles — instead of watching Epstein, who was supposed to be checked on every 30 minutes.

The attorney general also removed the agency’s acting director in the wake of Epstein’s death and named Kathleen Hawk Sawyer, the prison agency’s director from 1992 until 2003, to replace him.

Since Epstein’s death and N’Diaye’s removal as warden, the Manhattan jail has had two interim leaders. The newest warden, M. Licon-Vitale, used to oversee a federal prison in Danbury, Connecticut. Her first big order of business has been to deal with jailed lawyer Michael Avenatti’s complaints about his treatment at the lockup.

The Bureau of Prisons has been plagued for years by chronic violence, extensive staffing shortages and serious misconduct.

___

Sisak reported from New York.

Pakistan Is Cleaning Up Trump’s Mideast Mess

The Middle East has always been a difficult region for the West, especially for the United States. During the Cold War era, America’s efforts to establish its hold over the region’s key oil-producing countries backfired, resulting in anger and resentment in those countries. Be it the CIA-backed coup to overthrow the Mossadegh government in Iran for nationalizing the oil industry in 1953 or Charlie Wilson’s war to oust the Soviets from Afghanistan in the 1980s, the results have been devastating for the U.S. The repercussions from these American campaigns continue to resonate even today in Afghanistan and Iran. Are the two connected in any way?

Afghanistan has been the theater of America’s longest war—19 years of violent fighting have claimed the lives of 2,400 American soldiers—and the end is still uncertain. There have been as many ups and downs in the peace process as there were in the war when it was launched just two months after 9/11 in 2001. Few in the U.S. recall that what has happened in Afghanistan in this century was in reality an offshoot of Zbigniew Brzezinski’s strategy of making Afghanistan the “Soviet Vietnam.” The Taliban of today are the mujahedeen of yesterday, who were trained and armed by the CIA, along with Pakistan’s spy agency, the ISI.

The negotiations between the Americans and the Afghan Taliban that opened in August 2018 have followed a tedious, off-again-on-again course. Facilitated by a Pakistan under tremendous economic pressure and under threats of sanctions, the talks in Doha, Qatar, were expected to bring peace tidings and lead to the withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan. Instead, they ended in September 2019 with a presidential tweet from the White House calling off both the talks and a previously unannounced summit that was to take place at Camp David between the Taliban leadership and Donald Trump. The reason Trump gave at the time was that the Taliban had killed an American soldier, but as Trump is known to be whimsical, it was impossible to determine for sure what had offended him.

Related Articles


[image error]







Trump Leaves Afghanistan and Pakistan at His Mercy



by Zubeida Mustafa








[image error]







U.S.-Pakistan Relations on a Razor's Edge



by Zubeida Mustafa








[image error]







Trump's Ignorance Touches Off a New Crisis in Kashmir



by Zubeida Mustafa

As unexpectedly as the negotiations had been called off, they have since been pushed back on track. Why? Anyone’s guess. Trump made a sudden unannounced dash to Kabul on Thanksgiving Day and let it be known that the stalled Doha talks would be restarted—and they were, a week later.

This time, the move has been a quieter one, and it appears the U.S. has moderated its stance somewhat to ensure positive results. For instance, the emphasis is no longer now so much on a ceasefire in Afghanistan as on the lowering of violence. Still, intra-Afghan talks will ultimately have to be held so that a political agreement is reached among various Afghan groups as well as between the government in Kabul and the Taliban. How these complexities will be resolved is not clear. The post-election standoff between Ashraf Ghani and Abdullah Abdullah is another complicating factor.

Meanwhile, Pakistan has played its cards well. It has kept itself aloof from all the parties entangled in the war while nudging them toward the negotiating table. Even Trump is pleased with Pakistan, which he had characterized as a liar and a cheat. He declared Tuesday, during his trip to Davos, Switzerland, for the World Economic Forum summit, that the U.S. and Pakistan are getting along very well, and that the two have never been closer.

What has endeared Pakistan so suddenly to the U.S.? The fact is that the crisis in Iran earlier this month has shaken Washington, and again Pakistan emerged as the mature and sensible state in the region looking to smooth ruffled feathers. The provocative element was Trump, who proved to be the bull in the china shop. First, he ordered the Jan. 3 assassination of Iranian’s star general, Qassem Soleimani, creating a huge reaction in Tehran. The Trump administration accused Gen. Soleimani of planning attacks on U.S. embassies, but no evidence of this plot has been produced. Gen. Soleimani was struck by a missile while on a visit to Baghdad. Iran reacted by firing missiles at an American base in Baghdad.

Violence could have spiraled out of control had sanity not prevailed. Iran pulled out of the nuclear treaty that it had signed with the P5+1—that is, the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council plus Germany. One of former President Obama’s top diplomatic achievements in 2015, the nuclear agreement had led to the lifting of sanctions against Iran and brought a measure of stability to the region. Enter Trump, who pulled the U.S. out of the pact in 2018 and reimposed sanctions on Iran. The Middle East is back to square one.

The two powers locked in this test of strength mercifully pulled back from the brink. We may not know for some time what transpired behind the scenes. But when Pakistan’s Foreign Minister, Shah Mahmood Qureshi, dashed off to Tehran and thereafter to Washington, this was on display for the world to see. Pakistan has maintained a longstanding relationship with Iran. The two countries have helped each other in times of need, and history, culture and economic ties have sustained strong bonds between them.

Is it, then, surprising that Trump made a U-turn at Davos and had such warm words to say about Pakistan’s friendship with the U.S.? One can expect Islamabad to demand a price—and voices have been raised to that effect. Pakistan’s Qureshi has already made it clear that when the U.S. withdraws from Afghanistan, it must leave a token presence in that country so that Pakistan is not sucked into the vacuum that is created, as happened in 1988 when the Soviets withdrew from Afghanistan.

A senator has suggested that the government should demand a quid pro quo for its diplomacy in averting further bloodletting in the region. This should be in the form of assistance in getting Pakistan out of the grey zone in which the Financial Action Task Force has categorized it. Prime Minister Khan requested Trump to help in this matter, which he apparently did. At the FATF meeting in Beijing, Pakistan escaped being pushed into the black list as it had been feared.

For Pakistan, the biggest achievement stemming from the latest meeting between Trump and Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan was Trump’s promise to address the Kashmir issue that has left India in turmoil and cast its shadow on Pakistan as well.

Opioid Victims Can Now File Claims Against Purdue Pharma

State and local governments have been leading the legal fight against the opioid industry, seeking payouts to help them deal with the fallout from the nation’s addiction crisis. Average Americans are about to get their shot.

