Rouge Forum Dispatch: When Will the Draft Begin?
Saturday, October 12th, 2019We Say Fight Back!
Chicago Teachers Union Blasts City’s Final Contract Offer as Strike Date Inches Closer
The Chicago Teachers Union blasted a final contract offer put forth by the Chicago Public Schools and Mayor Lori Lightfoot on Friday, describing the proposal as “half-baked” and “wholly deficient.”
Following Friday’s negotiations, the two sides didn’t appear to be any closer to avoiding a strike on Oct. 17.
“Their actions today are designed to force a strike, by refusing to put an offer forward that represents progress for students or respects teachers and clinicians,” CTU President Jesse Sharkey said on Friday.
The CTU and CPS have been at odds over several key issues including class sizes, teacher pay and adding additional resource staff.
CPS officials released a press release on Friday, outlining several changes included in the proposed contract, including dropping a proposal on teacher preparation time and offering additional support for overcrowded classrooms.
The CTU insisted the district hadn’t allocated adequate funding to address overcrowding, saying the $1 million offered by CPS would be barely enough money to hire two dozen teacher assistants and teachers.
When it comes to hiring additional nurses, social workers and case managers, the school district dedicated $400,000, which the union pointed out is a “fraction of a hundredth of a percent” of the district’s budget. www.nbcchicago.com/news/local/Chicago-teachers-union-blast-final-offer-contract-562873061.html
The Radical Guidebook Embraced by Google Workers and Uber Drivers
A book based on ideas associated with a labor group from the early 20th century has provided a blueprint for organizing without a formal union.
Its authors are a longtime labor historian, ROUGE KEYNOTER, Staughton Lynd, and an organizer, Daniel Gross. They identify with a strain of unionism popularized in the early 1900s by the Industrial Workers of the World, a radical labor group known as the Wobblies that defined itself in opposition to mainstream trade unions.
The book has been “incredibly helpful in thinking through options for action, ways of building collective power, and giving workers who often aren’t familiar with labor law some working knowledge that can guide decision making,” said Meredith Whittaker, a leader of the walkout who left Google in July after more than a dozen years at the company. www.nytimes.com/2019/10/10/business/economy/labor-book.html
Ecuadorian Protests Intensify as President Flees Capital, Blames Venezuela
Dakota Access Pipeline Activists Face 110 Years in Prison, Two Years After Confessing Sabotage
Two women who vandalized the Dakota Access pipeline in an effort to halt construction have been indicted on charges that carry up to 110 years in prison and hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines. They are among the harshest penalties environmental activists have faced in the last decade.
Civil liberties lawyers say the charges are in line with industry-inspired scare tactics meant to deter citizens from participating in direct-action protests or acts of sabotage against oil and gas companies. As the deadly impacts of carbon emissions grow ever clearer, the fossil fuel industry has increased pressure on lawmakers and government officials to penalize those who would inhibit their projects’ operations.
At the same time, a growing number of activists have demonstrated willingness to break laws in order to highlight the urgency of the climate emergency and other ecological crises. Ruby Montoya and Jessica Reznicek, who stand accused of damaging pipeline valve sites using a welding torch, “tires ignited by fire, and gasoline-soaked rags,” are part of that trend. theintercept.com/2019/10/04/dakota-access-pipeline-sabotage/?fbclid=IwAR1AXXCAupaeZM1s-GbeTriapu6n2utcJLOhuFGHKAyFq83cVOBR9v2RbmQ
The Little Red Schoolhouse
Charter Scandal Exposes Holes in State Processes
Just one process in California is designed to act as an early warning system when financial shenanigans are going on inside schools. It’s a yearly audit, by a “state-approved,” “independent” auditor, according to the Department of Education.
But the auditors are not exactly independent, reports VOSD’s Will Huntsberry. Auditors are hired and fired at will by the schools they are supposed to be auditing.
“The term state-approved is also something of a misnomer,” reports Huntsberry. “To qualify as an approved firm, the State Controller’s Office must only verify that the potential auditors are accountants in good standing with the California Board of Accountancy. No special training or vetting required.”
Newly released transcripts from a grand jury proceeding into an alleged $80 million charter school scam also show that the audits are not designed to dig deeply into a charter school or school district’s finances.
