Rouge Forum Dispatch: Resistance (not a ghost) is Risen!
April 1st, 2018 / Author: rgibsonWe Say Fight Back!
Oklahoma teachers say they’re going on strike next week
Tax cuts and budget cuts forced 20 percent of public schools in the state to switch to four-day weeks.
Time is running out for Oklahoma lawmakers. They have until April 2 to reach a spending deal or teachers will strike en masse.
Oklahoma’s teachers are rebelling against years of deep cuts to education that have left 20 percent of public schools on a four-day-week schedule and average teacher salaries ranked 49th in the country. Last year, about a quarter of the state’s public school teachers left the state or quit teaching altogether.
Those who remain have come up with a list of demands. Teachers want raises for all state employees for the next three years, plus more spending on health care and pension plans. They also want lawmakers to restore millions of dollars in school funding that have been cut in the past decade. To meet the educators’ demands, state legislators need to come up with $3.3 billion over three years to pay for it.
So far, lawmakers have come up short. The latest of several bills, which passed the Republican-controlled Senate Wednesday night after moving through the House, would raise taxes on cigarette sales, oil production, and diesel to pay for the raises. It would be the first increase in state taxes in 28 years, but would still only bring in $447 million for teacher pay raises, a fraction of the $3.3 billion needed to give teachers what they want. Gov. Mary Fallin is expected to sign the bill Thursday.
The Oklahoma Education Association isn’t backing down from its original demands. So unless a surprise deal comes together in the next four days, teachers and school administrators who serve 73 percent of the state’s students won’t show up to work Monday. State employees are prepared to strike too. www.vox.com/2018/3/29/17164284/oklahoma-teachers-strike
Arizona teachers demand 20 percent raises, more money for students
Frustrated and desperate, Arizona educators are demanding 20 percent pay raises to address the state’s teacher crisis and have threatened to take escalated action if state leaders don’t respond with urgency.
About 2,500 teachers and their supporters — clad in a sea of red — cheered organizers of the Arizona Educators United grassroots group as they announced their list of demands of Gov. Doug Ducey and the Legislature at a Wednesday evening rally at the Capitol.
The educators said Ducey and state legislators have failed Arizona’s students and teachers by not adequately funding public education.
The organizers said they will give the governor and state lawmakers through the end of this legislative session to act on their demands, and said they would go on strike if they did not.
“Governor Ducey, Legislature, the last thing that any of us want to do is go on strike, but if we have to, we will,” said Dylan Wegela, an organizer and teacher in the Cartwright School District.
“Arizona Educators United is prepared to do whatever it takes to reach our demands,” Wegela said. “However, we will do everything in our power to avoid a strike. As educators, we’re willing to put kids first, even when the state won’t.” www.azcentral.com/story/news/politics/arizona-education/2018/03/28/arizona-teachers-demand-20-percent-raise-education-funding-governor-doug-ducey-legislature-redfored/462810002/
Irate Teachers Skip Class Across Kentucky To Protest Surprise Pension Overhaul
As of Thursday morning, SB 151 was a bill about sewage services.
But by the time both chambers of the Kentucky Legislature had passed it that night, the amendment process had turned the bill about sewage into a 291-page overhaul of public employees’ retirement benefits. Now, it rests on Gov. Matt Bevin’s desk awaiting his signature — and teachers across the state are livid.
Even before the state Senate passed the bill Thursday night, teachers and other school staff had descended on the Capitol in Frankfort, bearing signs and belting chants in protest of the fast-moving legislation. Still more protesters arrived in the capital Friday, and thousands of others called off work — so many, in fact, that schools in roughly two dozen counties shuttered their classrooms.
“This has been a difficult evening for all of us in education,” Madison County Public Schools, one of the state’s largest districts, said on Facebook on Thursday night. “We share a passion for our students and for their futures that is unmatched and unwavering. Tonight we have to balance that passion with the need to stand in solidarity with others in our profession across this state.”
Then, in all caps, the post announced there would be “NO SCHOOL” Friday.
At issue, specifically, are state employees’ pensions. Ryland Barton of member station Kentucky Public Radio broke down some of the major changes included in the bill. You can find that summary in the text inset below or read the bill for yourself. www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/03/30/598341937/irate-teachers-skip-class-across-kentucky-to-protest-surprise-pension-overhaul?utm_source=facebook.com&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=npr&utm_term=nprnews&utm_content=20180330
Voices of Conscience Conference
Please note, this conference is only open to a limited number of attendees. Registration for the conference ends March 30. Contact Lisa Gingerich to register.
The Kroc Institute is sponsoring the conference “Voices of Conscience” at the University of Notre Dame. The conference will examine the history and moral and political implications of opposition to war within the military during the Vietnam and Iraq wars.
Confirmed participants in the conference include Madame Ton-Nu-Thi Ninh of the Ho Chi Minh City Development & Peace Foundation; historians Michael Kazin and Christian Appy; sociologist David Meyer; scholars David Cortright and Ann Mische of the Kroc Institute; and Veterans For Peace Executive Director Michael McPhearson, as well as veterans Skip Delano, J.J. Johnson, Fred Gardner, Jonathan Hutto, Jerry Lembcke, Camilo Mejia, Susan Schnall, Will Short, Michael Uhl, Jose Vasquez and others.
The program will feature literary readings from William Ehrhart, author of Vietnam-Perkasie: A Combat Marine Memoir; Roy Scranton, Iraq veteran and author of the book, War Porn; and others.
The program will also include film presentations featuring Connie Field and her new film The Whistleblower of My Lai; Academy Award winner Barbara Kopple and the films Winter Soldier andShelter; and David Zeiger and his film, Sir! No Sir!.
“Voices of Conscience” will launch the GI Press Collection, the newly created digital archive of antiwar newspapers published by active duty GIs during the Vietnam War. The conference will also feature the exhibit Waging Peace, highlighting information on soldier and veteran opposition to the Vietnam War. kroc.nd.edu/news-events/events/2018/05/22/voices-of-conscience-conference/
www.youtube.com/watch?v=3nPJgeg6hpA
Strikes in France: 200,000 march through streets to protest Macron’s reforms
www.facebook.com/telesurenglish/videos/1320294084780657/
An estimated 200,000 protesters took to the streets of France on Thursday in a showdown between trade unions and President Emmanuel Macron that could be decisive for his reform agenda.