On Friday, the federal judge overseeing the bankruptcy case of Purdue Pharma set a June 30 deadline to file a claim against the company. That includes governments, entities such as hospitals and, for the first time, individuals who have personal injury claims.

It’s not clear how much money might be at stake. Purdue reached an agreement with some states and local governments that could be worth more than $10 billion over time as part of its bankruptcy filing. But Judge Robert Drain emphasized during the hearing in White Plains, New York, that no final settlement is in place.

Related Articles


[image error]







Big Pharma Is Literally Poisoning Us



by








[image error]







Doctors Prescribe More of a Drug if Big Pharma Pays Them



by








[image error]







Ralph Nader: Big Pharma Must Be Stopped



by

Once a settlement and restructuring deal for Purdue is approved, the next step will be deciding how to divide the company’s assets. There is no guarantee those who became addicted to opioids or their families would receive any money, and the judged emphasized that the claims would be open only to people who believe they were harmed by Purdue’s products, not opioids generally. Still, lawyers for plaintiffs say people should file claims even if they’re not sure Purdue’s drugs were involved in their injuries.

Dede Yoder of Norwalk, Connecticut, is among those who plan to file. Her son, Christopher, was prescribed a 30-day supply of painkillers, including OxyContin, during a series of surgeries when he was 13 and 14 years old.

He died in 2017 at age 21 of a heroin overdose after years of rehab and relapses. His mother is now on a committee of victims seeking input in the process.

“I spent my whole retirement. I probably spent almost $200,000 on rehab and doctors,” she said. “I would like to get my retirement back; I’m not looking for this huge payoff.”

In bankruptcy proceedings, notices for claim deadlines are usually made in ads in publications or in letters mailed to people who might be eligible to file. Purdue’s case is different because so many people might be able to assert legal damages against the company.

Prescription and illicit opioids have been linked to more than 400,000 deaths in the U.S. since 2000. Perhaps millions of other people have struggled with addiction to them, and an estimated 500,000 children were born in opioid withdrawal.

Purdue, a privately held company based in Stamford, Connecticut, plans to spend $23.8 million to advertise the claim-filing deadline, an unusually large amount to notify potential creditors in a bankruptcy case.

The ad campaign is intended to reach 95% of U.S. adults, with ads in newspapers, movie theaters and on Facebook. Billboards will promote the deadline in four hard-hit states: Alabama, Kentucky, Tennessee and West Virginia. The budget also includes hiring a public relations firm to encourage news outlets to report on the deadline and the website to file claims.

The publicity push also is getting help from victims themselves.

Another member of the victims’ committee, 33-year-old Garrett Hade, said he has been sober for nearly five years after a long odyssey through addiction that began with OxyContin when he was a teenager in Florida. He said he would donate any money he receives from Purdue.

Now, as an organizer with the Recovery Advocacy Project, he said he’s telling people that they will be able to make claims.

“People need to know that as a person there is some recourse out there,” said Hade, who now lives in Las Vegas.

Also on Friday, the bankruptcy judge said he would allow Purdue CEO Craig Landau to collect a bonus this year up to $1.3 million, on top of his $2.6 million salary. Landau had previously agreed to reduce his bonus to that amount and delay it. A group of states continued to object to the bonus.

Trump Attends Anti-Choice Rally in D.C.

WASHINGTON—President Donald Trump called it his “profound honor” on Friday to be the first president to attend the annual anti-abortion gathering in Washington called the March for Life.

He used his speech to attack Democrats as embracing “radical and extreme positions” on abortion and praised those attending the event, saying they were motivated by “pure, unselfish love.” He also recited actions he’s taken as president that were sought by social conservatives, including the confirmation of 187 federal judges.

“Unborn children have never had a stronger defender in the White House,” he declared.

Related Articles


[image error]







The Dark Truth Behind Anti-Abortion Laws



by










Would Overturning Abortion Rights Turn Back Clock to 1973?



by








[image error]







Abortion Bans Are Backfiring Spectacularly Across the U.S.



by

Trump once declared in a 1999 interview that “I am pro-choice in every respect.” Now, as he heads into the 2020 election, Trump continues to reach out to the white evangelical voters who have proven to be among his most loyal backers.

“Every life brings love into this world. Every child brings joy to a family. Every person is worth protecting,” Trump said, prompting loud cheers from the many thousands attending the march.

Trump is counting on the support of his base of conservative activists to help bring him across the finish line.

“I think it’s a brilliant move,” said Ralph Reed, chair of the Faith and Freedom Coalition and one of Trump’s most prominent evangelical supporters. Reed said the president’s appearance would “energize and remind pro-life voters what a great friend this president and administration has been.”

It also shows how much times have changed.

Past presidents who opposed abortion, including Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush, steered clear of personally attending the march to avoid being too closely associated with demonstrators eager to outlaw the procedure. They sent remarks for others to deliver, spoke via telephone hookup or invited organizers to visit the White House.

Over the last 10 years, however, the Republican Party has undergone a “revolution,” displaying a new willingness to “embrace the issue as not only being morally right but politically smart,” said Mallory Quigley, a spokeswoman for the Susan B. Anthony List and Women Speak Out PAC. The group is planning to spend $52 million this cycle to help elect candidates opposed to abortion rights. Its president, Marjorie Dannenfelser, will serve as national co-chair of a new campaign coalition, “Pro-life Voices for Trump.”

According to Pew Research Center polling in 2019, roughly 6 in 10 Americans said abortion should be legal in all or most cases. Over time, though, both the Republican and Democratic parties have taken harder-line positions for and against abortion rights.

“There used to be a middle in this country and candidates would not want to alienate the middle,” said Ari Fleischer, who served as White House press secretary under President George W. Bush. “And it just seems that that is over and that both parties play to their bases to get maximum turnout from their base.”

During his first three years in office, Trump has embraced socially conservative policies, particularly on the issue of abortion. He’s appointing judges who oppose abortion, cutting taxpayer funding for abortion services and painting Democrats who support abortion rights as extreme in their views.

“President Trump has done more for the pro-life community than any other president, so it is fitting that he would be the first president in history to attend the March for Life on the National Mall,” said White House spokesman Judd Deere.

This is not the first time Trump has given serious consideration to an appearance. Last year, he wanted to go and came close to attending, according to a person familiar with the discussions who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal planning. But the trip never came together because of concerns about security so Trump joined the event via video satellite from the White House Rose Garden instead.

Trump’s thinking on the matter was simple: If he supported the cause, “why wouldn’t he show up to their big event?” said Matt Schlapp, chair of the American Conservative Union and a close ally of the White House. He said the appearance would be deeply significant for those in participants.

“I’ve had people be moved to tears over the fact that he’s going,” said Schlapp. “It’s a big deal.”