(You may remember the DA’s office recently charged 11 people in connection to the dealings of a company called A3 Education. Prosecutors say two men were the ringleaders in an operation that siphoned $80 million of public education money into companies they controlled.) www.voiceofsandiego.org/topics/news/morning-report-charter-scandal-exposes-holes-in-state-processes/?utm_source=Voice+of+San+Diego+Master+List&utm_campaign=9cf800de28-Morning_Report&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_c2357fd0a3-9cf800de28-81862829&goal=0_c2357fd0a3-9cf800de28-81862829
Below, the long time SDSU racist portrayal of “Monty Montezuma”
SDSU to Make Formal Mission Valley Purchase Lowball Offer Monday
In a conference call with reporters Thursday, SDSU President Adela de la Torre announced that the university had unilaterally decided to get out of its confidentiality agreement with the city of San Diego. She and top aides also made it known that they would be presenting the City Council with a purchase offer for the 132 acres around the stadium in Mission Valley Monday.
She also announced that she would support paying for at least part of the contested Fenton Parkway bridge long envisioned as a necessary outlet for vehicles in Mission Valley. This appears to be a shift from the university’s earlier determination, in its environmental impact report, that the bridge isn’t something it would pursue to mitigate traffic impacts of its construction.
She reviewed the history of appraisals of the property and compared them positively to the latest, which values the site at $68.2 million (after deducting the cost of constructing the 34-acre river park and stadium demolition).
“The estimated cost of the 34 acre river park is $30 million. We will also be building additional parks, including hike and bike trails. SDSU is excited to do this for the benefit of all San Diegans. Let’s all win,” de la Torre said. www.voiceofsandiego.org/topics/news/morning-report-charter-scandal-exposes-holes-in-state-processes/?utm_source=Voice+of+San+Diego+Master+List&utm_campaign=9cf800de28-Morning_Report&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_c2357fd0a3-9cf800de28-81862829&goal=0_c2357fd0a3-9cf800de28-81862829
Bigger budget shortfalls than expected are ahead for Sweetwater school district
The Sweetwater Union High School District may have to make larger budget cuts next year than it previously estimated.
The 39,000-student district — the largest high school district in the state — may need to cut $24 million next school year out of an approximately $395 million annual general fund budget.
That’s roughly $14 million more in cuts than district officials first estimated in June.
“That’s a significant increase. There’s going to be a lot of work,” said Sweetwater Chief Financial Officer Jenny Salkeld at the school board meeting Tuesday. www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/education/story/2019-10-10/bigger-budget-cuts-than-previously-expected-are-ahead-for-sweetwater-school-district
Only half of California students meet English standards and fewer meet math standards, test scores show
Just over half of public school students who took the state’s standardized English language arts test performed at grade level, while only 4 in 10 are proficient in math, scores that represent a slow upward trend over the past four years, according to data released Wednesday by the state Department of Education.
Proficiency rates rose about 1 percentage point each in both English and math between 2018 and 2019, with 50.9% of students meeting English standards and 39.7% of students meeting math standards on the California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress, designed to test Common Core concepts. However, scores among African American students are markedly lower, prompting calls from educators to address the achievement gap.
Although the overall incremental progress is a good sign, education experts said it’s troubling that the majority of public school students test below grade level in math, and nearly half in English. Students in grades three through eight and 11th-grade high school juniors take the test. The low scores reflect a lack of investment in early childhood education and in the public school system, the experts said. www.latimes.com/california/story/2019-10-09/california-school-test-scores-2019
San Diego’s 20 top-paid school superintendents
1. Fallbrook Union High School
Former Superintendent Hugo Pedroza received $487,381 in base pay and $36,707 in benefits, for a combined total of $524,088. The sum includes an additional year’s base pay awarded to Pedroza as part of a settlement agreement between him and the school board.
According to the agreement, Pedroza planned to resign two years before the end of his contract, but the board opted to terminate him without cause so he could receive the severance bonus.
The district served 2,154 students in the 2018-2019 school year. www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/watchdog/story/2019-10-09/san-diegos-20-top-paid-school-superintendents
The International Hot War of the Rich on the Poor
www.facebook.com/MarineCorpsTimes/videos/701517653665165/?t=17
Isis militants break out of prison in Syria after bombing by Turkey
Five Isis militants have broken out of a prison in northern Syria after Turkish shelling nearby, a spokesman in the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) has said.
The detainees escaped from a prison in Qamishli city, Marvan Qamishlo said.
Meanwhile, women affiliated with Isis attacked security offices with sticks and stones during unrest at a camp in the region where Turkey has launched attacks.
The unrest at al-Hol camp started in the foreigners’ section and involved more people than previous incidents at the camp, Mr Qamishlo said.
