Helen H. Moore's Blog, page 283

Will the Las Vegas shooting be a wake-up call to Congress?

A shooter sprayed hundreds of bullets into an outdoor concert from his hotel room on the Las Vegas strip, killing 58 people and injuring at least 500 more. The shooter was allegedly Stephen Paddock, 64, a retired accountant, who, officials say, killed himself in his hotel room after the massacre. The death toll in Las Vegas Sunday night marks one of the deadliest mass shootings in modern U.S. history.

Billy Rosen, deputy legal director at Everytown for Gun Safety, a group fighting to reduce gun violence, joined Salon’s Andrew O’Hehir and Amanda Marcotte on “Salon Talks” to discuss the aftermath of the shooting and the gun legislation that is front and center during this crisis.

“When you think about the political landscape, right now,” O’Hehir said, “a lot of people have been wondering, especially in the context of a country music event, which is — let’s just go for the stereotype here — likely to have involved a lot of conservatives, a lot of possibly gun owners, perhaps second amendment purist-type supporters, do you see the possibility of this event serving as a wake up call for anyone?”

“I wish I could say yes, but I think that after Sandy Hook it’s very difficult,” Marcotte said.

Rosen does see some progress post-Sandy Hook, primarily with legislation on the state level. “Since the beginning of 2013, we’ve seen seven states enact laws to require background checks on all gun sales,” he said. “We’ve seen 24 different states enact a law to keep guns out of the hands of domestic abusers—soon to be 25, actually, because just last week, we had a big victory in Rhode Island.”

“Certainly, Congress has failed and we need to hold them accountable,” Rosen continued, “but lest people become overcome with a pessimistic despair, there is progress being made… mostly at the state level.”

Watch our full “Salon Talks” conversation on Facebook.

Tune into Salon’s live shows, “Salon Talks” and “Salon Stage,” daily at noon ET / 9 a.m. PT and 4 p.m. ET / 1 p.m. PT, streaming live on Salon and on Facebook.

America’s white man problem: After Las Vegas, a familiar script unfolds

A Las Vegas Metropolitan Police officer stands after a mass shooting at a country music festival on October 2, 2017. (Credit: Getty/Ethan Miller)

As I watched the news unfold about the horrible mass shooting in Las Vegas during the late-night hours of Sunday and Monday, I said to myself, “Please God, don’t let these killers be black.” I doubt I was alone in such sentiments. In a country stuck in the grip of a white backlash and resurgent white supremacy, black and brown folks don’t need any further troubles.

As the initial news reports twisted and turned, I remembered how many initial reports about mass shootings are rife with inaccuracies, born of panic and chaos and the human desire to make sense of mayhem and murder. I then said to myself, “Please God, don’t let this killer be a Muslim.” I doubt I was alone in those sentiments. Muslim Americans are overwhelmingly a peaceful and law-abiding people. The challenges they face in America are already too great.

I had another fear as well. If the mass shooting in Las Vegas had been committed by a Muslim or a person of color, it might have presented an irresistible opportunity for Donald Trump — who is a racial authoritarian and (as I believe) a fascist — to expand his power. As historian Timothy Snyder has warned, Trump is waiting for his own “Reichstag Fire moment.” A terrorist attack on a major city could well provide that opportunity.

I breathed a sigh of relief when it was revealed by Las Vegas police that it was a white man who rained down death and pain into a crowd of concertgoers. I doubt I was alone in such a sentiment. His barbaric actions killed at least 58 people and wounded hundreds more.

Whenever a white man commits an act of mass gun violence in America — politically motivated or otherwise — there is a cultural script that is closely followed by the mainstream news media, politicians and too many members of the public. This narrative is obvious and predictable. Alas, it provides some small measure of comfort to many, even if that familiarity is rooted in gross hypocrisy and flagrant contradictions.

Unlike the impulsiveness he has shown when Muslims are accused of committing a terrorist act, either in the United States or abroad, Donald Trump will be reserved and careful in his statements. The American news media will respond by observing that Trump has now magically become “presidential,” as if his sins could be washed away by a chattering class desperate to make the abnormal into something palatable and routine.

The National Rifle Association and the Republican politicians whom they own will default to irrational talking points: “Now is not the time to politicize a tragedy” or “It’s too early to talk about gun laws.” Gun manufacturers will see their stocks rise in value. America’s addiction to guns will continue unabated even as it kills tens of thousands of people a year. Somehow the gun fetishists like Bill O’Reilly will mouth such absurdities as “guns are the price of freedom” without soiling themselves from uncontrollable laughter.

The alleged shooter is a man named Stephen Paddock. He has been described as a “lone wolf.” The Las Vegas police have now offered up two new entries for America’s mass shooting lexicon: Paddock is a “sole perpetrator” and a “local individual.” He is not a “terrorist,” since that term is almost exclusively reserved for nebulous brown people.