During his video address last year, Trump sent a clear message to the thousands of people braving the cold on the National Mall. “As president, I will always defend the first right in our Declaration of Independence, the right to life,” he said.

The rhetoric underscored Trump’s dramatic evolution on the issue from his days as a freewheeling New York deal-maker, when he described himself as “very pro-choice” in a 1999 interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

During his 2016 campaign for the Republican nomination, Trump said his views had changed and that he was now opposed to abortion, but for three exceptions: In the case of rape, incest and when the life of the mother is at risk.

Yet Trump’s unfamiliarity with the language of abortion activism was clear, including when he offered a bungled response during a televised town hall and was forced to clarify his position on abortion three times in a single day.

Asked, hypothetically, what would happen if abortion were outlawed, Trump said there would have to “be some form of punishment” for women who have them, prompting a backlash that managed to unite abortion rights activists and opponents, including organizers of the March for Life.

Asked to clarify his position, Trump’s campaign initially issued a statement saying he believed the issue should rest with state governments. He later issued a second statement that said doctors, not women, should be punished for illegal abortions.

Critics, for their part, accuse Trump of using the march to try to distract from his impeachment trial in the Senate.

Ilyse Hogue, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, called it “an act of desperation, plain and simple.” Alexis McGill Johnson, acting president of the Planned Parenthood Action Fund, accused Trump of carrying out “a full-out assault on our health and our rights.”

Views of abortion have remained relatively stable over two decades of polling, and it’s a minority of Americans who hold extreme opinions — that abortion should be legal or illegal in all cases. But polling does suggest a widening partisan gap on the question of support for abortion rights in all or most cases, along with some movement on both sides of the aisle further into their extreme positions.

The first march took place on the west steps of the Capitol in January 1974, the year after the Supreme Court decided Roe v. Wade, the landmark ruling that established a woman’s legal right to abortion.

___

Associated Press writer Hannah Fingerhut contributed to this report from Washington.

An Open Letter to the Green Party for 2020

As the 2020 presidential election approaches the Green Party faces the challenge of settling on a platform, choosing a candidate for president, and deciding its campaign strategy. In that context, Howie Hawkins, a contender for Green Party presidential candidate, recently published a clear and cogent essay titled “The Green Party Is Not the Democrats’ Problem.” It represents a precedent Green Party stance which may guide Green campaign policy. We agree with much, but find some ideas very troubling.

The stance offered in Hawkins’ article says “the assertion that the Green Party spoiled the 2000 and 2016 elections is a shallow explanation for the Democrats’ losses;” that in 2000, “the Supreme Court…stopped the Florida recount;” that many factors “elected Trump in 2016…including black voter suppression, Comey publicly reopening the Clinton email case a week before the election, $6 billion of free publicity for Trump from the commercial media, and a Clinton campaign that failed to get enough of its Democratic base out;” that the Electoral College “gave the presidency to the loser of the popular vote;” that most Greens are “furious” at a Democratic party “that joins with Republicans to support domestic austerity and a bloated military budget and endless wars;” “that the Green Party’s Green New Deal science-based timeline, would put the country on a World War II scale emergency footing to transform the economy to zero greenhouse gas emissions and 100% clean energy by 2030;” and that “the Green Party want(s) to eliminate poverty and radically reduce inequality“ including a job guarantee, a guaranteed income above poverty, affordable housing, improved Medicare for all, lifelong public education from pre-K through college, and a secure retirement;” and finally that the Green Party strategy “is to build the party from the bottom up by electing thousands to municipal and county offices, state legislatures, and soon the House as we go into the 2020s.”

We agree that many factors led to Democratic Party losses and that the Supreme Court was a big one as was the Electoral College, and we too are furious at Democrats joining Republicans in so many violations of justice and peace. Likewise, we admire the Greens’ Green New Deal and economic justice commitments, and also support a grassroots, local office approach to winning electoral gains.

Related Articles


[image error]







Democratic Party Loyalty Has Always Been a Scam



by Conor Lynch








[image error]







How America Broke Up With the Democratic Party



by








[image error]







A New Year's Resolution For Democrats



by

So with all that agreement, why are we sending a critical open letter?

The stance the article presents, which may guide the Green campaign for president, says, “To hold all other factors (contributing to recent Presidential victories) constant and focus on the Green Party as the deciding factor is a hypothetical that is a logical fallacy because it assumes away a factual reality: the Green Party is here to stay.” However, our finding Green policy a factor in Republican victories in no way suggests that the Green Party should disappear. And our focus on factors within our reach to easily correct (for example, the Green Party role in contested states) is in fact sensible.

The stance also says “the Green Party is not why the Democrats lost to Bush and Trump,” but even if true, that wouldn’t demonstrate it won’t be why this time. In any case, let’s take Trump and Clinton, and see how Green Party policy mattered.

If Clinton got Jill Stein’s Green votes in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan, Clinton would have won the election. Thus, the Green Party’s decision to run in those states, saying even that there was little or no difference between Trump and Clinton, seems to us to be a factor worthy of being removed from contested state dynamics, just like the Electoral College is a factor worthy of being removed across all states.

We realize many and perhaps most Greens will respond that if those who voted for Stein in contested states in 2016 hadn’t done so, they would have abstained. We don’t know how anyone could know that, but for the sake of argument we will suppose it is correct.

Still, if these voters who preferred Stein did indeed erroneously believe that there was no difference between Trump and Clinton, surely to some degree that was a result of Stein refusing to acknowledge the special danger of Trump, and insisting that while it would be bad if Trump won it would also be bad if Clinton won, and refusing to state any preference.

Similarly, if these Stein voters did indeed erroneously believe that no harm could come from casting a vote for Stein in a close state in a close election, that also to some degree was surely a result of Green campaigning insisting that Green voters bore no responsibility for the 2000 election result.

And finally, if these voters did indeed erroneously believe that it was immoral to contaminate themselves by voting for Clinton or for a Democrat, surely in part that too was encouraged by Green campaigning that treated voting as a feel-good activity (“vote your hopes, not your fears”) as if fear of climate disaster, for example, shouldn’t be a motivator for political action.

The stance says, “The Green Party is not going back to the ‘safe states strategy’ that a faction of it attempted in 2004.” This means they will not forgo running in contested states where Green votes could swing the outcome as happened in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan in 2016, and they will not run in only 40 safe states where the outcome will be a foregone conclusion.

But why reject a safe states strategy?

Like Stein in 2016, some might claim doing so can’t help Trump win again or, in any case, that Trump’s re-election would not matter all that much. “He isn’t that much worse.”

We write in hopes that no one in 2020 will rationalize campaign actions by making such irresponsible and patently false claims.