“The [Isis] women rose against the internal security forces at al-Hol, they set ablaze tents and attacked the administrative and security offices there with stones and sticks,” he added said. www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/isis-turkey-syria-prison-bombing-kurds-sdf-a9152536.html?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Facebook&fbclid=IwAR1ikrvCeibf74q3PSU_t2bScPFo7Df_4nInTgaiPpvwWOCkqHmejP1jJMk#Echobox=1570810300
The Kurds: Betrayed Again by Washington
The warning signs were there all along, yet President Donald Trump’s brusque decision to pull U.S. forces out of northeast Syria nevertheless stunned Syria’s Kurds. Overnight, their dream of establishing an autonomous Kurdish region has been dashed, and they must now choose between a return to the mountains in a bid for survival, or staying put, awaiting a resurgent Assad regime and what it has in mind for them after six years of self-rule.
The fear of betrayal by superior powers is written into the Kurds’ DNA. Their birth as one of the world’s largest nonstate nations from the wreckage of the Ottoman empire derived from a broken promise by the victors of World War I, or this is how the Kurds see it. Divided over four states—Turkey, Iran, Iraq, and Syria—since then, they have fought and died in search of freedom and nationhood. Their successes invariably proved short-lived; each time, a vacuum they had exploited disappeared. Powerful allies on whose support they thought they could rely abandoned them. www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2018/12/chaos-washington-kurds-stranded/578941/?fbclid=IwAR12DgcjJHFT5iDUgAMpaCx-_vbs3sgW1KQQiWW6TpaHcFem5qdVFE3f_28
Syrian Arab Fighters Backed by Turkey Kill Two Kurdish Prisoners
The killings, one of them caught on video, raised the specter of wider sectarian warfare as fighting in Syria escalates.
Turkish-backed Syrian Arab fighters killed at least two Kurdish prisoners on Saturday, one of them lying on the ground with his hands bound behind his back, in a powerful illustration of the forces unleashed by President Trump’s decision to pull back American troops shielding former Kurdish allies in northern Syria.
A video that captured one of the killings shows two of the Turkish-backed group’s fighters firing bullets at close range into the man with his hands tied while their colleagues shout “God is great!” The second prisoner who was killed appears in the video alive and wearing a military uniform, but he is missing from the group’s later social media post about its captives.
“The guy in the military outfit was neutralized,” said Al-Harith Rabah, a media activist with the Arab fighters who was at the scene. www.nytimes.com/2019/10/12/world/middleeast/turkey-invasion-syria-kurds.html
US forces unharmed after coming under fire in Syria
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U.S. special operations forces located in Syria came under fire Friday but did not sustain any casualties, the Pentagon has confirmed.
Artillery fire from Turkish positions landed “a few hundred meters” near U.S. troops in Kobani, Syria, according to a statement late Friday night from Navy Capt. Brook DeWalt, Director of Defense Press Operations at the Pentagon.
The area was “known by the Turks to have U.S. forces present,” DeWalt said. “All U.S. troops are accounted for with no injuries. U.S. Forces have not withdrawn from Kobani.
Turkey this week began an offensive into Syria to strike against Kurdish groups Ankara sees as terrorist organizations, but which the U.S. has trained and equipped to lead the fight against the Islamic State organization.
“The United States remains opposed to the Turkish military move into Syria and especially objects to Turkish operations outside the Security Mechanism zone and in areas where the Turks know U.S. forces are present,” DeWalt added. “The U.S. demands that Turkey avoid actions that could result in immediate defensive action.” www.militarytimes.com/flashpoints/2019/10/11/no-us-forces-harmed-by-explosion-in-syria-says-official/
ISIS Rears Its Head, Adding to Chaos as Turkey Battles Kurds
The Turkish invasion of Kurdish-held territory in northern Syria raised new fears of a resurgence of the Islamic State on Friday, as five militants escaped from a Kurdish-run prison and the extremist group claimed responsibility for a bomb that exploded in the regional capital.
As Turkish troops launched a third night of airstrikes and ground incursions, Kurdish fighters said they had thwarted a second attempt to break out of a detention camp for families of Islamic State members.
The moves compounded a mounting sense of turmoil in northeast Syria, where tens of thousands of residents were reported fleeing south. The Turkish government said its troops had advanced five miles inside part of the country. Several major roads had been blocked and a major hospital abandoned.
Since Wednesday, Turkish forces have pummeled Kurdish-held territory with airstrikes and sent in ground troops, trying to seize land controlled by a Kurdish-led militia, the Syrian Democratic Forces. That militia fought alongside United States troops in the recent war against the Islamic State. www.nytimes.com/2019/10/11/world/middleeast/turkey-syria-kurds.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage
BBC: Who are the Kurds?