Seven unions representing staff in the public sector led strikes and protests, and a third of railway workers walked out to join the demonstrations against 40-year-old Macron’s bid to shake up the French state.
Around 200,000 people demonstrated nationwide, according to police figures, including 49,000 in Paris. The CGT union, the biggest in the public sector, estimated the total turnout at over half a million.
Reminder: Coming anniversary of France, 1968
Prelude to Revolution is an essential history of the May 1968 protests and upheaval in France, during which French workers staged the first wildcat general strike in history and the largest general strike to this day. Daniel Singer discusses how these actions changed the world. Prelude to Revolution is the indispensable study of May 1968. Many generations have looked to older editions of this book for inspiration. Singer was widely considered the most adept interpreter of European politics for American audiences. He shows here how change happens – and why it is needed.
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Below, Bernard Coard, unjustly jailed in Grenada for 25 years following the US invasion in 1983, presenting his new book, “The Grenada Revolution, What Really Happened,” in London, March 25.
FROM THE CLASSICS: ENGELS ON ANARCHISM
“Written with brio, warmth, and historical understanding, this is the best biography of one of the most attractive inhabitants of Victorian England, Marx’s friend, partner, and political heir.”―Eric Hobsbawm
The Little Red Schoolhouse
The Learning Curve: ‘Restorative Justice’ Can Make Schools More Violent if Not Done Right
…Anthony Ceja, a senior manager for the San Diego County Office of Education who helps train schools on how to implement restorative practices, said they absolutely can lead to more chaotic classrooms when they’re not done properly.
To do restorative practices effectively, he said, administrators and teachers need to have clear communication. He often hears from frustrated teachers who say they send kids out of the room, only to see them reappear later. Because the teacher doesn’t know what was said in the office, he or she may assume the student faced no consequences.
“When you have a disconnect between teachers and the main office, that’s a formula for disaster,” he said.
Ceja said one of the biggest mistakes school districts have made is conflating lower suspension rates with restorative justice.
“The mistake that a number of school districts have made is tying restorative practices to reduced suspensions. If you do restorative practices well, the suspension rates will probably go down, but it’s not meant to be an alternative to discipline.”
Too often overlooked, Ceja said, is the relationship-building component of restorative justice, which helps students and staff see each other as people.
“This is what some schools really aren’t willing to do: Invest the time in the relationship building aspect of restorative justice. When students are able to humanize staff and other students, they’re much less likely to act out or hurt their classmates,” he said. www.voiceofsandiego.org/topics/education/the-learning-curve-restorative-justice-can-make-schools-more-violent-if-not-done-right/?utm_source=PANTHEON_STRIPPED&utm_campaign=PANTHEON_STRIPPED&utm_medium=PANTHEON_STRIPPED&utm_term=PANTHEON_STRIPPED&goal=0_c2357fd0a3-ed13d8d424-81862829
I got in, but by my final year I was miserable. I was so swamped with deadlines, test scores and essays that I never took time to reflect on who I was or who I wanted to become. After long days in the classroom, I came home to several hours of homework every night. Many of my teachers were of little or no help when I struggled with assignments, and when I had simply stopped attending class for days at a time no one even seemed to notice. In my senior year, the principal had no idea who I was.
When I did go to school, I watched my 16- and 17-year-old schoolmates pop Adderall to finish their essays and increase their SAT scores. nypost.com/2018/03/31/i-learned-nothing-at-one-of-nycs-elite-high-schools/
www.facebook.com/ForReadingAddicts/videos/1522274544567974/
Black students at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School want to be heard
Some African-American students at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida say their voices have been ignored by the media and others in the aftermath of the deadly school shooting.
The Cost of Success: How Letting Billionaires Shape Early Childhood Education Harms Kids—and Democracy
Racist posts prompt Michigan State University response to student body
Michigan State University is sending out a message to all students in the wake of racist social media posts that surfaced earlier this week and were connected to one of its students.
“Many of you have heard about and seen racist images circulating on social media tied to a member of our campus community. There is pain and anger being felt by our community members, students of color and especially our African American students,” excerpts from the letter say. “Actions and words that are meant to hurt someone based on their identity have no place in our community; hate has no home here on our campus. We know that this is not an isolated incident. Acts of discrimination, racial discrimination, and microaggressions against Black students and students of color are often unreported for many reasons, including the fear of invalidation and backlash.”
The letter, supplied to the Free Press late Saturday, will be fully distributed by Monday, MSU spokeswoman Emily Guerrant said in an email. www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/2018/03/31/michigan-state-university-racist-posts/476359002/
Nassar’s ex-boss accused of sexual misconduct at MSU
Larry Nassar’s former boss is facing accusations he used his own office to harass, discriminate, demean, proposition and sexually assault female students at Michigan State University.
District Judge Richard Ball on Tuesday morning authorized a criminal complaint and warrant against William Strampel on four charges, including misconduct by a public official, a five-year felony punishable by up to five years in prison and a $10,000 fine.
Strampel, former dean of the College of Osteopathic Medicine at MSU who took medical leave in December, is also charged with fourth-degree criminal sexual misconduct, a high court misdemeanor, and two misdemeanor counts of willful neglect of duty.
Michigan State Police Lt. Ryan Pennell outlined the case against Strampel in a court affidavit, which included accusations again Strampel by four women. Investigators said they also discovered pornographic videos on Strampel’s work computer at MSU and a video of Nassar performing his “treatment” on a young female patient. www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/michigan/2018/03/26/william-strampel-arrest-larry-nassar-msu/33310095/
Harvard administrators accused of embezzling $110,000 meant for disabled students, buying gadgets and sex toys
Meg DeMarco and a coworker are accused of stealing $110,000 from Harvard Law School.
(CBS News)
Meg DeMarco and Darris Saylors used to work at Harvard Law School, but resigned after a new budget manager discovered something wrong and started a police investigation, according to WBZ.
A criminal complaint seen by the station said that the pair each used tens of thousands of the stolen funds to buy iPads, IPods and laptops, with Saylors allegedly using a Dean of Students purchasing card for sex toys.