And, indeed, in his recent essay, Hawkins instead claimed a safe states strategy “couldn’t even be carried out. It alienated Greens in swing states who were working so hard to overcome onerous petitioning requirements to get the party on the ballot. Keeping the party on the ballot for the next election cycle for their local candidates depended on the Green presidential vote in many states. It became clear that safe states was dispiriting and demoralizing because the party didn’t take itself seriously enough to justify its existence independent of the Democrats. Few people, even in the safe states, wanted to waste their vote for a Green ticket that was more concerned with electing the Democratic ticket than advancing its own demands.”

This claims there is a price the Green Party has to pay for a safe states strategy. Okay, let’s take that as gospel. Where is an argument that this price is so great that avoiding it outweighs the price everyone, including Greens, will pay for re-electing Trump?

We have no way to assess the claim that Greens would find it dispiriting to remove themselves as a factor that might abet global catastrophe via a Trump re-election. But wouldn’t Trump out of office much less Sanders or Warren in office not only benefit all humanity and a good part of the biosphere to boot, but also the Green Party? For that matter, weren’t more potential Green Party members and voters driven off by the party’s dismissal of the dangers of Trump than were inspired by it? Which grew more in the last four years, DSA or the Greens?

And weren’t the Greens in the late ’80s and early ’90s winning elections to city councils and other local offices across the country, consistent with a grass roots strategy, though for much of the past 20 years, they’ve largely abandoned local and state contests, devoting nearly all their attention to increasingly harmful races for president? Hawkins’ own exemplary races for Senate and Governor in New York state, and especially the Greens’ successful mayoral races in politically important places like Richmond, CA, as well as less visible ones like New Paltz, NY, were exceptions, but how many Greens have used their hard-won ballot access to run for Congress or state legislature? Might the massive focus on presidential elections mark a decline in prospects for the localist strategy, not an advance for it?

We are told, “Greens want to get Trump out as much as anybody” but how can that be if Greens would vote for a Green candidate, and not for Sanders, Warren, or any Democrat in a contested state knowing that doing so could mean Trump’s victory?

If during the 2020 election campaign, the Green candidate campaigns in contested states knowing that he or she might be winning votes that would otherwise have gone to Sanders or to Warren or whoever, causing Trump to win the state and win the electoral college, how could that possibly evidence wanting Trump to lose as much as anyone?

Indeed, if a Green candidate weren’t telling everyone who was a potential Green voter to vote for Trump’s opponent in contested states, how could that evidence that Greens want Trump to lose as much as anyone?

Let us put our question another way. It is election night 2020. The vote tallies are in. Which way would the 2020 Green candidate feel better? Trump wins and the Green candidate gets 250,000 votes across the contested states, more than enough for Sanders, Warren, or whoever to have won? Or, Trump loses and the Green candidate gets no votes in the contested states, but a bunch extra in other states as a result of having more time for campaigning there?

Greens tell Democrats “to stop worrying about the Green Party and focus on getting your own base out.” We agree on the importance of Democrats getting their base out, starting with nominating Sanders, or, at worst, Warren. But how does that warrant the Green Party risking contributing to Trump winning?

The stance asks, “So why are we running a presidential ticket in 2020 if our strategy is to build the party from the bottom up?” The stance answers, “Because Greens need ballot lines to run local candidates. Securing ballot lines for the next election cycle is affected by the petition signatures and/or votes for our presidential ticket in 40 of the states.”

Greens will pay a price for not running in contested states. Our advice to Greens would be to notice the infinitely bigger price that millions and even billions of people will pay for Trump winning.

The stance says “Greens don’t spoil elections. We improve them. We advance solutions that otherwise won’t get raised. We are running out of time on the climate crisis, inequality, and nuclear weapons. Greens will be damned if we wait for the Democrats. Real solutions can’t wait.”

But real solutions require Trump out of office. Real solutions will become far more probable with Sanders or Warren in office. Real solutions will become somewhat more probable even with the likes of Biden in office.

To conclude, is a Green candidate running for President after the summer really going to argue we shouldn’t vote for Sanders in contested states not just to end Trumpism but also to enact all kinds of important changes including urging and facilitating grass roots activism and thereby advancing Green program?

We offer this open letter in hopes of prodding discussion of the issues raised.

Progressives Want to Beat More Than Just Trump

What follows is a conversation between the Working Family Party’s Maurice Mitchell, activist Jennifer Epps-Addison and Jaisal Noor of The Real News Network. Read a transcript of their conversation below or watch the video at the bottom of the post.

Jaisal Noor: Welcome to The Real News. I’m Jaisal Noor. The race for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination is heating up, and the media has highlighted a recent clash between front runners, Senator Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren.

Newscaster: Tempers were hot in the moments after Tuesday’s Democratic Presidential Debate, and so were the mics.

Related Articles


[image error]







Corporate Media Hates Progressives as Much as It Loves Capitalism



by








[image error]







Who Deserves to Be Called a Progressive?



by Conor Lynch








[image error]







The Progressive's Guide to Corporate-Democrat Speak



by

Senator Warren: I think you called me a liar on national TV.

Senator Sanders: You think I did what?

Senator Warren: I think you called me a liar on national TV.

Senator Sanders: Let’s not do it right now. You want to have that discussion, we’ll have that discussion.

Senator Warren: Any time.

Senator Sanders: You called me a liar. You told me… All right, let’s not do it.

Anderson Cooper: Probably the most talked-about moment at last night’s Democratic Debate.

Candidate: You know, other candidates, particularly the moderate ones, may stand to benefit from the more swiping back and forth that goes on, on the left.

Jaisal Noor: But progressive groups say they want supporters of both candidates to focus on the greater threats like defeating corporate Democrats who oppose policies like the Green New Deal, Medicare for All, and taxing the wealthy to pay for it.

Speaker 6: My plan gives everybody access to Medicare. Others say it’s Medicare for All or nothing. I approved this message to say the choice should be yours.

Joe Biden: I believe we have to protect and build on Obamacare. That’s why I proposed adding a public option to Obamacare as the best way to lower costs and cover everyone.

Speaker 7: There’s an America waiting to be rebuilt, where everyone without health insurance is guaranteed to get it, and everyone who likes theirs can go ahead and keep it.

Jaisal Noor: These groups, who have also been fighting the far right policies of Donald Trump, argue either Warren or Sanders would be the party’s best choice to defeat him.

Well, now joining us to discuss this, are two guests. Maurice Mitchell is the National Director of the Working Families Party, a national organization that’s building parties in 15 States. His organization has endorsed Senator Warren. And we have Jennifer Epps Addison, Co-Executive Director of the Center for Popular Democracy Action, a coalition of groups in 34 states, Puerto Rico, and DC with hundreds of thousands of members. And they have endorsed Senator Sanders. Thank you both for joining us.