Stephen Paddock is being humanized as a man who “liked to gamble,” “listened to country music” and “lived a quiet, retired life.” When white folks commit horrible crimes their actions are often placed in a context where they are described as “good people” and “all American.” This is all so “surprising” and “unimaginable,” we are told, because this person was so “ordinary.” By comparison, when black or brown folks or Muslims commit horrible crimes they are usually depicted as one-dimensional monsters.

There will be no “national conversation” about the connection between toxic (white) masculinity and American gun culture. In the mainstream news media and broader public discourse there certainly will be no discussion of the fact that white men are 31 percent of the population but commit 63 percent of mass shootings. Such a fact is forbidden or explosive, because it connects race, gender, guns and death.

The mass shooting in Las Vegas on Sunday night is the 273rd such event in America so far this year. It will not be the last. When the next mass shooting occurs I might just as well take this article and update it. The facts will likely not be much different. America is addicted to guns. The sickness will not be cured until, like an alcoholic or an opioid addict, the country admits it has hit rock bottom.

We know the routine: Mourning and prayers, followed by lies and evasion

(Credit: Shutterstock)

Every time there’s another mass shooting in the United States, the same patterns emerge. It’s a sad statement, but we all know the beat-by-beat rhythm by now, as if we’ve seen the same horrendous movie on endless loop. As we power through the familiar horror show, it begins with thoughts and prayers (fine) and ends with complete inaction by legislators (not fine) who are powerless or completely unwilling to exercise common sense by applying new regulations to firearms and firearm owners.

In the end, exactly nothing is done, with many reasonable solutions left to die on the vine. Despite the graphic carnage — including incidents when members of Congress from both parties have been among the victims — most legislators possess neither the courage nor the will to break the pattern of blinding stupidity when it comes to policing who can own guns, what guns are available for retail and how many such weapons would-be shooters are permitted to stockpile.

The shooter in Las Vegas, whose name I can’t bring myself to type, carried with him to his room in the Mandalay Bay Resort a small arsenal of weapons, as many as 34 guns according to current reports. Again, it’s a predictably similar pattern seen everywhere from Sandy Hook to Alexandria. The weapons he harnessed to murder at least 58 people, while injuring hundreds more, apparently included an automatic rifle, capable of spraying bullets with a single squeeze of the trigger.

The staccato bursts of automatic gunfire in the videos emerging from Nevada should be seared into our national soul today. We don’t yet know which specific weapons were used, but in these disasters, gunmen have typically been armed with (among other things) AR-15 rifles, which are literally the most popular firearm in America and were used most prominently in the heart-wrenching carnage at Sandy Hook Elementary School.

Rather than making sure madmen like the Las Vegas shooter have a more difficult time acquiring arsenals of the world’s deadliest rifles — armaments better suited for an infantry platoon in Iraq or Afghanistan — we become ensnared in a debate featuring some of the most ridiculous arguments to hit the political stage, short of random blurts by Donald Trump or Sarah Palin. The point is to scramble the debate over gun control, tangling it within the semantic weeds until frustration or the next major news cycle shuts it all down. Here’s some of what we are already hearing, with more to come

Half-baked analogies

One of the oft-recycled arguments, despite being one of the dumbest possible excuses for firearms proliferation, is that cars kill people, too. Should we also ban certain makes and models? The truth is that cars and drivers are heavily regulated by the government, from emissions standards to annual inspections to safety features. Every driver must carry insurance to compensate anyone you might injure in an accident. You can’t legally drive a car that doesn’t feature seat belts, nor can you drive a car that spews too much exhaust into the air. You have to take both a written test and a driving test to get a license to operate a car. You have to renew that license at regular intervals and, if you’re older, you have to prove that you’re physically and mentally capable of driving a car. You may face serious legal consequences if you drive after drinking alcohol or while impaired by other chemicals.

There are thousands of police officers patrolling our roads and, as most of us have experienced at one time or another, they will penalize you or arrest you for both major and minor infractions. There are literally hundreds of laws drivers must observe, and violators face penalties ranging from fines to imprisonment to the government stripping you of your right to drive at all. So, if gun rights supporters want to continue comparing firearms to automobiles, then let’s talk about regulating guns and gun owners the same way we regulate cars and drivers. If not, cut the crap. It’s not helping, but maybe that’s the point.

Moving the goalposts

 If it’s not a wafer-thin argument like “cars kill people, too,” then it’s constantly shifting the policy goalposts around, shielding Republican lawmakers and the gun lobby from enacting regulations they previously supported (or at least claimed to). For example, after the Sandy Hook massacre, Wayne LaPierre, the CEO of the National Rifle Association, told supporters that a national database of mentally ill people might’ve prevented the shooting at the elementary school. LaPierre demanded, “How many more copycats are waiting in the wings for their moment of fame from a national media machine that rewards them with wall-to-wall attention and a sense of identity that they crave, while provoking others to try to make their mark?” He continued: “A dozen more killers, a hundred more? How can we possibly even guess how many, given our nation’s refusal to create an active national database of the mentally ill?”