DeMarco, whose LinkedIn page says that she was in charge of managing the budget for the Dean of Students Office, is accused of using a mobile card reader to put money directly into her own personal bank account. www.nydailynews.com/news/national/harvard-admins-accused-stealing-110k-meant-disabled-stude-article-1.2985009
The International Hot War of the Rich on the Poor
Inspector General reveals DoD can’t verify where $3.1 billion was spent in Afghanistan
The DoD Inspector General (IG) revealed in a report last week that military authorities could not confirm whether the $3.1 billion in funding for the Afghan government fulfilled its intended purposes. According to the report, insufficient US oversight and Afghan capability led to mismanagement and an overall lack of assurance as to exactly where DoD funds ended up.
The funding provided by Combined Security Transition Command–Afghanistan (CSTC-A) to the Afghan Ministry of Defense (MoD) and Ministry of Interior (MoI) from 2014 through 2017 was meant to “increase ANDSF effectiveness and capabilities so the ANDSF can become more professional and increasingly self-sustaining.” Specifically, the $3.1 billion supported improvement of Afghan ministerial capacities. This includes training for Afghan personnel to better track budgeting and allocation for supplies like ammunition, vehicles, and fuel needed to support ANDSF combat efforts around the country.
The goal of the CSTC-A funds was to develop an independent and self-sufficient Afghan ministerial sector capable of supporting ANDSF forces battling a resurgent Taliban insurgency. Without an established complex to supply ammunition, vehicles, and necessary supplies, ANDSF forces could be cut off from vital resources needed to take and hold territory. The DoD IG warned that the MoD and MoI are not reaching this level of self-sufficiency, summarizing that they lack effective inventory and budgeting capabilities, can’t properly maintain equipment, and are still reliant on US assistance.
For example, the DoD simply doesn’t know where some of the vehicles it supplied to the ANDSF ended up. www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2018/03/inspector-general-reveals-dod-cant-verify-where-3-1-billion-was-spent-in-afghanistan.php?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+LongWarJournalSiteWide+%28FDD%27s+Long+War+Journal+Update%29
Theodore Roosevelt Strike Groups Enters 7th Fleet Area of Operations
The San Diego-based Theodore Roosevelt Carrier Strike Group has returned to the U.S. 7th Fleet area of operations after four months in the Arabian Gulf.
The 7th Fleet operates from the India-Pakistan border to the International Date Line, an area that includes China, Russia and North Korea.
The strike group includes the San Diego-based guided-missile cruiser USS Bunker Hill and guided-missile destroyers USS Halsey, USS Sampson and USS Preble.
“We are prepared to conduct a variety of operations while in 7th Fleet,” said Rear Admiral Steve Koehler, commander of the strike group. “We will continue our reputation of excellence and show that we remain committed to U.S. Navy presence in the Indo-Asia Pacific.”
While in the Arabian Gulf and 5th Fleet area of operations, the strike group took part in Operation Inherent Resolve fighting the remnants of the terror group ISIS.
The Roosevelt left San Diego on Oct. 6 for the regularly-scheduled deployment. timesofsandiego.com/military/2018/03/26/theodore-roosevelt-strike-groups-enters-7th-fleet-area-operation/
www.youtube.com/watch?v=UqkikdVVG4s
Can Resolute Support possibly still not understand Taliban strategy?
After nearly 17 years with boots on the ground, Resolute Support apparently still does not understand the Taliban’s strategy in Afghanistan. Or, if NATO’s mission does, its leaders are being intentionally obtuse in public statements in order to pump its public relations campaign in support of the Afghan military and government.
Just this week, Resolute Support spokesman Captain Tom Gresback claimed that Taliban operations in remote district centers “represent a significant lowering of ambition.” Below is the full quote, from a Reuters report that discusses the fighting in the southern provinces of Helmand and Farah, where the Taliban have recently made significant gains:
“Taliban offensives in these remote areas represent a significant lowering of ambition after their failure to take any provincial capitals in 2017,” U.S. Navy Captain Tom Gresback, spokesman for the NATO-led Resolute Support coalition, said in an emailed statement.
Gresback is parroting the line given by his boss, General John Nicholson, the commander of Resolute Support. Two months ago, Nicholson claimed Afghan forces had a successful 2017 in that it “[denied] the Taliban any of their stated battlefield objectives … In 2017 the Taliban failed to take any provincial capitals.”
Of course, Nicholoson falsely attributed a strategic goal to the Taliban that it never claimed. (For more background on this, see Afghan and Coalition forces prepare for 2018 offensive against the Taliban.)
The Taliban has explicitly stated that part of its strategy is to take control of remote areas in order to pressure more populated areas, including district centers and provincial capitals. In fact, this strategy was explained by Mullah Aminullah Yousuf, the Taliban’s shadow governor for Uruzgan, in April 2016.
Based on the US military’s own statistics, the Taliban has had success: nearly half of the districts in Afghanistan are controlled or contested by the Taliban.
www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-2/mswv2_09.htm
If the US military and Resolute Support truly does not grasp the Taliban’s strategy nearly 17 years after entering the country, we strongly suggest its commanders and its strategists take a history lesson. In his concept of People’s War, Mao Zedong believed it was important to keep the support of the people and fight in rural areas to sap the strength of government forces and extend its lines of communications. The Taliban has had success in both areas; it is always engaging the Afghan public and clearly maintains enough support to sustain its insurgency nationwide, while the Afghan security forces are stretched thin and its bases often are under siege or overrun entirely. www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2018/03/can-resolute-support-possibly-still-not-understand-taliban-strategy.php?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+LongWarJournalSiteWide+%28FDD%27s+Long+War+Journal+Update%29
U.S.-Russian relations worst Ambassador Antonov can remember
“Today Russia’s responsible for everything, even for bad weather,” Russia’s ambassador said.
Russia’s ambassador to the United States has told the “Today” show that he can’t remember a period of worse relations between Washington and Moscow, after both countries expelled dozens of diplomats following the poisoning of a former Russian spy.
In an exclusive interview with Savannah Guthrie broadcast Friday, Anatoly Antonov also reiterated Russia’s denials that it meddled in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, saying it was “impossible to imagine” that the Kremlin was responsible.