I’ve heard a lot of concern recently about whether this recent fight, which the mainstream media has really focused on, between Warren and Sanders could have lasting damage in the progressive movement. Maurice, you coauthored a recent article in Buzzfeed arguing that progressives should focus on defeating corporate Democrats. You’re not saying that progressives shouldn’t argue, but you’re saying let’s stick to policy disagreements and focus on defeating Mayor Pete or Biden or Bloomberg, who’s spent 115 million at least so far on this race. Tell us why you wrote that piece.

Maurice Mitchell: Sure. Well, and also it’s a pleasure to be here. I wrote that piece because it’s pretty clear to us that progressives need to keep our eyes on the prize, that the progressive wind of the electorate is growing, and it’s growing because both Bernie and Elizabeth Warren are in this fight. We think that’s a good thing for our movement. And as somebody who’s building a movement organization that endorses candidates, we put the movement first, and we understand that the movement is what ultimately allows us to have the changes that we’ve seen all throughout the trajectory of this country’s several hundred years. It’s been movements, it’s been people on the ground that have done that.

And presidential candidates have used the opportunity that movements have created in order to do that. Right now we have two movement candidates that are talking about big progressive change, and it only benefits our movements if we focus on the corporate wing of the Democrats, discrediting their failed policies and lift up big progressive change.

Jaisal Noor: So Jen, your colleague coauthored that piece with Maurice. And again, you’re not arguing, let’s not have fights within the progressive movement, let’s not debate, because Sanders and Warren are not the same. To be clear, you’re not saying we shouldn’t have those arguments, and I hope to maybe host a debate with both of you soon to hash that out. But can you elaborate on that? Why is it important that we still have disagreements within the progressive movement?

Jennifer Epps-Addison: Yeah, I mean, first of all, great to be here with my good friend and colleague Maurice, who is the leader of my political home, the Working Families Party.

I think people have to understand what is at stake in this moment. We are not just looking to go back to the status quo that has failed so many people in this country, from the working class to black and brown communities to we’re all in geographically isolated communities. We are looking to build a country in which we all have the freedom to thrive, and we believe that right now there is a moment for the left to ascend to build a country where we don’t put profits of a small handful of individuals and corporations over the health and wellbeing and the lives of our people.

The only candidates who are offering that type of vision for our country are the two Progressive’s that are left in the race. And so we believe that what benefits us all as does the Working Families Party is for those progressive based on our ideals to go out there and build the broadest, biggest coalitions that they can. So when it comes time, we can defeat the corporate Democrats and defeat Trump and Trumpism once and for all.

Jaisal Noor: And so some have argued that there would actually be an upside to having two Progressive’s in the primary, deep into the primary race, which is very different than 2016. Maurice let’s start with you. Because the downsides are easy. To think about the downsides because the downsides are, is that they’re going to keep clashing with each other and they’re going to be going for each other supporters. What’s your response?

Maurice Mitchell: What we know is that there are millions of people who is still trying to make up their mind. In all of the polls that we’ve seen, we’ve seen significant percentages of people that still have yet to make up their mind. That’s still true in the early primary states. And we think it’s important that the Progressives engage those people and bring them onto the Progressive tent before they’re influenced by the Centrist. And so we think there’s a lot of people to pick up and having two candidates running grassroots campaigns that are focusing on organizing allows that to happen.

Both of these candidates are lifting up Progressive values and doing it in different ways and have different appeals. So we feel like that just grows the tent in bigger ways. And they’re building, each of them are building grassroots armies and coalitions that are distinct. And we think that that’s a good thing.

The other thing I will say is that unity does not mean uniformity. And so I think it’s great that we could argue about not whether or not health care is a right or a commodity, but what is the path to Medicare for All. Right? I think it’s great that we’re arguing, not the idea that we need to take corporate money out of politics, but how we do that. And so when you have multiple Progressive’s in the race, we could actually challenge ourselves to achieve the greatest outcomes but actually settled the debate on these fundamental questions about whether or not the economy and the democracy should work for everyday people.

Jaisal Noor: And Jen, I wanted you to respond to that as well.

Jennifer Epps-Addison: Yeah, I mean I think the biggest risk we have in our strategy is that somehow the disagreements and the sort of strategy and policy differences end up poisoning the well for either of our two preferred candidates to move forward. What we are trying to communicate to our membership, to our base in certainly with our presence online is that we cannot do ourselves a disservice here to say that is our candidate or the only candidate. We have to actually see ourselves in struggle and in unity with folks who have made a different strategic choice on which candidates to support in the primary. Because at the end of the day when we get down to those final states, when we get down to convention, we are going to need each other supporters in order to defeat the corporate wing.

And just to be clear, when we say the corporate wing, we are talking about folks who are taking money from pharmaceutical companies and from wall street who crashed our economy. One of the reasons why black wealth has all but disappeared. The limited amount that we had been able to build has all but disappeared in the last decade. And we’re talking about people who are taking money from the fossil fuel industry as well, sitting there and pretending that they value the principles in the Green New Deal.

We must defeat that because, Democrats, we are a big tent coalition in terms of the elected representatives we have, but when you actually poll us on these issues, when you ask folks, do they want to make sure everybody in this country has health care? When you ask folks, do they want a humane immigration system that treats people as people and not as criminals? When you ask people, do they want to reform our criminal justice system? Are they tired of seeing black bodies slain by the police in this country? The answers to those questions are uniformly yes for people who identify as Democrats and then for a lot of people who have been disillusioned in this political process, who people like Senator Warren and Senator Sanders are welcoming back in.

Jaisal Noor: So Hillary Clinton made headlines this week by saying in an interview based on a documentary she’s in, nobody likes him, Bernie Sanders, called him a career politician and also said, she didn’t commit to backing him in the primary, which she later walked back on Twitter, a short time afterwards, but I wanted to use those recent comments to set up a clip of a freshman congressperson Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York. She was in conversation with Ta-Nehisi Coates, famed author and journalist at Riverside’s Church on Monday. This is a bit of what she said.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez: We don’t have a left party in the United States. Democratic Party is not a left party. The Democratic Party is a center or center conservative party. We do not advocate for, we do not… We can’t even get a floor vote on Medicare for All, not even a floor vote that gets voted down. We can’t even get a vote on it. So this is not a left party. There are left members inside the Democratic Party that are working to try to make that shift happen.

Jaisal Noor: So final question, we’re almost out of time, Maurice. How important is it going to be to wage this fight, not only on the presidential level, but throughout the democratic party and beyond 2020?