In the days following the Washington Navy Yard shooting less than a year later, LaPierre appeared on “Meet the Press” and pronounced, “We have a mental health system in this country that has completely and totally collapsed. We have no national database of these lunatics.”

Yet when President Obama signed an executive order enhancing the mental health database, per the National Instant Criminal Background Check Improvement Amendments Act of 2007, the NRA came out against the so-called “Obama rule.” Later, in February of this year, President Donald Trump signed into law a bill that overturned the rule. In other words, the gun lobby and the Republican Party talk a big game when it comes to mental health and gun massacres, but when it comes to actually supplementing the mental health database, they suddenly believe it’s an unacceptable restriction on American freedom. More contradictions and whiplash from a faction whose core values have been replaced by a simple desire to troll the opposition.

Guns as prizes

 Speaking of trolls, gun culture in America has gone from a sacred family bond in which fathers hand down heirlooms to their sons — carrying on hunting and shooting traditions from ages past — to wacky contests in which these deadly retail products are the prize. Since the massacre at Sandy Hook in December 2012, gun clubs, firearms retailers, gun rights organizations and even a then-sitting U.S. congressman have all held multiple contests in which the AR-15, Adam Lanza’s weapon of choice, was the prize. A prize!

In fact, former Rep. Steve Stockman, R-Texas, a small time proto-Trump character who, by the way, was indicted on 28 counts of fraud, conspiracy and money laundering charges, conducted two AR-15 giveaways while serving in Congress. Not only did Stockman deliberately choose the AR-15 due to its high profile during the post-Sandy Hook gun control debate, but he chose the exact same AR-15 manufacturer as the Lanza weapon: Bushmaster.

The ghoulishness is breathtaking, especially given the sheer number of other available firearms that have little or no association with the most gruesome day on American soil (at least, the most gruesome after 9/11 and before Las Vegas), not to mention the numerous other manufacturers of the AR-15. But Stockman chose that one. Worse yet, roughly 100,000 people entered his contest. On the day of the second of two drawings, Stockman said, “An AR-15 muzzle flash is the new torch of liberty.” An AR-15 muzzle flash was also the last thing 20 children and six school teachers would ever see. But sure, torch of liberty. You bet.

While we’re talking about the AR-15, back in September 2013, not even a year after Sandy Hook, another gun-maker, Slide Fire, released a modified AR-15 that can reportedly act as a fully automatic rifle using belt-fed rounds. A loophole in the law makes it perfectly legal. The company’s marketing manager said, “It sprays like a fire hose.”

That’s convenient. And what would you use such a weapon for, exactly?

Putting Las Vegas into perspective, conservative intelligence analyst John Schindler reminded us that the casualty count in Las Vegas now exceeds the American military casualties in the second assault on Fallujah in November 2004, during the Iraq War. That body count was the work of one man, 10 firearms and the tacit backing of the gun lobby and the entire Republican Party, which has stuck to its defiant rhetoric in support of deranged men having access to as many firearms as they choose. They’ll continue to do so as long as the gun lobby and the NRA are legally permitted to inject unlimited sums of cash into the system, blackmailing lawmakers by threatening primary challenges from the right if they dare to promote common sense. Within that vise grip, we get gibberish arguments and constantly moving goalposts instead of reasonable reforms — or any at all.

When does it end? When do we return to decency and common sense in the name of defending ourselves from increasingly commonplace massacres? Until the debate is engaged on sensible terms and until money is stripped from politics, it’s not looking good. But there’s a midterm election around the corner, and, if nothing else, we shouldn’t forget what happened in Las Vegas. Nor should we forget the so-called political leaders who, under duress from lobbyists for those who market instruments of death, have been too cowardly to act.

Musicians and celebrities pay tribute to Tom Petty amid conflicting reports of his condition

Tom Petty (Credit: AP/Paul Warner)

After news that the beloved rock musician Tom Petty may have passed away on Monday, Twitter exploded with an outpouring of emotion from celebrities over the star’s death — much of it even before it was confirmed.

Even as news organizations scrambled to properly report — and sometimes retract — news of the legend’s passing or survival, many fellow musicians and stars wished for him to rest in peace and reminisced about his work. At this hour, there is still no confirmation of Petty’s condition.

What’s notable here is the diversity of the voices paying tribute. Yes, those influenced by Petty — Neko Case, Sheryl Crow, John Mayer and Ryan Adams — spoke up. Yet there were tributes too from Stephen King, Chuck D, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Nikki Sixx, Brian Wilson, St. Vincent and other artists who simply loved the man and his music. The variety of those celebrating his life is a fitting memorial to a man who quite consciously kept his music open to all ears and a reminder of his substantial and profound reach.

