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Why the Founding Fathers Thought Banning Torture Foundational to the US Constitution

Juan Cole Informed Comment
We will likely hear these false appeals to an imaginary history a great deal with the release of the Senate report on CIA torture. It seems to me self-evident that most of the members of the Constitutional Convention would have voted to release the report and also would have been completely appalled at its contents.

The Lame-Duck Congress Plots to Undermine Retiree Pensions

Michael Hiltzik, "The Economy Hub" LA Times
In 2006, Congress passed the "Pension Protection Act", which had a devastating effect on single-employer defined benefit pension plans. Now Congress is looking to do the same to multi-employer pension plans.

Mamdani's "Holistic Challenge": Anti-Zionists Must Persuade Jews They Can Only be Safe by Dismantling the Jewish State

Philip Weiss Mondoweiss
The Zionist message to the Jewish population of Israel is this, Zionism is your only guarantee against another holocaust. The opposite is the case. Jews can have a homeland in the Middle East, but their safety can only be achieved by dismantling the Jewish state, Mamdani said. His speech was a political challenge to Jewish anti-Zionists, now just a splinter, to launch a political struggle inside the Jewish community to liberate it from Zionism.

Wall Street's Democrats

Robert Reich Robert Reich
Carried interest allows hedge-fund and private-equity managers, as well as many venture capitalists and partners in real estate investment trusts, to treat their take of the profits as capital gains — taxed at maximum rate of 23.8 percent instead of the 39.6 percent maximum applied to ordinary income. So why didn’t Democrats close it when they ran Congress?

The Assassination of Fred Hampton: How the FBI and Chicago Police Murdered a Black Panther

Amy Goodman, Juan Gonzalez Democracy Now!
On December 4, 1969, Chicago police raided Hampton’s apartment and shot and killed him in his bed. He was just 21 years old. Black Panther leader Mark Clark was also killed in the raid. Authorities claimed the Panthers had opened fire on the police who were there to serve a search warrant for weapons, evidence later emerged that told a very different story: the FBI, the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office and the Chicago police conspired to assassinate Fred Hampton.

Red-Red-Green Is Triumphant!

Victor Grossman Portside
The “red-red-green” coalition has taken office in Thuringia, German -- having squeezed through to victory by one single wavering vote.