Maurice Mitchell: Sure. I mean, that’s why we’re building the Working Families Party. We believe that the way to expand our politics in this rigid two party system is to build independent political power and to join forces with members in Congress, like member, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and grassroots leaders up and down the ballot. From municipal races like our recent WFP city council, woman, Kendra Brooks, all the way up and hopefully a Progressive president. You have to create an inside, outside coalition that includes the forces on the left of the democratic party and all of these forces in our grassroots movements and labor organizations to push for these changes. Because we know that just like there’s a left wing of the democratic party, there’s a strong organized capital wing that’ll always drag us to the right.

And so I think that that is spot on. And I also think that what Hillary Clinton had to say was correct. People in Washington are afraid of true Progressive’s like Bernie Sanders. That’s why we endorsed him last cycle. That’s why we are very supportive of his movement this cycle, even though we’ve endorsed, Elizabeth Warren. And that’s the reason why so many people have embraced him at that big bold, progressive change that both him and Elizabeth Warren have been champion.

Jaisal Noor: All right Jen, we’ll give you the last word.

Jennifer Epps-Addison: Well I would just say I like that quote from AOC but I liked the one more where she talks about that the party, we are not dragging the party left. We’re bringing the party home and the reality is the millions and millions of people who make up the voting base of the Democratic Party are with us on the issues are with Senator Warren and Senator Sanders on the issues. What we have to do is actually inspire them to believe that a better world is possible and that they can actually achieve it through their political participation.

And so that’s why we need a candidate who not just represents policies and ideas, but who brings a movement of people willing to put their time, energy, and hard earned dollars on the line to help elect that candidate president. And we don’t see that happening for any of the corporate Democrats. We see it with candidates who are movement candidates like Senator Warren and Senator Sanders.

Jaisal Noor: We want to thank you both for joining us. Jennifer Epps Addison, co-executive director of the Center for Popular Democracy Action who has endorsed, Senator Sanders. And Maurice Mitchell, national director of the Working Families Party who have endorsed Senator Warren. Thank you so much for joining us.

Maurice Mitchell: Thank you. It’s good to be here.

Jennifer Epps-Addison: Thank you.

34 Soldiers Suffered Brain Injuries in Iran Strike, Pentagon Reports

WASHINGTON—The Pentagon said Friday that 34 U.S. troops were diagnosed with traumatic brain injuries suffered in this month’s Iranian missile strike on an Iraqi air base, and that half of the troops have returned to their military duties.

Seventeen of the 34 are still under medical observation or treatment, according to Jonathan Hoffman, the chief Pentagon spokesman.

President Donald Trump had initially said he was told that no troops had been injured in the Jan. 8 strike. The military said symptoms were not immediately reported after the strike and in some cases became known days later. Many were in bunkers before nearly a dozen Iranian ballistic missiles exploded, damaging several parts of the base.

Related Articles


[image error]







The Real Reason Trump Assassinated Qassem Soleimani



by Juan Cole








[image error]







Trump’s Unprecedented Attack on Iran and the Rule of Law



by Bill Blum








[image error]







Gustave Flaubert Anticipated Our Surreal New Normal



by

After the first reports that some soldiers had been hurt, Trump referred to them as “headaches” and said the cases were not as serious as injuries involving the loss of limbs.

Hoffman’s disclosure that 34 had been diagnosed with traumatic brain injury, or TBI, was the first update on the number injured in Iran’s missile attack on Ain al-Asad air base in western Iraq since the Pentagon said on Jan. 17 that 11 service members had been flown out of Iraq with concussion-like symptoms. Days later, officials said more had been sent out of Iraq for further diagnosis and treatment, but the Pentagon did not provide firm figures on the total or say whether any had been returned to duty.

Hoffman said that of the 34 with TBI, 18 were evacuated from Iraq to U.S. medical facilities in Germany and Kuwait, and 16 stayed in Iraq. Seventeen of the 18 evacuees were sent to Germany, and nine remain there; the other eight have been transported to the United States for continued observation or treatment.

The one American sent to Kuwait has since returned to duty in Iraq. All 16 of those who were diagnosed with TBI and remained in Iraq have since returned to duty there, Hoffman said.

The eight who were sent to the United States arrived Friday and will receive treatment either at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, or at their home bases, Hoffman said.

No one was killed in the attack on Ain al-Asad. The strike was launched in retaliation for a U.S. drone missile strike that killed Qassem Soleimani, the most powerful military general in Iran, on Jan. 3 at Baghdad International Airport.

The U.S. had no missile defense systems protecting Ain al-Asad from potential missile attack. Hoffman said Friday that deploying one or more Patriot anti-missile systems to Iraq is among options now being weighted by military commanders. The U.S. had deployed numerous Patriot systems to other countries in the region as protection against Iranian missile attack, including in Saudi Arabia, but a strike on Iraq was seen as less likely.

Trump has repeatedly claimed that no Americans were harmed in the missile strikes, an outcome that he said drove his decision not to retaliate further and risk a broader war with Iran. He credited the minimized damage to an early warning system “that worked very well” and said Americans should be “extremely grateful and happy” with the outcome.

Some members of Congress this week pressed the Pentagon for more clarity on the scope of the TBI cases resulting from the Iranian attack. Rep. Bill Pascrell, D-N.J., wrote senior Pentagon officials on Thursday requesting additional details on casualties from the attack.

On Friday morning, Defense Secretary Mark Esper directed the Pentagon’s acting undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness, Matthew Donovan, to begin working with the staff of the Joint Chiefs to review how military injuries are tracked and reported — not just TBI cases but battlefield injuries of all kinds, Hoffman told reporters.

“The goal is to be as transparent, accurate, and to provide the American people and our service members with the best information about the tremendous sacrifices our warfighters make,” Hoffman said.

Traumatic brain injury is a type of casualty that the U.S. military began to understand and deal with during the height of the Iraq war, where roadside bombs — including particularly effective ones produced by Iran — caused severe injuries and death to thousands of U.S. troops.

Republicans Have Made a Mockery of Impeachment

This piece originally appeared on Truthout.

In a scene straight out of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, the GOP-controlled Senate has refused to allow timely testimony from witnesses who had front row seats to Donald Trump’s abuse of power. The senators voted 53-47, strictly along party lines, to table any possible discussion of whether to allow witnesses and documentary evidence until six days of legal arguments and two days of senator questioning had occurred. That means the parties will argue the case and senators will ask questions before they ever get to see documents or hear from prospective witnesses.

The House Intelligence Committee subpoenaed several documents and witnesses to testify during the impeachment inquiry. But unlike any prior impeached president and despite the Constitution’s command that the House of Representatives “shall have the sole power of impeachment,” Trump totally refused to cooperate with the inquiry. He declined to provide even one document. He forbade all members of the executive branch to testify, raising the discredited theory that subpoenaed witnesses who refused to testify would enjoy “absolute immunity” from civil and criminal prosecution. But every court to examine that theory has rejected it.