This is unbearable. Vegas and now a great music hero has passed. You brought us so much joy, @tompetty. We will miss you. ❤️ #RIPTomPetty

— Sheryl Crow (@SherylCrow) October 2, 2017

Damn ….Tom Petty I remember standing backstage w him & he tells me ‘Go Get Em at a. Presentation #rockAnointed — Chuck D (@MrChuckD) October 2, 2017

I hope Tom Petty is not actually dead and makes a full recovery to see all the kind, sweet things you are are saying about him. What a life. ❤️

— Neko Case (@NekoCase) October 2, 2017

I loved Tom Petty and I covered his songs because I wanted know what it felt like to fly. “you belong somewhere you feel free.”

A big “thank you, America!” from the super rich

(Credit: AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)

Congress is about to take up Donald Trump’s desire for people like himself to get income-tax-rate cuts. So, what’s the long-term trend in tax-rate cuts? And how has the vast majority fared compared with the richest?

Is there a case to be made that the highest income people in America need a tax-rate cut? What do the numbers tell us about the claim that at current tax rates the rich cannot afford to invest in ways that will create more jobs?

Thanks to a quirk in the official data, we can compare the very highest income Americans in 1961 and 2013 with the vast majority, the 90%. For two decades, the IRS has done an annual report on the 400 highest income taxpayers. The latest data on them is from 2013. Turns out in 1961 there were 398 taxpayers who made more than $1 million, allowing a statistical comparison to 2013.

Take a seat. The numbers may knock the breath out of you when you read what 52 years have done to the incomes and tax burdens of the vast majority and those at the apex of the economy.

Both groups saw their incomes rise in real terms, meaning after adjusting the IRS data for inflation.

For each dollar that the vast majority earned in 1961, they made $1.30 in 2013. That’s a 30% real increase after more than a half-century.

More income, less tax

The top taxpayers saw their incomes rise, too. For each dollar they made in 1961 they made $17.50 in 2013.

That’s 30 cents more on each 1960 dollar for most folks, compared to $17.50 more for the those at the top. The ratio of increased income is one buck for the vast majority to more than $58 for those at the top.

But this is about tax burdens, so what happens when we measure after-tax income?

The vast majority got an income tax cut. Out of each dollar earned in 1961, they paid 9.6 cents in federal income taxes. In 2013 that was down by two pennies to 7.6 cents on the dollar.

Those at the top also got a tax-rate cut. In 1961, they paid Uncle Sam 42.4 cents out of each dollar of income in 1961, but in 2013 they paid just 22.9 cents. That’s a tax-rate cut of 19.5 cents per dollar. That’s almost 10 times as large a tax-rate cut applied to a lot more dollars.

Each taxpayer in the vast majority saved on average $633 in 2013 because of their lower tax rate. Each of the top 400 taxpayers saved an average of $51.6 million.

Now, because both groups made more money while they were taxed at lower rates, their take-home incomes rose. The vast majority enjoyed $6,812 more after-tax income in 2013 than in 1961. The top 400 each enjoyed $195.4 million more.

Now here comes the first ratio that may take your breath away. For each dollar of increased after-tax income enjoyed by the vast majority in 2013, the top 400 enjoyed $28,684 more.

That’s $28,684 to $1.

If the top taxpayers were currently paying at 1961 rates, their income tax bills would rise by 85 %. On average after paying taxes at 1961 rates they would each still have $152 million to spend. That’s $3 million per week in after-tax cash.

Don’t forget social security

In both 1961 and 2013, there was another federal tax, the Social Security tax, which applied only to wages. The maximum amount taxed in 1961 was $3,000 at 3% or $90, which measured in 2013 dollars would be $699. For this analysis, we’re going to assume those at the top paid the maximum Social Security tax in both years.

For the top 400, the extra tax is so relatively small that it makes no real difference.

The after-tax income of the vast majority declined. That’s because Uncle Sam took a bigger bite because the Social Security tax rate more than doubled to 6.2 %. That increase wiped out the income tax reduction of two pennies on the dollar earned and then raised the total tax burden by more than a penny on the dollar.

The net result was that the vast majority saw their after-tax income rise by just 25 cents for each dollar of 1961 income. Notice that is less than the 30-cent increase in pre-tax income.

Each of the top 400, for comparison, took home $23.40 more for each dollar they took home in 1961.

Now take another deep breath. The ratio works out to $35,620 more take home pay at the top for each extra dollar taken home by the vast majority.

That’s a number to remember–more than $35,000 to $1 of after-tax income for those at the top versus the 90% because the super-rich got more money and they were taxed at much lower rates while the vast majority got a modest increase and were taxed at a higher rate.

35,000 to 1. Memorize that. 35,000 to 1.

And never forget that it’s the share of your income that measures your tax burden, not the absolute dollars. If the highest income Americans paid a tax rate of 1% they would pay far more than the vast majority make. It’s the share of income taken by the government that matters, not absolute dollars.

Just how much more the rich will save with the Trump tax plan is unknown because the Trump administration has yet to release its tax-rate cut plan.

That’s strange. During the campaign, Trump declared himself the world’s top expert on tax. He tweeted in May 2016: “I think nobody knows more about taxes than I do, maybe in the history of the world. Nobody knows more about taxes.”  He told voters he had a tax plan. He didn’t.