Between 25 and 35 million Kurds inhabit a mountainous region straddling the borders of Turkey, Iraq, Syria, Iran and Armenia. They make up the fourth-largest ethnic group in the Middle East, but they have never obtained a permanent nation state.
Where do they come from?
The Kurds are one of the indigenous peoples of the Mesopotamian plains and the highlands in what are now south-eastern Turkey, north-eastern Syria, northern Iraq, north-western Iran and south-western Armenia.
In the early 20th Century, many Kurds began to consider the creation of a homeland – generally referred to as “Kurdistan”. After World War One and the defeat of the Ottoman Empire, the victorious Western allies made provision for a Kurdish state in the 1920 Treaty of Sevres.
Such hopes were dashed three years later, however, when the Treaty of Lausanne, which set the boundaries of modern Turkey, made no provision for a Kurdish state and left Kurds with minority status in their respective countries. Over the next 80 years, any move by Kurds to set up an independent state was brutally quashed. www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-29702440?SThisFB&fbclid=IwAR3SszBBt3Z8RVmO1WZxcCwDdqYxbjswN5hdFb2RzZ1K5CZYhNC9q3CJWdU
The U.S. Is Now Betraying the Kurds for the Eighth Time
The U.S. has now betrayed the Kurds a minimum of eight times over the past 100 years. The reasons for this are straightforward.
The Kurds are an ethnic group of about 40 million people centered at the intersection of Turkey, Syria, Iran, and Iraq. Many naturally want their own state. The four countries in which they live naturally do not want that to happen.
On the one hand, the Kurds are a perfect tool for U.S. foreign policy. We can arm the Kurds in whichever of these countries is currently our enemy, whether to make trouble for that country’s government or to accomplish various other objectives. On the other hand, we don’t want the Kurds we’re utilizing to ever get too powerful. If that happened, the other Kurds — i.e., the ones living just across the border in whichever of these countries are currently our allies — might get ideas about freedom and independence.
Nothing in this world is certain except death, taxes, and America betraying the Kurds.
Here’s how that dynamic has played out, over and over and over again since World War I. theintercept.com/2019/10/07/kurds-syria-turkey-trump-betrayal/?fbclid=IwAR23aSNLxkP7SqqgAwFGZOOrI30pdaj2yEb547CzLxtSUZv_Vp1iTBjWH6A
Civilian Deaths in US Wars Are Skyrocketing Under Trump. It May Not Be Impeachable, but It’s a Crime.
fter nearly three years in office, President Donald Trump may have finally gone too far. His boneheaded attempt to enmesh another member of America’s gilded class into legal trouble with the help of a foreign country has awakened the full moral outrage of his political rivals. They are out for blood and, at long last, they may get it. “The president must be held accountable,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in a stern address announcing an impeachment inquiry. “No one is above the law.”
Anyone interested in the integrity of American democracy should welcome such accountability. And yet there are even more consequential reasons why Trump should be the object of our moral outrage. Not least among them are his central role in the violent deaths of thousands of innocent people.
Since his emergence as a political figure, Trump has promised that if he ever attained power, he would use the U.S. military to inflict a massive bloodletting on others, including noncombatants. Unlike other campaign promises, Trump has delivered on this one. Since taking office, he has presided over skyrocketing rates of civilian casualties in America’s many foreign conflicts. Beneath the hue and cry of the impeachment announcement, more people are dying in wars that are being waged as Trump promised, with more brutality than ever.
The last few weeks provide several horrifying examples. readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/59017-civilian-deaths-in-us-wars-are-skyrocketing-under-trump-it-may-not-be-impeachable-but-its-a-crime
The International Economic War of the Rich on the Poor
After Avoiding Safety Upgrades, PG&E Hired Lobbyists and Public Relations Instead
Power shutoffs affecting more than 1 million residents, scheduled by PG&E this week throughout the San Francisco Bay Area and Northern California, have sparked a massive backlash, with many community members telling reporters that they are shocked that the company has not done more to upgrade its transmission lines.
The decision to shut off the electricity services, a precaution over concerns about high winds, raises the question of precisely how PG&E has been spending its rate-payers’ money. And the answer isn’t pretty: While neglecting safety upgrades and investments in its aging infrastructure, PG&E has instead been lavishly rewarding shareholders and buying political influence.
Over the last year, reporters have highlighted the large lobby spending and billions of dollars in dividend payments to investors by PG&E, while the company avoided necessary investments in its aging transmission towers — some of which are among the oldest in the world and were known to the company to be a potential fire hazard. The aging transmission lines caused the Camp Fire wildfires last November, the most destructive in California history, that left 86 dead, over a dozen injured, and caused at least $16 billion in damages.