Related Articles


[image error]







Why Have No Republicans Turned on Trump?



by








[image error]







The Republican Party Is as Guilty as Trump



by Sonali Kolhatkar








[image error]







The Decade Republicans Hijacked American Democracy



by

Ultimately, 17 witnesses testified in the House inquiry. Nine followed Trump’s command and defied their subpoenas. The testimony provided overwhelming evidence of Trump’s abuse of power and obstruction of Congress as charged in the Articles of Impeachment issued by the House.

On the first day of the Senate trial, the Democratic House impeachment managers made 11 motions to amend Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s proposed trial rules to allow witnesses and documents. The managers moved to subpoena relevant documents from the White House, State Department, Pentagon and the Office of Management and Budget. They also moved to issue subpoenas to Mick Mulvaney, acting White House chief of staff; John Bolton, former national security adviser; Mike Duffey, White House budget official; and Rob Blair, adviser to Mulvaney.

In the course of arguing their motions, the managers laid out the case of Trump’s abuse of power. The four men the managers want to testify witnessed Trump’s withholding of almost $400 million of congressionally authorized military aid to Ukraine until President Volodymyr Zelensky agreed to announce investigations into one of Trump’s political rivals.

During arguments on the managers’ motions, Trump’s lawyers repeatedly bemoaned the threat to executive privilege if witnesses were required to testify. Executive privilege means that some internal executive branch communications are protected from compelled disclosure. But Trump has relied on the “absolute immunity” theory to prevent witnesses from testifying; he never asserted executive privilege. During a witness’s testimony, Trump can invoke executive privilege to prevent an answer to a specific question. But he can’t stop the witness from testifying in the first place. In United States v. Nixon, a unanimous Supreme Court denied Richard Nixon’s claim of executive privilege and ordered him to produce the inculpatory tapes. Nixon resigned shortly thereafter.

Even if Trump asserts that a witness is absolutely immune from compelled testimony, House manager Jerry Nadler observed, the president has no authority to block that person from testifying. Nadler cited a judge who recently wrote, “Presidents are not kings. That means they do not have subjects … whose destiny they are entitled to control.”

Trump’s legal team spent the bulk of its time arguing about process. His lawyers criticized the method the House used to issue subpoenas even though the House has the “sole power of impeachment.” They claimed that Trump was denied due process in the House inquiry even though he was invited to participate and declined. What Trump’s lawyers didn’t do was to refute the powerful evidence presented by the managers.

All 100 senators must sit silently, on pain of imprisonment, for six days a week for the duration of an impeachment trial except for during the 16 hours when the senators get to ask questions. McConnell is under pressure from Trump to conduct a quick trial so that the president can brag about his acquittal during his State of the Union address on February 4. McConnell insisted that all motions be resolved on Day 1 of the trial so the arguments could begin on Day 2. Thus, the senators and Chief Justice John Roberts, the presiding officer, were forced to sit in the Senate Chamber for nearly 13 hours into the early morning hours.

McConnell wants a “rushed trial with little evidence in the dark of the night,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said. “If Trump is so convinced he’s innocent,” he added, “why not in broad daylight?” Because, the managers argued, Trump wants to minimize the incriminating evidence the American people hear.

“A trial without evidence is not a trial; it’s a cover-up,” Schumer charged. All prior impeachment trials featured evidence. “The witnesses we subpoenaed weren’t Democrats,” Schumer said. They’re “the president’s own men.”

The most important decision the senators can make is whether there will be a fair trial, lead manager Adam Schiff noted, saying this decision is “more important than the vote on guilt or innocence.” If senators wait to call witnesses, they “won’t have any of the evidence the president seeks to conceal during most of the trial,” he added.

Moreover, Schiff argued, limiting the evidence to that developed in the House would make the Senate function as an appellate body, meaning that it would just review what the House inquiry had found. This role is inconsistent with the Constitution, which grant the Senate the “sole power to try all impeachments.”

Zoe Lofgren, the first woman ever to address the Senate as an impeachment manager, challenged the senators to “end President Trump’s obstruction” by authorizing subpoenas. “If the Senate fails to take this step, you won’t even ask for the evidence,” she said. “This trial and your verdict will be questioned.”

The managers also made a motion to rectify an unfair defect in McConnell’s draft resolution that would permit Trump to cherry-pick documents he had refused to provide to the House and then introduce them in the Senate. That would allow Trump to “use his obstruction not only as a shield to his misconduct, but also as a sword in his defense,” Schiff noted. The proposed amendment said that if any party tries to admit evidence that wasn’t produced in the House, it must provide the other party with all documents responsive to the subpoena. This is consistent with the well-established Rule of Completeness, which prevents the selective introduction of evidence that would mislead the jury. That motion was also tabled by a 53-47 vote.

But the rubber hit the road when the Senate tabled the managers’ motion to ensure they would be able to argue for witnesses and documents later in the trial. Before trial, a few moderate GOP senators had publicly expressed a desire to hear witnesses. On the first day of trial, however, they walked in lockstep with McConnell and Trump in refusing to guarantee even the opportunity to discuss whether witnesses will be called. Schumer accurately told CNN at a break earlier in the day that when the Republicans say “later” for witnesses, “they mean never.”

Finally, the managers moved to allow the chief justice to determine whether a requested witness’s testimony would be relevant to the inquiry, a determination that could be overruled by the Senate. That motion, too, was tabled by the same margin.

“Every Republican senator has shown that they want to be part of the cover-up by voting against every document and witness proposed,” Nadler said.

Indeed, Day 1 of the trial is a harbinger that all Republican senators will ultimately serve as loyal foot soldiers to the president, seriously imperiling the constitutional separation of powers. To borrow Frank Rich’s striking characterization, they are “Vichy Republicans,” referring to the French government that did Hitler’s bidding during the Nazi occupation of France.

The Fight for Our Democracy Is Far From Over

Ten years ago, in January 2010, the Supreme Court released its disastrous Citizens United decision. The court, either through remarkable naivety or sheer malevolence, essentially married the terrible idea that “money is speech” to the terrible idea that “corporations are people.”

The ruling put a for sale sign on our democracy, opening up a flood of corporate, special interest, and even foreign money into our politics.

Related Articles


[image error]







Bernie Sanders Explains Why Congress Fears Citizens United



by Bill Boyarsky








[image error]







Behold the Devastating Consequences of Citizens United



by








[image error]







The People vs. Citizens United: 7 Steps to Reversing Runaway Political Spending



by Bill Blum

Through Citizens United and related decisions, the Court made a bad situation worse. We saw the proliferation of super PACs, which can accept and spend unlimited amounts of money to influence elections, and the rise of dark money, which is undisclosed political spending that can come from any special interest, including foreign countries.