Special counsel Robert Mueller’s indictment of 13 Russian nationals on suspicion of interfering in the vote was, according to the ambassador, “not a proof” of responsibility.
“It seems to me that atmosphere in Washington is poisoned — it’s a toxic atmosphere,” he said. “It depends upon us to decide whether we are in Cold War or not. But … I don’t remember such [a] bad shape of our relations.” www.nbcnews.com/news/world/u-s-russian-relations-worst-ambassador-antonov-can-remember-n861391
Fuzzy Wuzzy Imperialism:
These are the cats and dogs the U.S. military is helping in Latin America
Man’s best friend is getting medical help from the U.S. military in Latin America.
The Army sent a group of veterinarians aboard the Virginia Beach-based USNS Spearhead as part of Operation Continuing Promise, which focuses on providing free medical care to local populations.
During the ship’s first stop, in Puerto Cortés, Honduras, veterinarians removed cancerous growths, provided rabies vaccinations and spayed and neutered dozens of cats and dogs over eight days earlier this month in a makeshift facility at a local school. They also treated a rabbit and some horses.
pilotonline.com/news/military/local/article_bf5a7f9e-2ea5-11e8-b043-d37ab30ec697.html
The International Economic War of the Rich on the Poor
Wall Street’s average bonus in 2017?
Three times what most U.S. households made all year.
Wall Street bonuses are climbing toward record highs again, according to government data released Monday showing that in 2017, the average bonus payout reached $184,220.
That is a 17 percent increase compared to the previous year and the closest Wall Street has come in more than a decade to its all-time high of $191,360 in 2006, according to the New York state comptroller. It follows an 15 percent increase in 2016, when the average bonus was about $157,660.
The bigger bonuses reflect a revival on Wall Street as the Trump administration begins rolling back financial industry regulations. The recent sell-off in the markets is creating the kind of volatility that Wall Street traders thrive on. And the Federal Reserve has begun raising a key interest rate, making it easier for banks to make a profit. The financial industry’s revenue increased 4.5 percent last year to $153 billion, according to the New York state comptroller.
The government figures also continue to reflect how much more Wall Street executives earn compared to the rest of the private sector. Including bonuses, the average Wall Street salary was $375,200 in 2016, the most recent year available, five times as high as the rest of the private sector, with an average of $74,800, according to the comptroller’s office. In New York City, about 25 percent of the industry’s employees took home more than $250,000, compared with 2 percent in the rest of the city’s workforce, the report said. The median U.S. household income reached $59,039 in 2016, according to the Census Bureau…
The larger bonus pool was due, in part, to the sweeping changes to the tax code passed last year that encouraged some banks to accelerate some pay and bonuses, industry experts said. Banks are expected to be among the biggest beneficiaries of lowering the corporate tax rate to 21 percent.
This comes at a time when efforts to rein in Wall Street pay are beginning to ease. In the 2010 financial reform package, known as the Dodd-Frank Act, lawmakers called for regulators to curb compensation that was considered excessive or pay that exposed a company to significant financial losses. Butprogress on the rules has been slow and is not expected to be a priority under the Trump administration. www.washingtonpost.com/news/business/wp/2018/03/26/wall-streets-average-bonus-in-2017-three-times-what-most-u-s-households-made-all-year/?utm_term=.2aa3bdeec3e1
II. What are our new findings on global income inequality?
We show that income inequality has increased in nearly all world regions in recent decades, but at different speeds. The fact that inequality levels are so different among countries, even when countries share similar levels of development, highlights the important roles that national policies and institutions play in shaping inequality.
How has inequality evolved in recent decades among global citizens? We provide the first estimates of how the growth in global income since 1980 has been distributed across the totality of the world population. The global top 1% earners has captured twice as much of that growth as the 50% poorest individuals. The bottom 50% has nevertheless enjoyed important growth rates. The global middle class (which contains all of the poorest 90% income groups in the EU and the United States) has been squeezed.
Income inequality varies greatly across world regions. It is lowest in Europe and highest in the Middle East.
- Inequality within world regions varies greatly. In 2016, the share of total national income accounted for by just that nation’s top 10% earners (top 10% income share) was 37% in Europe, 41% in China, 46% in Russia, 47% in US-Canada, and around 55% in sub-Saharan Africa, Brazil, and India. In the Middle East, the world’s most unequal region according to our estimates, the top 10% capture 61% of national income
wir2018.wid.world/executive-summary.html
Controversial water shutoffs could hit 17,461 Detroit households (Hope + Change!)
About 17,461 Detroit households are at risk for water shutoffs next month when the city’s water department resumes its controversial program, the Free Press has learned.
The potential shutoffs have angered some local activists who argue the city should instead create a comprehensive affordability plan to help prevent service interruptions altogether.
Water shutoffs have long been a divisive issue in Detroit. The shutoffs made international headlines in 2014 when tens of thousands of shutoffs began, catching the attention of United Nations officials.
“When I got here, 50,000 people were at risk of being shut off and 44,000 were actually shut off,” Water and Sewerage Director Gary Brown said in an interview. “The United Nations was here, people were picketing, and rightly so, saying this was inhumane and unfair.”
Last year, the water department shut off 17,689 delinquent accounts, a 20% drop from 2016 when there were close to 28,000 service interruptions, according to officials.
The average past due amount is $663, Brown said, adding that he expects the number of at-risk customers to drop significantly by May because he expects most customers will come in to set up payment arrangements. www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/detroit/2018/03/26/more-than-17-000-detroit-households-risk-water-shutoffs/452801002/
The Emergence of Fascism as a Popular Mass Movement and The War on Reason
Video Shows Unarmed Texas Man With Pants Down Before Fatal Police Shooting
Last Thursday morning, the Harris County Sheriff’s Office in Texas issued Cameron Brewer a body camera, making him one of the last deputies in the department to receive one. But two hours later, the camera was off and still charging in his patrol car when he came upon a fight at a Houston intersection.
Within 30 seconds of arriving, Deputy Brewer had exited his car, confronted a man in the street whose pants were around his ankles and fatally shot him once in the chest. While the deputy’s body camera did not capture the shooting, the Sheriff’s Office released footage from his car’s dashboard camera on Monday that offered another angle of the encounter, which many in Houston had quickly criticized as a case of excessive force and the latest example of an officer killing an unarmed black person.
