Stuart Jeanne Bramhall's Blog: The Most Revolutionary Act , page 1145
September 21, 2017
Nuclear Blast Preparations: Inside Legislators’ Secret Meeting
Hawaiian lawmakers and their staff got briefed Tuesday on a possible North Korea attack, but the public wasn’t invited.
By Courtney Teague
Some lawmakers who attended stressed that the secret meeting was not called because of any immediate threat to the islands. Instead, it was a discussion of how to help the public prepare.
A public meeting on the topic is planned for Thursday at 10:30 a.m. in the Capitol auditorium. Legislators said they did not know how that meeting would differ from Tuesday’s.
Civil Beat obtained a copy of a memo Sen. Clarence Nishihara, chair of the Committee on Public Safety, Intergovernmental and Military Affairs, sent Monday inviting all legislators and their staffs to attend a presentation by the EMA “regarding recent regional military threats and the planned responses to such events.”
Brian Black, executive director of the Civil Beat Law Center for the Public Interest, said the Legislature sets its own rules on public access and the state constitution only prohibits private meetings that concern decision-making committee hearings.
Shortly after Civil Beat photographer Cory Lum showed up to take pictures, he was asked to leave by a staffer.
Civil Beat still caught the end of the meeting as legislators and EMA officials discussed how to best prepare residents and visitors for a nuclear attack without fear-mongering.
“It seems to me that primal instincts are going to just overwhelm nearly everybody,” said Sen. Gil Riviere, who then repeated the advice given out recently by the EMA: “Get inside, stay inside, stay tuned.”
“People are just going to be fleeing, they’re not going to stay in,” Riviere added.
EMA Executive Officer Toby Clairmont said Thursday’s public presentation would stress the importance of emergency preparedness, like keeping enough food on hand for 14 days.
“When you hear us speak to the public, it’s going to start off with the majority talking about how to prepare your family for major emergencies … getting your act together. And then it’s going to include this (preparation for a nuclear attack) as one hazard in addition to hurricanes and tsunamis and other things,” Clairmont told the legislators and staffers. . .
Source: Nuclear Blast Preparations: Inside Legislators’ Secret Meeting
What It Feels Like Going To University If You’re Working Class
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I really identify a lot with what Tom says – especially the alienation and condescension. I never realized I was working class until I arrived in medical school on a student loan. They never tell you that you’re working class while you’re growing up.
ED~I can really relate to a LOT of this, it’s slightly adapted from his bright contribution
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by TOM RASMUSSEN
21 SEPTEMBER 2017
Someone told me the other day that trying to define what the terms ‘middle class’ and ‘working class’ mean is the most categorically middle class, privileged thing you can do. I think it’s croquet, but that’s a close second.
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Issues of class are tricky territory, and talking about them brings countless problems: of misunderstanding, erasure, tone policing, patronisation, privilege competition and all those really bleak things that make people shy away from subjects and silence their own experience. As working class people, we are constantly talked about but never given the privilege of being platformed in our own right.
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As a working class person, I have spent a lot of time amplifying conversations about my past and equal amounts of time hushing up my working…
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September 20, 2017
After the Hurricane, Solar Proved More Secure than the Grid
By using energy storage with solar panels, homeowners were able to go off-grid, showing how distributed power could speed future storm recovery. Source: After the Hurricane, Solar Kept Florida Homes and a City’s Traffic Lights Running | InsideClimate News
Iran’s President Calls for Destruction of ALL Nuclear Weapons
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Iranian president calls for destruction of nuclear weapons.
Iranian president: “We are against any type of weapons of mass destruction as well as nuclear weapons, and we believe that they must be destroyed around the world.”
The Trumpster: “They will be met with fire and fury like the world has never seen,”
So tell me, who is the aggressor here?
Source: Nuclear weapons ‘must be destroyed,’ says Iranian President (VIDEO)
theduran.com
Sept 19, 2017
Amid tensions caused by North Korea’s latest nuclear test, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani stated that his country is unequivocally opposed to weapons of mass destruction and nuclear weapons.