In the 10 years since the decision, there’s been $4.5 billion in political spending by outside interest groups, compared to $750 million spent in the 20 years prior to the case.

From 2000-2008, there were only 15 federal races where outside spending exceeded candidate spending. In the same amount of time following Citizens United, this occurred in 126 races. Now, almost half of all outside spending is dark money that has no or limited disclosure of its donors.

That money isn’t coming from the farmers suffering through Donald Trump’s trade war or the fast-food workers fighting for a living wage. It’s coming from the wealthiest donors, people often with very different priorities than the majority of Americans. In fact, a full one-fifth of all super PAC donations in the past 10 years have come from just 11 people.

This has led to an unresponsive and dysfunctional government. With so many politicians in the pockets of their big donors, it’s been even harder to make progress on issues like gun safety, health care costs, or climate change.

Not to mention, we’re left with the most corrupt president in American history, who’s embroiled in a series of scandals that threaten our prosperity, safety, and security.

To name just a few of these scandals: Trump urged a foreign country to investigate his political opponents. His lawyer’s “associates” funneled money into Trump’s super PAC through a sham corporation. The National Rifle Association spent tens of millions of dollars in unreported “dark” money to elect him while allegedly serving as a Russian asset.

Trump and his accomplices should be held accountable, through congressional impeachment, the judicial process, or both. But we also need meaningful anti-corruption reforms.

Thanks to a class of reformers elected in 2018, we’ve already begun that process. Last year, the House of Representatives passed the For the People Act (H.R. 1).

H.R. 1 would strengthen ethics rules and enforcement; reduce the influence of big money while empowering individual, small-dollar donors; and, along with a bill to restore the Voting Rights Act, protect every American’s right to vote. It also calls for a constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United.

Sadly, this bill is being blocked by Mitch McConnell in the Senate.

These reforms are all popular with the American people. We can unrig the system and restore that faith by fighting for these priorities, and by pressuring elected officials to act. Join groups like End Citizens United or Let America Vote to push back against our rigged system and put people ahead of corporate special interests.

Together, we can restore trust in government, prevent corruption, strengthen our national security, and ensure Washington truly works for the people.

The Paris Agreement Is Officially Too Little, Too Late

The fevered arguments about how the world can reach the Paris climate goals on cutting the greenhouse gases which are driving global heating may be a waste of time. An international team of scientists has learned more about the main greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide (CO2) − and it’s not good news.

Teams in six countries, using new climate models, say the warming potential of CO2 has been underestimated for years. The new models will be used in revised UN temperature projections next year. If they are accurate, the Paris targets of keeping temperature rise below 2°C − or preferably 1.5°C − will belong to a fantasy world.

Related Articles


[image error]







Noam Chomsky Makes the Case for the Lesser of Two Evils



by Robert Scheer








[image error]







Oil Companies Must Cut Production by 35% to Meet Paris Climate Accord



by








[image error]







Naomi Klein: We Have Far Less Time Than We Think



by Ilana Novick

Vastly more data and computing power has become available since the current Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) projections were finalised in 2013. “We have better models now,” Olivier Boucher, head of the Institut Pierre Simon Laplace Climate Modelling Centre in Paris, told the French news agency AFP, and they “represent current climate trends more accurately”.

Projections from government-backed teams using the models in the US, UK, France and Canada suggest a much warmer future unless the world acts fast: CO2 concentrations which have till now been expected to produce a world only 3°C warmer than pre-industrial levels would more probably heat the Earth’s surface by four or five degrees Celsius.

“If you think the new models give a more realistic picture, then it will, of course, be harder to achieve the Paris targets, whether it is 1.5°C or two degrees Celsius,” Mark Zelinka told AFP. Dr Zelinka, from the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, is the lead author of the first peer-reviewed assessment of the new generation of models, published earlier this month in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.

“Climate sensitivity has been in the range of 1.5°C to 4.5°C for more than 30 years. If it is now moving to between 3°C and 7°C, that would be tremendously dangerous”

Scientists want to establish how much the Earth’s surface will warm over time if the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere doubles. The resulting temperature increase, known as Earth’s climate sensitivity, is a key indicator of the probable future climate. The part played in it by clouds is crucial.

“How clouds evolve in a warmer climate and whether they will exert a tempering or amplifying effect has long been a major source of uncertainty,” said Imperial College London researcher Joeri Rogelj, the lead author for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) on the global carbon budget − the amount of greenhouse gases that can be emitted without exceeding a given temperature cap. The new models reflect a better understanding of cloud dynamics that reinforce the warming impact of CO2.

For most of the last 10,000 years the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere was a nearly constant 280 parts per million (ppm). But at the start of the 19th century and of the industrial revolution, fuelled by oil, gas and coal, the number of CO2 molecules in the air rose sharply. Today the concentration stands at 412 ppm, a 45% rise − half of it in the last three decades.

Last year alone, human activity injected more than 41 billion tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere, about five million tonnes every hour.

Impacts already evident

With only one degree Celsius of warming above historic levels so far, the world is already having to cope with increasingly deadly heatwaves, droughts, floods and tropical cyclones made more destructive by rising seas.

By the late 1970s scientists had settled on a probable climate sensitivity of 3°C (plus-or-minus 1.5°C), corresponding to about 560 ppm of CO2 in the atmosphere. That assessment remained largely unchanged − until now.

“Right now, there is an enormously heated debate within the climate modelling community,” said Earth system scientist Johan Rockström, director of Germany’s Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research.

“You have 12 or 13 models showing sensitivity which is no longer 3°C, but rather 5°C or 6°C with a doubling of CO2,” he told AFP. “What is particularly worrying is that these are not the outliers.”

Serious science

Models from France, the US Department of Energy, Britain’s Met Office and Canada show climate sensitivity of 4.9°C, 5.3°C, 5.5°C and 5.6°C respectively, Dr Zelinka said. “You have to take these models seriously − they are highly developed, state-of-the-art.”

Among the 27 new models examined in his study, these were also among those that best matched climate change over the last 75 years, suggesting a further validation of their accuracy.

But other models that will feed into the IPCC’s next major Assessment Report found significantly smaller increases, though almost all were higher than earlier estimates. Scientists will test and challenge the new models rigorously.

“The jury is still out, but it is worrying,” said Rockstrom. “Climate sensitivity has been in the range of 1.5°C to 4.5°C for more than 30 years. If it is now moving to between 3°C and 7°C, that would be tremendously dangerous.”