When we do see the Trump tax plan, pay close attention to who benefits and by how much. We’ll keep you posted. Meanwhile, just remember when thinking about tax rate cuts that ratio–35,000 to 1.

New CNN contributor Ed Martin said “failing” CNN is “fake news”

(Credit: Shutterstock)

CNN’s latest pro-Trump commentator has repeatedly echoed the president’s rhetoric against the network.

Ed Martin recently announced that CNN has hired him to be a political commentator and said he was “proud to join CNN to continue to make the case for Donald Trump.” But Martin has called CNN “fake news” and “state-run media” and said the network hasn’t “been credible for a long time.” He has also praised self-proclaimed “guerrilla journalist” James O’Keefe for his disinformation campaign against CNN and encouraged people to “move away from” the network because they are “obviously not telling the truth.”

Martin is the president of the Eagle Forum Education & Legal Defense Fund, which was founded by the late anti-gay and anti-feminist writer Phyllis Schlafly. He also co-hosts the radio program “Phyllis Schlafly Eagles.”

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported in January that “drama has been a prominent factor in Martin’s own career.” He resigned as chief of staff for Republican Missouri Gov. Matt Blunt in 2007 “amid controversy over the firing of a staffer that cost the state a $500,000 settlement.” And Eagle Forum board members have accused “Martin of manipulating” Schlafly for “his own agenda” (which he has denied).

Martin spoke at a 2016 Tea Party rally and said: “You’re not racist if you don’t like Mexicans. They’re from a nation. If you don’t think Muslims are vetted enough, because they blow things up, that’s not racist.”

He had until recently been making unpaid appearances on CNN to defend Trump and his policies — with frequently embarrassing results:

In his hiring announcement, Martin praised CNN for having allowed him “to say clearly” during an October appearance — after video was released of Trump bragging about sexually assaulting women — “that Donald Trump is a good man.”
Martin recently said Trump should get credit for starting a “national conversation” by attacking NFL players who kneel during the national anthem, claiming: “Instead of having a debate on something else right now we’re talking about whether African-Americans have been abused by the police. Isn’t there some way that you guys should say hey, wow, Trump has led us into a national conversation?”
Martin argued that Trump was putting “America first” when he pardoned racist former Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio (the comment drew a harsh rebuke from fellow CNN commentator Ana Navarro).
Martin said Trump can’t be “racist” because he saw him “hugging and speaking with and kissing a baby, and they happen to be black.”

Martin has appeared on several other outlets, including Fox News, RT America, and conspiracy theoristAlex Jones’ program. During an April 10 appearance on Jones’ Infowars network, Martin praised Jones for doing “valuable” work in fighting the “globalists” and later encouraged people to “reject the mainstream media.”

As a pundit, Martin has reserved some of his harshest criticism for his new employer.

During a segment of his June 27 radio program — which he labeled “fake news Tuesday” — Martin praised discredited conservative pundit James O’Keefe for his inept work against CNN and said of the network: “I think CNN is on the ropes. I don’t know, I don’t know what you do now if you’ve become so — they haven’t been credible for a long time but now they’ve really been exposed and I don’t know what they do to recover.”

He later suggested that listeners not watch CNN, stating: “CNN is obviously not telling the truth and people have to push past it and move away from it because they’ve got to find real truth.” He added that “to see CNN implode so dramatically is pretty extraordinary.” He later claimed of CNN’s coverage of Trump: “At a certain point you have to start to say, ‘Hey, this is so distorted, the coverage by CNN, it is worse than ever.’”

Martin has also attacked CNN on his Twitter account:

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During a September 26 radio — after his hiring was announced — Martin said that he’s been telling people “with a straight face — I’m trying to say, ‘Hey look, this is the most reliable place on the planet to watch TV news.'” He added that doing CNN is “a challenge” because “it seems like the hosts are usually a bit against my position as well as my kind of fellow panelists. But it is either going to be really exciting and hopefully fruitful or really good training on how to survive this kind of thing.” He later said that CNN doesn’t have the same amount of conservatives as Fox News but that could be a good thing because he stands out.

Despite Martin’s complaints about CNN, as media reporter Michael Calderone noted last month, there are “at least a dozen paid contributors on the network who are reliably supportive of the president. . . . CNN president Jeff Zucker has long justified the network hiring pro-Trump pundits during the campaign — including, most controversially, former campaign manager Corey Lewandowski, who left the network shortly after the 2016 election.”

CNN did not respond to a request for comment.

Trump’s Muslim ban 3.0 is still unconstitutional

(Credit: AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

After federal courts struck down Donald Trump’s first two Muslim bans, his functionaries crafted a third one. In an attempt to withstand judicial scrutiny by convincing the courts it is not really aimed at Muslims, Trump’s new travel ban (Muslim Ban 3.0) cosmetically adds two countries — Venezuela and North Korea — that do not have Muslim-majority populations. Nevertheless, the new ban suffers from the same constitutional infirmities as the first and second Muslim bans.