In an interview with Christiane Amanpour on Monday, President Rouhani discussed the possibilities that US President Donald Trump could come through on a campaign promise to shred the nuclear agreement negotiated under the Obama administration.
“Our position has been very clear and remains clear vis-a-vis nuclear weapons. We are against any type…
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Oil Privatization: NAFTA and the Rape and Pillage of Mexico
Crude Harvest: Selling Mexico’s Oil
Al Jazeera (2017)
Crude Harvest is about a controversial law Mexico has enacted that puts its publicly owned oil industry up for sale to foreign corporations. The law also grants foreign oil companies the right to override the wishes of Mexican farmers if oil is discovered on their land.
Following a massive popular uprising, Mexico nationalized their oil industry in 1938. It’s the last nationally owned oil company to be opened to foreign investment. US oil economies are extremely excited as Mexico is an extremely corrupt country that makes no effort to regulate oil production. They will be allowed to pollute Mexican water and air as much as they like without consequences.
The documentary goes on to reveal how NAFTA has systemically “raped” the Mexican economy and forced the government to sell their oil industry to pay off Wall Street debt. By flooding the Mexican market with cheap (subsidized) American food, the US has wiped out most small Mexican farmers and ranchers and turned many small indigenous villages into ghost towns. Left with no way to support themselves, these former farmers can only survive by turning to organized crime or illegally entering the US.
Once that their lands are to be turned over to foreign oil companies, yet more farmers will lose their livelihood. Meanwhile Mexican debt will only increase as the government loses oil profits that currently comprise 40% of government revenue.
September 19, 2017
Flood of Escalating Repression boosts Catalan Referendum Resistance
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The far-right PP government, direct successor to the fascist Franco regime has ordered thousands of militarized Guardia Civil into Catalonia where they are trying to try prevent the Referendum.
The fight between the majority of Catalans and the Spanish State is escalating by the hour. Support for holding an Independence Referendum on 1st Oct is growing in reaction to a flood of repression.
The far-right PP government, direct successor to the fascist Franco regime has ordered thousands of militarized Guardia Civil into Catalonia where they are trying to try prevent the Referendum.
Some Key Events
On 11th Sept over one million people demonstrated in favour of the Referendum, in perfect order and for the sixth year running.
After a 48 hr ultimatum the State has seized the bank accounts of the local Catalan Government, threatening all public employees,health, pensions, etc. http://www.elpuntavui.cat/barcelona.html
Thousands of military police have arrived and seized millions of posters and leaflets in favour of the referendum. http://www.elpuntavui.cat/po…..
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What Happened to All Those Foreclosed Houses?
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It turns out that Wall Streeters themselves formed profiteering investment groups that rushed out to scoop up tens of thousands of those foreclosed properties, usually grabbing them on the cheap at courthouse auctions in suburban metro areas that were hard-hit by the crash. History repeating itself – the exact same thing happened during the 1929 Depression.
Wall Street bought them — and is now leasing them out and driving up rents.
By Jim Hightower
Source: OpEdNews.com
We know that millions of American families lost their homes after Wall Street’s 2007 financial crash. But where did all those houses go?
It turns out that Wall Streeters themselves formed profiteering investment groups that rushed out to scoop up tens of thousands of those foreclosed properties, usually grabbing them on the cheap at courthouse auctions in suburban metro areas that were hard-hit by the crash.
These moneyed syndicates have deep, deep pockets, so they easily outbid local buyers to take possession of the majority of the single-family homes being sold off in many distressed places.
Why are they buying? To turn the homes into rental properties and become the dominant suburban landlord, controlling the local market and constantly jacking up rents.
For example, the Wall Street Journal found that…
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Actions of A Bully Child or Dying Empire: Sanctions and Threats
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As the Western world continues to slide into the dust bin of history, it’s not going without a fight.