The Intercept has identified even more money spent by PG&E on lobbyists and image-makers, including previously unreported filings made public through Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings that began in January. theintercept.com/2019/10/11/pge-power-shutdown-california/?fbclid=IwAR2-fzR23zCI6HbbDCmXiH8d3MaZnz8DDr5G6xrbd7uqwQ7i24mF7HJ-p6c
Federal Reserve approves rules to loosen bank restrictions
The Federal Reserve has approved a package of rules that will ease restrictions imposed on banks following the 2008 financial crisis, giving a victory to the banking industry and President Donald Trump, a vocal critic of the more stringent rules.
The Fed’s rule changes approved Thursday will implement legislation passed by Congress in May 2018 to loosen restrictions, especially on smaller community banks, that had been imposed by the Dodd-Frank Act passed in 2010.
Trump made Dodd-Frank a frequent target of his attacks on government over-regulation which he charged had hurt economic growth by making it harder for banks to lend.
The Fed’s changes will loosen rules in the area of capital and liquidity standards and also on the living wills big banks must develop in case they fail. www.pbs.org/newshour/economy/federal-reserve-approves-rules-to-loosen-bank-restrictions?fbclid=IwAR0mm7U5BQUL9Dr6zGt1PnK3YiRgvqQjKwxJhia3E9DIaBwJZbyz4ew5ypE
Wage inequality is surging in California — and not just on the coast. Here’s why
Wage inequality has risen more in California cities than in the metropolitan areas of any other state, with seven of the nation’s 15 most unequal cities located in the Golden State.
San Jose, with its concentration of Silicon Valley technology jobs, had the largest gap of any California metro area between those at the top of the pay scale and those at the bottom. It ranked second in the nation after the suburb of Fairfield, Conn., home to wealthy New York financiers, according to a new analysis of 2015 U.S. Census data by Federal Reserve economists. San Francisco and Los Angeles also ranked high on the list.
More surprising, perhaps, is the inclusion of Bakersfield, where high-wage engineering jobs are juxtaposed with poverty-wage farm work.
The heavy concentration of California metro areas is a striking turnabout from 1980, when just three figured in the top 15.
No One Needs a Superyacht, but They Keep Selling Them
Billionaires won’t stop buying superyachts. You can even thank Donald Trump.
The end of summer is a nervous time for superyacht designers, and not because they fear that the owners of their latest creations may be disappointed with the first outings in the Mediterranean.
The worry is about the designers’ next vessels, because this is the time of year when clients whose boats are still in production come back from holidays with a wish list of new features — usually, based on what they saw on their friends’ yachts or at the Monaco Yacht Show, which ended Sept. 28.
“Right now we are quite far down the line in completing a big yacht in northern Europe for one client who has just spent time on a friend’s boat, which is not necessarily helpful,” said Dickie Bannenberg, the head of one of the world’s best-known superyacht design houses, Bannenberg & Rowell. He was in his London studio, an airy two-story space lined with sleek models of its creations.
“The delivery date is in the first half of next year, and that is sooner than it might seem,” Mr. Bannenberg said. “It’s fine when it’s superficial — let’s say they liked the plates or towels on their friend’s yacht — but if you’re not careful it can verge on, ‘Oh, my friend’s gym was like this, can we have something similar?’ or, ‘I would really like to add a submersible vessel.’” (NYT 10/8/19)
Miners Kill Indigenous Leader in Brazil During Invasion of Protected Land
Several dozen heavily armed miners dressed in military fatigues invaded an indigenous village in remote northern Brazil this week and fatally stabbed at least one of the community’s leaders, officials said Saturday.
The killing comes as miners and loggers are making increasingly bold and defiant incursions into protected areas, including indigenous territories, with the explicit encouragement of Brazil’s far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro. Officials warned the conflict could escalate in the coming hours.
Mr. Bolsonaro has said that indigenous communities are in control of vast territories that should be opened up to industries to make them profitable.
Land invasions in indigenous territories are on the rise across Brazil, where indigenous leaders say they regularly come under threat by miners, loggers and farmers. Yet assassinations of indigenous leaders are rare. www.nytimes.com/2019/07/27/world/americas/brazil-miners-amapa.html?fbclid=IwAR0RWP18Yv4hPMfDMkupM3wD8NbmGXa53hy5PhycARAKjZxOTwggQeDiY34
World’s richest man cuts health benefits for 1,900 Whole Foods workers
Jeff Bezos, the world’s richest man, is cutting health benefits for part-time workers at Whole Foods. The move will leave 1,900 people without health insurance.