In the video, Deputy Brewer, who is black, stops his car behind two men having an altercation, with shoving, in the street. The deputy can be heard yelling at Danny Ray Thomas, the man whose pants were down, as he walks toward the car. “Get down, man! Get on the ground,” the deputy screams repeatedly, before, out of the camera’s view, a single gunshot rings out. Mr. Thomas, 34, was pronounced dead at a hospital. www.nytimes.com/2018/03/26/us/danny-ray-thomas-houston-police-shooting.html?smid=fb-share
Stephon Clark Was Shot 8 Times Primarily in His Back, Family-Ordered Autopsy Finds
Stephon Clark, the unarmed black man who was fatally shot last week by Sacramento police officers, was struck eight times, mostly in his back, according to an independent autopsy released Friday, raising significant questions about the police account that he was a threat to officers when he was hit.
The autopsy — commissioned by the family of Mr. Clark, 22, and conducted by Dr. Bennet Omalu, a private medical examiner — showed that he was shot three times in his lower back, twice near his right shoulder, once in his neck and once under an armpit. He was also shot in the leg. The neck wound was from the side, the doctor found, and he said that while the shot to the leg hit Mr. Clark in the front, it appeared to have been fired after he was already falling.
“He was shot from the back,” Dr. Omalu said Friday at a news conference. Standing next to diagrams of the findings, he said that seven of the shots could have had a “fatal capacity.” He described severe damage to Mr. Clark’s body, including a shattered vertebrae, a collapsed lung and an arm broken into “tiny bits.” www.nytimes.com/2018/03/30/us/stephon-clark-independent-autopsy.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news
www.youtube.com/watch?v=1FH1sl37uY0
Lindbergh, fascist,whitewashed by Detroit News, along with his fascist pal, Henry Ford–“Native son.”
Prior to his barnstorming days, Lindbergh had graduated from military flight training as a 2nd lieutenant in the Army Air Service Reserve, antecedent to today’s U.S. Air Force. In 1941 he resigned his commission in protest to President Roosevelt’s war preparation policies. Following the attack on Pearl Harbor he tried to re-enlist but the White House refused to reinstate him, branding him a “Nazi sympathizer” and “ruthless enemy of American democracy” for his inflammatory speeches and radio broadcasts opposing America’s involvement in the war in Europe.
Above, Henry Ford’s newspaper. Below, Ford and Lindbergh
Henry Ford learned of his dilemma and came to the rescue. An avowed enemy of President Roosevelt, he was only too happy to hire the 40-year-old aviator. Lindbergh agreed to come aboard for $666.66 per month, the same pay he had been receiving as a colonel in the reserves. Both Ford and Lindbergh had seen their reputations plummet due to expressed anti-Semitic prejudices. It didn’t help that, prior to the war, the Nazis awarded them Order of the German Eagle medals adorned with swastikas. www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/michigan-history/2018/03/31/charles-lindbergh-detroit-roots/33399877/
US Puppet El-Sisi wins Egypt election with 92 percent: state media
Egyptian state media reports victory for Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, after securing 92 percent of the election vote.
![Turnout stood at about 40 percent, according to state media reports [Mohamed Abd El Ghany/Reuters]](https://www.aljazeera.com/mritems/imagecache/mbdxxlarge/mritems/Images/2018/3/29/dea05de7205548b2a9ca48ba5f880312_18.jpg "El-Sisi wins Egypt election with 92 percent: state media")
Turnout stood at about 40 percent, according to state media reports [Mohamed Abd El Ghany/Reuters]
Abdel Fattah el-Sisi has won re-election as Egypt’s president, according to preliminary results reported by a number of state media outlets, showing the former army general winning 92 percent of the vote.
The official MENA news agency and the state-owned newspapers al-Ahram and Akhbar el-Youm said on Thursday that 23 million out of the 60 million registered voters – 40 percent – turned out to cast the ballots during the three days of polling that ended on Wednesday.
El-Sisi’s opposing candidate, Mousa Mostafa Mousa, a little-known contender who entered the presidential race hours just before the nomination deadline, received 721,000 votes, according to al-Ahram.
Mousa had previously endorsed Sisi for a second term, and his official Ghad part had backed Sisi’s presidential bid just 10 days before he announced his candidacy.
Mousa has continuously refuted accusations that his candidacy was being used to present a false sense of competition. www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/03/sisi-wins-egypt-election-92-percent-state-media-180329134411321.html
Walmart To Remove ‘Cosmopolitan’ From Checkout Aisle (fear of sex, key to inner slave)
The nation’s largest retailer has bounced Cosmopolitan from the coveted checkout aisle following a years-long campaign targeting the women’s magazine for its “hyper-sexualized” covers and content.
Walmart said Tuesday that it was removing the magazine from checkout lines at its 5,000 stores across the country.
“Walmart will continue to offer Cosmopolitan to customers that wish to purchase the magazine, but it will no longer be in the checkout aisles,” the company said in a statement. “While this was primarily a business decision, the concerns raised were heard.”
Those concerns were raised by the National Center on Sexual Exploitation, which compares Cosmo to porn and has waged a campaign for years to get it removed from store shelves. It had previously succeeded in getting Rite Aid stores and Delhaize America (which owns Food Lion) to put Cosmopolitan behind blinders, according to USA Today. www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/03/28/597541958/walmart-to-remove-cosmopolitan-from-checkout-aisle?utm_source=facebook.com&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=npr&utm_term=nprnews&utm_content=20180328
Florida Cops Laundered Millions For Drug Cartels, Failed To Make A Single Arrest
Posing as money launderers, police in Bal Harbour and Glades County, Fla. laundered a staggering $71.5 million for drug cartels in an undercover sting operation, according to an in-depth investigation by The Miami Herald. With fake identities, undercover officers made deals to pick up cash from criminal organizations in cities across the country. Agents then delivered the money to Miami-Dade storefronts and even wired cash to banks overseas in China and Panama. After laundering the cash, police would skim a three percent commission fee, ultimately generating $2.4 million for themselves.