Trump’s second ban, which had included slight changes from his first one, was issued on March 6 and expired on September 24. It restricted travel to the United States by nationals from Iran, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Somalia and Sudan.

The new ban, issued by Trump in a “proclamation” on September 24, restricts travel by most citizens of Iran, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Somalia, Chad and North Korea. It bars everyone from Syria and North Korea from obtaining visas. Nationals from the other six countries will be subjected to varying additional security checks. Iranian students are exempted from the ban. It also forbids Venezuelan government officials and their families from traveling to the US.

This newest iteration, like its predecessors, violates the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause by prohibiting nationals from eight countries, including six with Muslim majorities, from traveling to the United States.

During the presidential campaign, Trump clearly stated his goal of a “total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States.” That goal apparently continues to motivate his latest mean-spirited and unnecessary travel ban.

Muslim Ban 3.0 discriminates against people from all eight countries on the basis of national origin, which violates the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), and the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD). The United States has ratified both treaties, making them “the supreme law of the land” under the Constitution’s Supremacy Clause.

Trump’s new ban purports to specify how each of the eight countries falls short in providing the US with sufficiently detailed information about its nationals or taking adequate precautions to protect US security interests. But it fails to tie nationals of those eight countries to terror attacks in the United States.

In February, the Department of Homeland Security concluded in an internal report that “country of citizenship is unlikely to be a reliable indicator of potential terrorist activity.” Indeed, the Cato Institute found that since 1975, no Americans have been killed on US soil by a terrorist from any of the eight countries covered by the new ban.

Becca Heller, director of the International Refugee Assistance Project, stated, “Of [the newly added] countries, Chad is majority Muslim, travel from North Korea is already basically frozen, and the restrictions on Venezuela only affect government officials on certain visas.” She added, “You can’t get any more transparent than that.”

“For the countries previously targeted, the targeting continues,” Zahra Billoo of the Council on American-Islamic Relations told reporters. She called the three countries added to the ban “token additions.”

Anthony Romero, executive director of the ACLU, concurs. “Six of President Trump’s targeted countries are Muslim,” he said. “The fact that Trump has added North Korea — with few visitors to the US — and a few government officials from Venezuela doesn’t obfuscate the real fact that the administration’s order is still a Muslim ban.” Romero noted, “President Trump’s original sin of targeting Muslims cannot be cured by throwing other countries onto his enemies list.”

The new ban does not apply to lawful permanent residents, people with valid visas, dual citizens traveling on a passport from an unrestricted country, foreign nationals traveling on a diplomatic visa, those who have been granted political asylum or immigration parole, or people whose deportation would violate the Convention Against Torture.

Unlike Trump’s two prior bans, his new ban has no end date but requires periodic reviews. It allows for the granting of waivers on a case-by-case basis if an individual “has previously been admitted to the United States for a continuous period of work, study, or other long-term activity,” “has previously established significant contacts with the United States,” “seeks to enter the United States to visit or reside with a close family member (e.g., a spouse, child, or parent) who is a United States citizen,” or “has been employed by, or on behalf of, the United States Government.” There must be a determination that denial would create an “undue hardship,” entrance would not “pose a threat to the national security or public safety,” and entrance is “in the national interest.”

The discretion to grant these waivers is up to a consular officer or the commissioner of US Customs and Border Protection, or the commissioner’s designee.

Muslim Ban 3.0 does not apply to refugees, who are currently limited by Trump’s first travel ban. New rules governing refugees will reportedly be announced soon.

On June 26, the Supreme Court agreed to decide the legality of the second ban when it reconvenes. Wishing to proceed promptly, the Court calendared oral arguments for October 10. In the meantime, the high court allowed parts of the ban to go into effect. But it specified that the government could not bar individuals who have a “bona fide relationship” with a person or entity in the United States.

Muslim Ban 3.0 violates the Supreme Court’s June 26 order by barring even those with a bona fide relationship. But the new ban is scheduled to go into effect on October 15, five days after the date when the Court was scheduled to hear arguments on the legality of the second ban. So, in light of Trump’s proclamation of the third ban, the Supreme Court vacated the October 10 court date. The Court ordered the government and those challenging the ban to submit briefs by October 5 arguing whether the issue pending before the high court — the legality of the second ban — is now moot in light of the new ban.

Several civil rights and religious organizations recently filed an amicus brief in the Supreme Court, stating that hate crimes against Muslims have almost doubled since the first Muslim ban was instituted.

Moreover, the National Iranian American Council issued a statement about the third ban, saying, “Casting a wider net only validates . . . that the Muslim Ban was but the first step in a wider initiative to implement Islamophobic, racist, and xenophobic policies that pander to the desires of Trump’s White supremacist base. These are not ‘targeted’ restrictions but arbitrary ones that do not keep the country safer and soil our national reputation.”