The cuts don’t affect full-time employees, but will hurt those who work around 20 hours a week.
“I am in shock,” said one employee, according to Salon. “I’ve worked here 15 years. This is why I keep the job — because of my benefits.”
The Bezos-owned company said it was cutting benefits “to better meet the needs of our business and create a more equitable and efficient scheduling model,” according to Business Insider.
The decision provoked outrage and disgust on Twitter. Senator Bernie Sanders called Bezos out for his greed. www.frontpagelive.com/2019/09/14/jeff-bezos-cuts-health-benefits-for-nearly-2000-whole-foods-workers/?fbclid=IwAR1T7mDckqoNCBhp6jL_CG96gFD7MDXxc-bUZo2eoyGwsm_lx0O-9mL–Uk
For first time in history, US billionaires paid a lower tax rate than the working class
Last year, for the first time in history, America’s richest billionaires paid a lower effective tax rate than the working class, according to a new study.
The findings were published by UC Berkeley economists Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman in their book-length study, “The Triumph of Injustice,“ set to be released next week.
The analysis found that the wealthiest 400 families in the country paid an average tax rate of 23 percent in 2018, while the bottom half of households paid an average tax rate of 24.2 percent.
In 1960, the top 400 families had an average tax rate of 56 percent, according to a report from the Washington Post. By 1980, it had fallen to 47 percent. Meanwhile, the working class’s tax rate has remained relatively stable, the report said.
The economists write that they decided to examine the top 400 families because they currently hold more wealth than the bottom 60 percent of households. www.clickondetroit.com/news/national/study-for-first-time-in-history-us-billionaires-paid-lower-tax-rate-than-working-class?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=snd&utm_content=wdiv4&fbclid=IwAR37hAEFdHQ2Hrhyi3ptatzQmIoL1iLgxj5KyzRko9kVCul6gOed9dkVxfo
The Emergence of Fascism as a Popular Mass Movement and The War on Reason
Depraved Ruling Class: Bill Gates Met With Jeffrey Epstein Many Times, Despite His Past
Jeffrey Epstein, the convicted sex offender who committed suicide in prison, managed to lure an astonishing array of rich, powerful and famous men into his orbit.
There were billionaires (Leslie Wexner and Leon Black), politicians (Bill Clinton and Bill Richardson), Nobel laureates (Murray Gell-Mann and Frank Wilczek) and even royals (Prince Andrew).
Few, though, compared in prestige and power to the world’s second-richest person, a brilliant and intensely private luminary: Bill Gates. And unlike many others, Mr. Gates started the relationship after Mr. Epstein was convicted of sex crimes.
Mr. Gates, the Microsoft co-founder, whose $100 billion-plus fortune has endowed the world’s largest charitable organization, has done his best to minimize his connections to Mr. Epstein. “I didn’t have any business relationship or friendship with him,” he told The Wall Street Journal last month.
In fact, beginning in 2011, Mr. Gates met with Mr. Epstein on numerous occasions — including at least three times at Mr. Epstein’s palatial Manhattan townhouse, and at least once staying late into the night, according to interviews with more than a dozen people familiar with the relationship, as well as documents reviewed by The New York Times.
Employees of Mr. Gates’s foundation also paid multiple visits to Mr. Epstein’s mansion. www.nytimes.com/2019/10/12/business/jeffrey-epstein-bill-gates.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage
Trump’s children take in millions overseas as president slams Biden’s (Corrupt) son
Eric Trump sounded shocked that Hunter Biden hadn’t drawn more criticism for his lucrative business deals in Ukraine and China while his father, Joe Biden, was vice president.
“Can you imagine if I took 3 cents from the Ukraine or 4 cents from China?” President Trump’s second-oldest son asked in a recent Fox Business appearance.
Eric Trump and his older brother, Donald Trump Jr., run the Trump Organization, which conducts business — and takes in tens of millions of dollars annually — around the globe and is still owned by the president. The company is forging ahead with projects in Ireland, India, Indonesia and Uruguay, and is licensing the Trump name in such turbulent areas as Turkey and the Philippines.
Their sister Ivanka is a senior advisor to the president. She kept her international fashion business going for 18 months after she was given a loosely defined White House portfolio that includes interacting with heads of state and working with domestic and international corporate chiefs on economic programs. www.latimes.com/politics/story/2019-10-10/trumps-adult-children-do-business-overseas-as-president-slams-biden
Why Flint residents are still dealing with water worries, 5 years after lead crisis (PBS VIDEO at link)
Solidarity for Never
The Impending UAW Sellout
GM is taking a hard line. Instead of throwing the UAW a bone, company negotiators floated the idea of shutting down the jointly run UAW-GM Center for Human Resources, which funnels $9-12 million a year into the coffers of the UAW. The CHR, which workers refer to as the Center for Hidden Relatives, has been source of padded salaries and huge kickbacks for union officials and their families.