“If you think of all the money that’s made from drugs, at some point it has to be cleaned up and become legit,” remarked Finn Selander, a former DEA agent and a member of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition. But unless proper precautions are taken, sting operations can “backfire” and “come back and bite you in the proverbial ass.”
Together, the Bal Harbour Police Department and the Glades County Sheriff’s Office formed the Tri-County Task Force, which, despite the name, consisted of only two agencies. From 2010 to 2012, the task force passed on information and tips to federal agencies that led to the government seizing almost $30 million. Yet the undercover unit laundered over $70 million for drug cartels—more than twice as much as what was actually taken off the streets.
Notably, the Tri-County Task Force never made a single arrest. The task force countered that assertion, claiming they passed on intelligence that led to over 200 arrests made by other agencies. But a representative from the DEA said, “There’s no way we can validate those numbers. We have no idea what they are basing those numbers on.” Tellingly, “the task force did not document the names of the 200 people who were arrested,” according to The Miami Herald. www.forbes.com/sites/instituteforjustice/2015/07/10/florida-cops-laundered-millions-for-drug-cartels-failed-to-make-a-single-arrest/#38562cc23a9e
Solidarity for Never
Nevada Union and Its Largest Local Could Be Headed For a Quickie Divorce
Clark County officers understandably viewed this as a direct threat and sent out a bulletin headlined “NSEA Wants to Take Control of CCEA From Members.”
The newsletter accuses NSEA of trying to “conduct a hostile takeover” and describes a trusteeship as “a dictatorship.”
“There will be no democracy,” it reads. “It will be one person rule and that person will be NSEA appointed.”
And the affiliate issued its own threat as part of a Frequently Asked Questions section:
“Why are we still part of NSEA and NEA?“Good question and the answer will be decided by members.”
NSEA denied that the bylaw amendment was part of a hostile takeover, and claimed it was “written to give members real control over their association.”
Over the last decade, NEA established trusteeships over state affiliates in Indiana, South Carolina, and Alabama, but in each case at the request of the state union’s governing bodies. NEA state affiliates have a much more checkered record when it comes to establishing trusteeships over locals, especially when the dispute is about independence.
In 2014, the Maryland State Education Association reacted swiftly to a proposed disaffiliation attempt by its Wicomico County local by sending its chief counsel, along with some local representatives, to gain entry to a headquarters building after hours, seize the computers and the bank accounts, and change the locks. A judge issued a restraining order soon after and restored the elected officers, but the state union was ultimately successful: the local did not disaffiliate.
The California Teachers Association tried to impose a trusteeship over the Modesto Teachers Association the night before a disaffiliation vote by the rank and file, also in 2014. The local was prepared, however, and called the police when the CTA-appointed trustee tried to take over. The police would not allow the action without a court order. Once again, however, the state union was ultimately successful when the rank and file voted against disaffiliation. www.the74million.org/article/nevada-union-and-its-largest-local-could-be-headed-for-a-quickie-divorce/
The Deafening Silence of Florida Teachers Unions as a Red Tide of Teacher Rebellion Sweeps the Nation.
In the wake of the largest teacher protests this century over teacher salaries and benefits, Florida teachers unions have been remarkably silent. It’s as if the crimson tsunami of teacher rebellion sweeping across the nation from West Virginia to Oklahoma and now Arizona has completely bi-passed the Sunshine state. Are we somehow better off than teachers in West Virginia, Oklahoma, and Arizona? I would argue that other than a closer drive to Disney World and a free annual pass to Legoland, the answer is a resounding “No!”
The situation is even more dire for teachers in Miami-Dade who face some of the highest housing costs in the nation but have median salaries similar to those of teachers in Oklahoma and Arizona. According to the Florida Department of Education, the median teacher salary for teachers in Miami-Dade in the 2016-17 school year was only $45,236.
Compare that to a median salary of $50,919 in Tucson, Arizona. Note that housing costs in Miami are nearly double that of housing in Tucson and someone earning $50,919 in Tucson would need a salary of $65,800 in Miami just to compensate for the cost of living difference.
The reaction of Florida teachers unions to this unprecedented widespread teacher activism has been a deafening silence. Scroll through the Facebook page of the United Teachers of Dade and you won’t find one post about either the illegal yet successful strike in West Virginia, the threat of a strike in Oklahoma and their legislature’s immediate response with a bill promising a 5% pay raise, and now Arizona teachers’ protests demanding a 20% raise. Instead, you’ll find a post about women workers striking in Spain and a worker walkout over the fight for a $15 an hour minimum wage….
Since the decertification bill was passed this year, Florida unions are desperate to increase membership. But instead of calling for radical action, they have turned to blaming the teachers themselves for the sad state of their profession. Based on recent Facebook comments of union leadership and people representing union leadership, their talking points seem to consist of: A) What have you done for your union? and B) Teachers need to go out and vote. Kafka Teach
NEA bosses love Trojan Horse March for Our Lives
Thousands of newly minted voters (and nationalists) register (for the empire’s and Wall Street’s Dems)at March for Our Lives demonstrations
“People are really understanding the power of the vote and that’s what’s really motivating a lot of them. They’re figuring out the importance and power of civic engagement.” (More cops, more surveillance, empower our dear friend, the state)
At many of the March for Our Lives events across the United States on Saturday, speakers reminded the hundreds of thousands of people in attendance that there was an important way they could push for gun reform: register to vote and go to the polls.
According to many of the student speakers at the Washington rally, voting is the only way to pressure politicians to propose legislation that would meet the movement’s demands, which include universal background checks and bans on assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition magazines.
“Let’s take this to our local legislators and let’s take this to midterm elections,” said David Hogg, one of the survivors of the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, who helped organize the march. “Because without the persistent heat, without the persistence of voters and Americans everywhere getting out to every election, democracy will not flourish.” www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/march-our-lives-pushes-expand-voter-rolls-across-country-n859756
Supplicants! Opportunists! Dilettantes!! Party on! You have nothing to lose but integrity. But enjoy the croissants.
Freire was a devout Catholic. Ridiculous.
He was always complaining about being in exile. Put me in exile in Switzerland with a plum job with the World Council of Churches and you won’t hear a peep.
He was a revolutionary wherever he wasn’t and liberal wherever he was. When he returned to Brazil, he went to work for the hack Lula and complained about the school buildings, not the core of instruction.