Actions of A Bully Child or Dying Empire: Sanctions and Threats
Posted with permission and written by Rory Hall, The Daily Coin
As the Western world continues to slide into the dust bin of history, it is not going without a fight. As with any “wounded animal”, once the reality of pain permeates the body, it typically lashes out at anything or anyone within arms’ reach. In the case of the Western world, arms’-reach is merely the push of a button and everything begins to change.
What Europe has already come to realize is these meaningless Russian and Iranian sanctions only hurt western manufacturing and have minimal impact on the country the sanction is directed. Threatening to cut off China from the SWIFT system is akin to threatening to keep a person out the restroom in a home with multiple restrooms – it doesn’t matter as there are alternatives and…
View original post 729 more words
September 18, 2017
Transforming Society as Capitalism Crumbles: Lessons from Brazil’s Peasant Movement
Rafael Soriano and Débora Nunes
Débora Nunes, member of the National Directory of Brazil’s Landless Workers Movement, addresses a crowd. (Gustavo Marinho/Landless Workers Movement)
Brazil is facing a profound political and economic crisis since a coup d’etat overturned Dilma Roussef’s government in March of 2016. The new government is unrolling austerity policies that are eroding working families’ political gains by dismantling labor protections and social services and unleashing human rights abuses, including escalating assassinations of peasants and indigenous people. This political context—which shares characteristics with the U.S. climate under Donald Trump—is defined by a crisis of capitalism that resurfaced with the economic meltdown in the Global North that was initiated in 2008.
Rafael Soriano, a member of MST’s Communications Collective, discussed this political climate with Débora Nunes, member of the National Directory of Brazil’s Landless Workers Movement, or Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra, widely known by its Portuguese acronym MST. This social movement of peasants, rural workers and landless families reclaims land rights and struggles for a genuine agrarian reform that would benefit all Brazilians—and strives for deep social and political transformation.
In this interview, Nunes reflects on the danger and potential of this current moment, highlighting opportunities to build alternatives to capitalism as the current economic system flounders. . .
Source: Transforming Society as Capitalism Crumbles: Lessons from Brazil’s Peasant Movement
Russia Refutes US Accusation About Bombing Coalition Forces
A statement by US forces operating illegally in Syria lied, claiming:
“At approximately 12:30 a.m. GMT Sept. 16, Russian forces struck a target east of the Euphrates River in Syria near (Deir Ezzor), causing injuries to Coalition partner forces. Several (US-supported terrorist) fighters were wounded and received medical care as a result of the strike.”
Russian war aviation has been critical in the fight against US-supported terrorists.On Sunday, Russian Defense Ministry spokesman General Igor Konashenkov categorically denied the accusation, saying:
“To avoid unnecessary escalation, the command of the Russian forces in Syria gave the US (forces) an advance notice, through an existing communications channel, on the borders within which the military operation in (Deir Ezzor) would be conducted.”
“The priority targets for destruction are the (ISIS) firing positions from which they are leading large-scale attacks on the Syrian forces.”
If coalition terrorists are in ISIS-controlled areas, it’s further proof of US support for this scourge.
On Sunday, Syrian forces liberated Jafrah, a strategic town northeast of Deir Ezzor’s military airport, improving its security, controlling areas surrounding it, closing off ISIS’ land-based exits from the city, the Euphrates River their only option.
Continued progress by government and allied forces in Deir Ezzor heads steadily towar eliminating ISIS in and around the city, a major triumph once accomplished, its last stronghold in the country liberated.
As US-supported SDF terrorists advance on the city, clashes with government and allied forces could follow.
Assad vowed to liberate Syria entirely. Washington has other ideas, wanting control over as much Syrian territory as it can grab.
On Sunday, Assad said some Western countries continue supporting anti-government territories – meaning America and its rogue allies, NATO and regional ones.
On Friday, “political prostitute” Nikki Haley said Washington won’t accept Syria under Assad’s leadership.
Regime change remains US policy – conflict resolution cooperation with Russia pure fantasy.
Source: Russia Refutes US Accusation About Bombing Coalition Forces
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