Backed by powerful Wall Street interests, GM has been willing to absorb the short-term cost of a protracted strike, which is already estimated at $1.13 billion in lost profits, in order to achieve its long-term goals of gutting health care benefits, closing underutilized plants and tripling the number of temporary workers who can quickly be fired in the event of a sales slowdown.
For the corporate and financial elite, the defeat of the strike is a strategic question because it would pave the way for the creation of a “flexible manufacturing workforce,” made up of low-wage, at-will employees with no job protections or medical and retirement benefits.
In the face of this, the UAW is isolating the GM strikers. It has kept 110,000 Ford and Fiat Chrysler workers on the job and sanctioned forced overtime and speedups to help the automakers stockpile in case of a strike. It has also put GM workers on poverty strike benefits of $250 a week, hoping to exert as much economic pressure as possible on workers to wear them down. www.wsws.org/en/articles/2019/10/11/auto-o11.html
Feds probe whether Detroit carmakers helped fund Dennis Williams’ UAW cabin
Federal agents are investigating whether Detroit automakers indirectly paid to build a lakefront home for retired United Auto Workers President Dennis Williams at the union’s northern Michigan resort, three sources told The Detroit News.
Investigators have issued grand jury subpoenas, including at least one to a contractor who worked at the UAW Black Lake Conference Center, to determine whether as much as $1 million from Detroit automakers was spent on personal luxuries for union leaders, according to sources familiar with the investigation who are not authorized to speak publicly. Those luxuries include a three-bedroom, three-and-a-half bath, 1,885-square-foot home for Williams, boats and a dock exclusively used by UAW officers, the sources said.
The government is trying to determine whether money from General Motors Co., Ford Motor Co. and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV was funneled through jointly operated training centers to pay for perks for UAW leaders at the 1,000-acre Black Lake retreat in Onaway either with or without the consent of auto executives. The inquiry is among the reasons why a team of investigators from the FBI, Internal Revenue Service and Labor Department raided the retreat on Aug. 28 as part of a series of nationwide searches targeting UAW leaders, the sources said.
The UAW used its own money to pay for the Williams home and renovate an adjacent cottage used by the retired president, union spokesman Brian Rothenberg told The News. The expenses were part of a $10 million Black Lake renovation project…www.detroitnews.com/story/business/autos/general-motors/2019/10/08/feds-probe-whether-carmakers-helped-fund-dennis-williams-cabin/2163616001/
Spy versus Spy
The ‘Whistleblower’ Probably Isn’t
It’s an insult to real whistleblowers to use the term with the Ukrainegate protagonist
Start with the initial headline, in the story the Washington Post “broke” on September 18th:
TRUMP’S COMMUNICATIONS WITH FOREIGN LEADER ARE PART OF WHISTLEBLOWER COMPLAINT THAT SPURRED STANDOFF BETWEEN SPY CHIEF AND CONGRESS, FORMER OFFICIALS SAY
The unnamed person at the center of this story sure didn’t sound like a whistleblower. Our intelligence community wouldn’t wipe its ass with a real whistleblower.
Americans who’ve blown the whistle over serious offenses by the federal government either spend the rest of their lives overseas, like Edward Snowden, end up in jail, like Chelsea Manning, get arrested and ruined financially, like former NSA official Thomas Drake, have their homes raided by FBI like disabled NSA vet William Binney, or get charged with espionage like ex-CIA exposer-of-torture John Kiriakou. It’s an insult to all of these people, and the suffering they’ve weathered, to frame the ballcarrier in the Beltway’s latest partisan power contest as a whistleblower. www.rollingstone.com/politics/political-commentary/whistleblower-ukraine-trump-impeach-cia-spying-895529/?fbclid=IwAR03zZyLyy0Nul34Hkfav6skKCk7zPBQNPjzre2IZicxTUFlNRCihfyVv44
The Magical Mystery Tour
Attorney General Barr Rages Against Secularist “Assault” on Religion
Experts blame grim economic conditions and the predatory practices of pharmaceutical companies for the current opioid epidemic. Unrest and violence on the part of young men is often attributed to economic conditions and accessibility of fringe ideologies online. But Attorney General Bill Barr apparently has a different theory for both of these problems: not enough religion.