He was a plagiarist. See the “Texts of Paulo Freire.” He stole a lot of his material from Dom Halder Camera, a Brazilian trying to defeat communists with liberation theology.
He built an opportunist little publishing cult around himself, then insisted, too much, on his own humility.
He sought to mix Che, Lenin, Mao, and others–add postmodernism, uncritically. Stupid.
His last wife is/was a gutter racist.
Nobody can fully explain how he goes from Brazil to Chile to Harvard.
Critical consciousness is not class consciousness. That is a dodge–part of the Freire hustle.
He claimed to “invent” a teaching method that probably predated Socrates.
He is a dead end. richgibson.com/rouge_forum/CSSE2008/GibsonCSSE2008.htm
In Gun Control Marches, Students Led but Adults Provided Key Resources
…organizers and supporters of Saturday’s events have done little to disguise that millions of dollars and thousands of hours were directed toward the weekend’s protests.
Everytown for Gun Safety, which was founded and financed by Michael R. Bloomberg, the billionaire and former New York mayor, proudly declared that it had doled out more than $1 million in grants to local organizers. A nonprofit led by former Representative Gabrielle Giffords and her husband, Mark Kelly, arranged for more than 200 people from the Parkland area to attend Saturday’s march in Washington, and said it had worked with the owner of the New England Patriots, Robert Kraft, to use the N.F.L. franchise’s plane to bring some people to the capital.
In Washington, volunteers staffed medical tents, the restaurateur José Andrés used one of his kitchens to prepare thousands of ham-and-cheese sandwiches, and a popular chain handed out personal-size pizzas to children.www.nytimes.com/2018/03/25/us/gun-march-organizers.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news
Spy versus Spy
Court Permits New York Police to Use ‘Neither Confirm nor deny”
For decades, it has been the federal government’s famous non-answer.
“We can neither confirm nor deny …”
It emerged in 1975 with the C.I.A.’s response to questions about the agency’s efforts to recover a sunken Soviet submarine in the Pacific. And in the decades since then, it has been used countless times by the C.I.A., F.B.I. and other federal agencies.
On Thursday, New York State’s highest court told the New York Police Department that it was free to use the phrase in response to inquiries from citizens who want access to their police files to learn if they have been the subject of surveillance.
The ruling, by the state Court of Appeals, carves out a new exemption in the state’s Freedom of Information Law, which has been understood to require local agencies to at least acknowledge the existence of records, even if they were not required to release them.
But the ruling for the first time allows the New York Police Department to avoid even answering whether such files exist, said Christopher T. Dunn, a New York Civil Liberties Union lawyer who filed a brief in the case. “That’s the ultimate act of secrecy,” Mr. Dunn said.
The New York Police Department has a reputation for secrecy, often declining to promptly release the kind of documents — complaint reports, use-of-force investigations, officer narratives of arrests — that many other departments disseminate to the news media. In 2016, the New York Police Department stopped releasing basic information about officer discipline, though it recently indicated it would resume releasing some information, though without officers’ names. www.nytimes.com/2018/03/30/nyregion/nypd-neither-confirm-nor-deny.html
The University That Launched a CIA Front Operation in Vietnam
How the friendship between a Vietnamese politician and an American academic led Michigan State University into a vast experiment in nation-building and pulled America deeper into war.
Time was, Michigan State University made national headlines mostly with its football and basketball teams. Then, more than 250 women accused Larry Nassar, a Michigan State physician and USA Gymnastics team doctor, of sexually assaulting them in the course of their gymnastics training. Since then, Nassar has been sentenced to up to 175 years in prison, MSU’s president and athletic director and five other officials have either resigned or been forced out, and pressure is mounting for its board of trustees to walk the same plank. From here on, many fear, the university’s name will be indelibly linked with the vile Dr. Nassar’s wholesale sexual abuse.
Or will it? A little over 50 years ago, another national scandal overtook Michigan State University, an academic and political cause célèbre that seemed to leave the school indelibly associated with—even, in some quarters, blamed for—nothing less than America’s war in Vietnam. Today the fateful exercise in nation-building and government-and-gown cooperation known as the Michigan State University Advisory Group rates but a footnote in popular histories of the war, if that. Ken Burns’ and Lynn Novick’s recent 18-hour documentary series The Vietnam War does not mention it at all.
To be sure, Michigan State’s entanglement in Vietnam was very different from Nassar’s crimes—a much more complex, morally nuanced saga of good intentions gone awry rather than stark abuse gone unmonitored. But its consequences were much broader.
In 1966, when news of the MSU project broke widely, it became notorious thanks to the exposé-packaging skills of a San Francisco editor named Warren Hinckle and his muckraking magazine, Ramparts. The cover of Ramparts’ April 1966 issue was one of the era’s definitive magazine images: a buxom caricature of Madame Nhu, the sister-in-law of South Vietnamese president Ngô Đình Diệm and the most visible and provocative voice of his regime, as a sweatshirt-clad MSU cheerleader.
The story inside, “The University on the Make,” was co-written by Hinckle and two other Ramparts editors, Robert Scheer and Sol Stern. It featured a confessional-but-accusatory introduction by an apostate ex-MSU political scientist named Stanley Sheinbaum. The main article recounted, in tones by turns gossipy and denunciatory, how an overambitious university had sold its soul, become a shameless CIA front, and helped launch a ruthless dictatorship and wasteful war by miring itself in a self-serving “Vietnam Adventure,” complete with the servants, spacious villas, free-flowing booze and other perks of the neocolonial elite.
This indictment has been taken up lately by Jeremy Kuzmarov, a history professor at the University of Tulsa, who denounced MSU’s role in “the making of a police state in South Vietnam” in his 2012 book Modernizing Repression and in a critique of the Burns/Novick documentary for HuffPost. It’s an appealing narrative, especially in light of the blunders and tragedies that ensued in Vietnam. But the full story is more complicated, interesting and, perhaps, instructive.