Why did Sudan disappear from the list in Muslim Ban 3.0? Because, Ryan Grim and Alex Emmons write in The Intercept, the United Arab Emirates lobbied Washington on behalf of Sudan and in return, Sudan provided mercenaries for the Saudi- and UAE-led coalition fighting in Yemen.

“The travel ban is being weaponized in odd but predictable ways,” Grim said.

Sudan is not a beacon of human rights. “Sudanese government forces have purposefully attacked civilians in Darfur, South Kordofan, and the Blue Nile region, according to Human Rights Watch, and the sitting president, Omar al-Bashir, has been charged with multiple counts of genocide by the International Criminal Court, related to his actions in Darfur,” according to Grim and Emmons.

When Muslim Ban 3.0 is challenged in court, it should be exposed for what it is, and struck down as violative of the First Amendment, ICCPR and ICERD.

Copyright, Truthout. Reprinted without permission.

Study: Spending more time outdoors may be good for kids’ eyes

(Credit: Daniel Hurst)

The ready availability of technology may make the children of today faster at configuring a new smartphone, but does all of that screen time affect the development of their eyes?

While conventional wisdom dictates that children should do less up-close viewing, sit farther from the television and perhaps even wear their eyeglasses less, we have found in recent studies that another factor may be at play: Kids need to go outside, and, if not play, at least get some general exposure to outdoor light.

To our surprise, more time outdoors had a protective effect and reduced the chances that a child would go on to need myopic refractive correction in the future. The size of the effect was impressive.

What causes nearsightedness?

Myopia, or nearsightedness, is a condition in which you can’t see far away but can see up close – without glasses or contact lenses. It typically starts during the early elementary school years. Because kids don’t know how other kids see, they often think their blurry vision is normal, so regular eye examinations are important during childhood.

With myopia, the eye is growing, but growing too long for distant rays of light to focus accurately on the back of the eye. A blurry image results.

For children, eyeglasses or contact lenses move the focus back to the retina, and a clear image is formed. The too-long eye measured from front to back cannot be “shrunk,” so refractive correction is then a lifelong necessity. In adulthood, surgery is an option.

But kids don’t always like wearing glasses, sometimes with good reason. It is harder to play sports in them. Swimming is nearly impossible, and kids tend to lose or break them.

Myopia on the rise

A worldwide epidemic of nearsightedness has been reported, associated with a combination of genetic and environmental factors. Besides creating the need to wear eyeglasses or contact lenses or to seek a surgical remedy, myopia can result in blinding eye diseases late in life, like retinal detachment or degeneration.

Risk factors include having myopic parents. A debate about the influence of reading and other close work has flourished for more than a century.

The bad actor in the environment was always assumed to be near work, such as reading, sewing and now computer, video game and smartphone usage. That theory makes so much intuitive sense. The eye in childhood is naturally growing longer, even in normally sighted children. In a child developing myopia, the eye grows to focus on the frequently observed, near-viewing field.

No less than Johannes Kepler, the astronomer and inventor who refined glass lenses for eyeglasses, was convinced that his poring over astronomical charts and calculations in the late 1500s was responsible for his nearsightedness. Kepler had it right when it came to the orbit of planets, but he was wrong about how the environment influences prescriptions for eyeglasses. The latest evidence says that near-work is not to blame for nearsightedness.

We studied this question for over 20 years in 4,979 children as part of the Collaborative Longitudinal Evaluation of Ethnicity and Refractive Error (CLEERE) Study, funded by the National Eye Institute, in order to put near-work, computer use and watching television in their proper place – essential for study and recreation but not an important factor in whether a child will need glasses.

Impressive differences for prevention

If a child has two nearsighted parents, the hereditary genetic effects increase the child’s chances of needing glasses to about 60 percent, if time spent outdoors is low.

More time outdoors, about 14 hours per week, can nearly neutralize that genetic risk, lowering the chances of needing glasses to about 20 percent, the same chance as a child with no nearsighted parents claims.

A recent survey of papers from around the world, including Australia, England and Singapore, in the last decade align almost perfectly with what we published in 2007 from the Orinda Longitudinal Study of Myopia.

Parents may ask: What about children who already wear glasses? Does more time outside help already nearsighted children?

Unfortunately, we and others have found that time outdoors has little to no effect on how prescriptions change over time in children who are already nearsighted, although more study of this is ongoing.

Enlightening theories

So what’s so good about being outdoors for a child without glasses? There are several theories.

One is that children may exercise more when they are out of doors and that exercise is somehow protective. Another is that more ultraviolet B radiation from the sun makes for more circulating vitamin D, which somehow prevents abnormal childhood eye growth and myopia onset. Yet another is that light itself slows abnormal myopic eye growth and that outdoors, light is simply brighter.

The dominant theory is that the brighter light outside stimulates a release of dopamine from specialized cells in the retina. Dopamine then initiates a molecular signaling cascade that ends with slower, normal growth of the eye, which means no myopia.

Evidence from our work and from animal models of myopia indicate it’s the actual light exposure, not just a decrease in the time spent reading because children are outdoors, that may work the magic.