In a speech at University of Notre Dame’s law school Friday, Barr blamed “secularists” and “so-called progressives” for wreaking havoc on American society. Barr’s depiction of a war between the non-religious and people of faith shocked legal experts, who saw Barr’s defense of religious freedom as an assault on the First Amendment’s protection against the government’s establishment of any religion.
Experts blame grim economic conditions and the predatory practices of pharmaceutical companies for the current opioid epidemic. Unrest and violence on the part of young men is often attributed to economic conditions and accessibility of fringe ideologies online. But Attorney General Bill Barr apparently has a different theory for both of these problems: not enough religion.
In a speech at University of Notre Dame’s law school Friday, Barr blamed “secularists” and “so-called progressives” for wreaking havoc on American society. Barr’s depiction of a war between the non-religious and people of faith shocked legal experts, who saw Barr’s defense of religious freedom as an assault on the First Amendment’s protection against the government’s establishment of any religion.
“This is not decay,” Barr said. “This is organized destruction. Secularists and their allies have marshaled all the forces of mass communication, popular culture, the entertainment industry, and academia in an unremitting assault on religion & traditional values.” (Barr spent years profiting off of these same industries he is attacking. He served as general counsel at Verizon for eight years, held a had a paid position on the board of Time Warner for nine, and represented telecoms giant GTE in the 1990s.) www.motherjones.com/politics/2019/10/attorney-general-barr-rages-against-secularist-assault-on-religion/?fbclid=IwAR32I82Ovhm4nZBTWsNL0C76Qd8CbCz1FxcsihPcmYUhXuvLqQw7z19NHgY
THIS SUNDAY, October 13: Chicago Teachers Union members are invited to gather for a moment of prayer during Sunday worship at St. James Community Church, 8000 S. Michigan with Pastor William E. Hall. CTU officers Christel Williams-Hayes and Stacy Davis Gates will be in attendance. Please join us!
The Best and Worst Things in the History of the World
www.facebook.com/coffeemusic01/videos/2981001548792524/?t=25
MLB May Have Completely Changed its Baseballs for the Playoffs and Nobody Knows Why
For Major League Baseball fans out there, there are few things more thrilling than seeing the ball fly out of the park. The “Chicks Dig the Long Ball” theory exists for a reason, after all. Everyone loves homers. But in case some of you haven’t been paying close attention, there’s been a big difference in the pop coming off the bats in the record-setting 2019 regular season compared to the ongoing postseason– and it’s happened suddenly.
But Why? Could it be because MLB decided to change balls on us? Allow one baseball-crazed physicist to explain. www.12up.com/posts/did-mlb-get-rid-of-juiced-balls-for-2019-playoffs-01dpv4rkr2px/partners/36534?fbclid=IwAR2f__DJtRwTdkFuud7jLo2sa2ZhJrmwiqxF_3OY_ttVSs4Z_803OHuMr4o
2009 Detroit Christmas Day ‘underwear bomb’ maker confirmed dead
The White House is confirming for the first time that Ibrahim al-Asiri, a master al Qaeda bombmaker, is dead.
The Saudi Arabian native was the mastermind behind the “underwear bomb” attempt to detonate a flight above the skies of Detroit on Christmas Day in 2009. It failed.
He was widely credited with perfecting miniaturized bombs with little or no metal content that could make it past some airport security screening. That ability made him a direct threat to the US, and some of his plots had come close to reaching their targets in the US.
It was previously reported by other US officials that al-Asiri was likely killed two years ago. www.clickondetroit.com/news/2009-detroit-christmas-day-underwear-bomb-maker-confirmed-dead?breaking_news=9581&utm_content=18294746&utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Breaking%20News%20Alert&utm_term=wdiv_breaking
So Long
Karen Pendleton, One of the Original Mouseketeers, Dies at 73
She was one of only nine kids who appeared on ‘The Mickey Mouse Club’ during its entire original run.
Karen Pendleton, one of the original Mouseketeers on The Mickey Mouse Club, died from a heart attack on Sunday in Fresno, California, Disney historian and author Lorraine Santoli announced. She was 73.
Among the youngest of the kids on the show, Pendleton was known for her shoulder-length blond curls and for being paired with fellow Mouseketeer Cubby O’Brien in the show’s sweet closing number, “Alma Mater” (“Now it’s time to say goodbye to all our company …”).
www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0yTdC35vM0
Pendleton worked on the Disney series throughout its four-year run (1955-59) on ABC, then entertained generations of children around the world for decades after it played in syndication. She was one of only nine kids who appeared on the program during its entire original airing. www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/karen-pendleton-dead-original-mouseketeer-mickey-mouse-club-was-73-1245964