It’s a story I was present at, as much as a kindergartner can be present at such adult dramas and intrigues. As a young political science professor, my father, Robert Scigliano, was an assistant to the chief of the MSU project from 1957 to 1959. He later co-wrote a measuredly critical book about the project that was a prime source for the Ramparts article (though he would hardly endorse Hinckle and company’s practices or conclusions) as well as the first in a series of articles in American journals that triggered a rupture with President Diệm and the demise of the project. www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/03/25/vietnam-war-secret-msu-michigan-state-217705
Former FBI Agent In Minnesota Charged With Leaking Classified Documents
A former FBI agent working on counterterrorism has been charged with sharing classified documents with a news organization, including documents that reportedly show that the bureau continues to use race and religion to profile potential targets.
Attorneys for Terry James Albury said in a statement that their client was “driven by a conscientious commitment to long-term national security and addressing the well-documented systemic biases within the FBI.”
The charges come as the Trump administration has made prosecuting leaks by government employees to the media a high priority. In August, Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced that the Justice Department was launching a crackdown on the “staggering” number of leaks.
MPR News says Albury was assigned as Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport liaison working on counterterrorism matters. He was the only African-American FBI field agent in Minnesota, according to MPR.
“Terry Albury served the U.S. with distinction both here at home and abroad in Iraq,” the statement from the attorneys read. “He accepts full responsibility for the conduct set forth in the Information.” www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/03/29/597855294/former-fbi-agent-in-minnesota-charged-with-leaking-classified-documents?utm_source=facebook.com&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=npr&utm_term=nprnews&utm_content=20180329
Pulse Gunman’s Father Was an F.B.I. Informer, Widow’s Lawyer Says (she walked)
Seddique Mateen, the father of the Pulse nightclub shooter, was an F.B.I. informer for over a decade before facing an investigation into financial transfers abroad, a lawyer for the shooter’s widow said in a weekend court filing.
The lawyer, Fritz Scheller, said in a Sunday motion that the case against the wife, Noor Salman, 31, should be dismissed because prosecutors waited until Saturday, after they had rested their case, to reveal to him the relationship that Mr. Mateen had with the authorities.
“It is apparent from the government’s belated disclosure that Ms. Salman has been defending a case without a complete set of facts and evidence that the government was required to disclose,” Mr. Scheller wrote in the motion.
Ms. Salman faces charges of aiding and abetting her husband, Omar Mateen, in the shooting in Orlando, Fla., in which he killed 49 people and wounded 53 others. Her trial began this month. If convicted, she faces life in prison.
In the filing, Mr. Scheller said that a federal prosecutor notified him by email on Saturday that Mr. Mateen’s father was a confidential F.B.I. source at various times between January 2005 and June 2016, when the attack occurred. www.nytimes.com/2018/03/26/us/omar-mateen-father-seddique.html
The Magical Mystery Tour
Does Hell Exist? And Did the Pope Give an Answer? (Are you kidding–that’s where the money and children are…)
The Vatican felt obliged this week to reaffirm that Pope Francis believes in a central tenet of Catholicism, that there is a hell.
That odd declaration came after the newspaper La Repubblica published a front-page article on Thursday by an atheist, left-wing and anticlerical giant of Italian journalism, who reported that during a recent meeting the pope had said that hell did not exist.
Bad souls are “not punished,” the journalist, Eugenio Scalfari, 93, reported the pope as saying. “A hell doesn’t exist.”
Nor, for Mr. Scalfari, does a tape recorder or notebook or the orthodoxy of quotation marks.
The Vatican characterized the remarks as misquotations.
In the past, Mr. Scalfari, the founder of La Repubblica, a bible of the Italian left that he edited for decades, has admitted to sometimes putting words in the papal mouth. www.nytimes.com/2018/03/30/world/europe/pope-francis-hell-scalfari.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=second-column-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news
above, Hardboiled egg hunt…..
Barry Minkow movie is finally out!
But critics aren’t buying in
In February, 2015 I wrote that Bruce Caulk, a part-time La Jolla resident, had a problem: as a movie producer/director, he had invested a bundle in a redemption movie about San Diegan Barry Minkow, who had run a huge Ponzi scheme as a teen, had been sentenced to prison, but had gotten out when he found God. He had become head pastor of San Diego Community Bible Church, also running Fraud Discovery Institute, which smelled out corporate scams, often for the government. A great turnaround movie, right?
Nope. Minkow, a recidivist self-promoter, had taken money from members of his flock to help finance the movie in which he would play a role. He had screwed them. He had screwed a large company which he had blasted in one of his scam reports. So, back to prison. (He is still an inmate at California’s Atwater U.S. Prison, near Atwater, and is scheduled to get out June 6 of next year.)
While Minkow was still a local minister, fawned over by national media, Caulk produced a movie, starring such big names as Mark Hamill (Luke Skywalker), and James Caan and Talia Shire (of The Godfather). But then Minkow went to prison again for those two major sins. Back in 2015, Caulk told me, “Sometimes you pull the yarn on a sweater and the whole thing unravels. We will have to integrate his repeated misbehaviors into the second act.”
This month, the new movie came out. Name: Con Man. It is not getting good reviews. “Minkow can’t act a lick and his interactions with the rest of the cast are painful,” www.sandiegoreader.com/news/2018/mar/22/ticker-barry-minkow-movie-finally-out/
The Best and Worst Things in the History of the World
Trump Is President. April Fool! (A Holiday Quiz)
Besides the Easter holiday, this weekend we’re also celebrating April Fools’ Day, an excellent reminder that the country is now a quarter of the way through the second year of the Donald Trump presidency.
Hang in there, people! To see if you’ve been paying attention, here’s a quiz.
To start off the new year, Trump boasted that compared with North Korea’s leader, he had …
“Much smarter” foreign policy advisers.
A “much bigger” nuclear button.
“Much taller” friends in professional basketball. (much more and kudos for a perfect score) www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/03/30/opinion/gail-collins-april-fools-quiz.html
April 1, 1979: Iran becomes an Islamic republic by a 99% vote, officially overthrowing the Shah.
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www.facebook.com/CBSNews/videos/10154488855645950/
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www.facebook.com/TheDeathOfStalinMovie/videos/1688004101247701/
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www.facebook.com/luzirani.ortiz.9/videos/221316481779839/
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So Long
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Below, Evan Hughes, a good man
above Viola Liuzzo murdered March 25 1965, for fighting racism
Below, Linda Brown of Brown vs the Board of Education, died at 76