There’s clearly much more to learn, but before you send your children out to run around the block, remind them to put on sunscreen and to wear sunglasses. Even as time outdoors might prevent the development of nearsightedness, parents will want to ensure they aren’t creating other skin and eye problems from ultraviolet light exposure

News literacy 101: How to teach kids (and adults) to think critically

(Credit: AP)

If it’s tough for us grown-ups to figure out what’s real news and what’s fake these days, imagine how difficult it is for kids. Among hearing opinions at home, talking with friends, learning from teachers, reading things online or in print, and seeing news on television, kids have a lot of information to sift through and a lot of sources to evaluate. According to Common Sense Media’s report, News and America’s Kids: How Young People Perceive and Are Impacted by the News, kids feel scared and depressed about the news. How can we help them?

The answer is media literacy. And it starts with asking questions. By encouraging kids to question what they see and hear, you train them to think critically about information. With strong media-literacy skills, they’ll be informed, engaged, and less likely to be taken in by fake news.

Here are some practical tips to help your kid be a smart consumer of the news.

Don’t start believin’. While it’s important to be open-minded, in today’s world you have to be just a little skeptical of pretty much everything.

Little kids can build media-literacy skills by analyzing things such as toy packaging and cereal boxes. Tell them to put on their thinking caps (pantomime it!) to get them ready.
Tweens and teens can start with a little side-eye — especially at online news — and avoid sharing, forwarding, and commenting on stories until they’ve verified that they’re true.

It takes all kinds. Talk about how there are lots of different kinds of news sources: investigative journalism, research studies, opinion pieces, blogs, punditry, evening news, and so on.

Kids will hear about the news at home, at school, and in other communities they’re a part of. Explain that “word-of-mouth” stories and rumors aren’t always true. Playing an old-school game of telephone might illustrate the idea of how information can get twisted along the way.
Make sure kids know the difference between fact and opinion. If they’re older, talk about objective vs. subjective information and bias. Ask them for examples of undisputable facts and colorful opinions.
Explain the difference between established news organizations that follow certain professional standards and every other type of publisher.
Watch out for viral videos. Videos that circulate around the internet may or may not contain nuggets of real news, but they rarely represent the whole situation. And, like photos, videos can be doctored and edited to bend the truth. Check out Photoshop fails for visual examples.

From both sides now. There’s usually more than one side to a story.

Talking about a real-life situation can help little kids understand the idea that different people have different points of view. Ask: “Remember when you and your sister were arguing? How many sides to the story were there?”
Older kids already understand the concept of perspective but might need help to transfer the idea to the news. Ask them to consider how different audiences (by gender, race, and culture) might interpret a story.

Play bad cop. Interrogate the source.

Walk kids through the questions they can ask to test a source’s validity:

Who made this?
Why did they make it?
Is it for or against something or someone?
Are they trying to get a big reaction from me or just inform me? How can I tell?
Is anyone else reporting this news?


Look for signs that the source is legit and not fake, such as a clear “About Us” section and a standard URL (for example, “.com” instead of “.com.co”).
Older kids can dig deeper with fact-checking websites.

Putting the pieces together. Sometimes the news can be like a puzzle with information coming in bits.

Just as with a puzzle, we need more than one piece to see the whole picture, so checking other sources is critical.
Remind kids that it’s hard to have all the facts all at once. Even respected news outlets make mistakes or jump the gun. It’s smart to wait to make up your mind about something until you have more information.
Model a wise approach to news by using media-literacy skills yourself. Show kids how you check other sources and ask questions to get as much truth as possible.
Leave some space for kids to make up their own minds. Of course we want them to respect our values and beliefs, but we also want kids to hold them up to the light to see for themselves.

President Trump dedicates golf trophy to hurricane victims, Puerto Rico

(Credit: AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

As millions of Puerto Ricans plea for aid from the U.S. government, President Donald Trump provided them a trophy at a golf tournament on Sunday.

Speaking at the Presidents Cup golf tournament at Liberty National Golf Course in Jersey Center, New Jersey, Trump dedicated the trophy to the storm victims.

“On behalf of all the people of Texas, and, if you look today and you see what’s happening, how horrible it is but we have it under really great control, Puerto Rico. And the people of Florida who have really suffered over this last period of time with the hurricanes,” Trump said.

“I want to just remember them, and we’re going to dedicate this trophy to all those people who went through so much, that we love, that are part of our great state, really a part of our great nation,” the president added.

A person at the trophy ceremony shouted, “You don’t give a shit about Puerto Rico!” according to reporters at the event.

The Trump administration has been under fire for inadequately responding to the disaster in Puerto Rico, where  of American citizens are without power. Trump has tried to silence the criticism by constantly extolling the recovery process.

Trump has not yet visited Puerto Rico but he has targeted Twitter attacks at Puerto Rican officials who have criticized his administration.

The president is scheduled to travel to Puerto Rico on Tuesday.