Tidbits - Dec. 19, 2019 - Reader Comments: Impeachment Matters; 2020 Elections as Anti-War Vote; Trump Jobs are Low-Wage; Free Public Transit; Family Separation-Nativity Scene; Greta Thunbeg: TIME Person of Year; Resources; Announcements
Re: Why Impeachment Matters, Regardless of the Outcome (Om Williamson)
Re: The 2020 Elections and the Anti-War Cause (Ethan Young)
Re: There’s a Philosophy Behind Trump’s Lies - How to Fudge, Obfuscate, and Lie Our Way into a New Universe - The War on Words in Donald Trump’s White House (Philip Specht; Ted Reich; Norberto Caraballo; William Davidowski)
The Season for Taking -- cartoon by Mike Luckovich
Re: Jobs, Jobs Everywhere, But Most of Them Kind of Suck (Marlene D McArthur; Sid Kivanoski)
Re: Key Takeaways in Newly Released Documents Detailing Failures of War in Afghanistan (John Woodford)
Re: Labour’s Manifesto is Fit for Purpose. So, Why are the Middle Classes so Hostile to it? (Dan Morgan)
Re: How Charlottesville's Echoes Forced New Zealand to Confront Its History (Judith Disla)
Re: Kansas City, Missouri, Approves Free Public Transit for All (Karl Edler; Jeffrey Gold)
Re: How I Get By: A Week in the Life of a McDonald’s Cashier (Jacquelyn Larson; Niraj Shah)
Re: Dollar Meals and Diabetes (Judy Atkins)
Re: U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement—Weak Tea, at Best (John Gallo)
Re: A Canadian Mining Company Intensifies a Culture War in Oaxaca (Marlena Santoyo)
Church's Nativity Scene Depicts Jesus, Mary, And Joseph as a Family Separated at the Border
Greta Thunberg: The Power of Youth (TIME Magazine Person of the Year)
Resources:
New Resource - The Battle for a New World: The Progressive Response to the New Right - By John Feffer (Institute for Policy Studies)
Dirty Tricks Game - a fun way to engage people on the many devious ways used to deny them their right to vote. (DemCastUSA)
Robert Reich Makes Case for Why Sanders or Warren—'Not Some Billionaire-Backed Milquetoast Moderate'—Offer Best Chance to Beat Trump
Announcements:
On the 5th Anniversary of #SayHerName, Join Us for a Ceremony of Remembrance - New York - December 14 (African American Policy Forum - AAPF)
Bringing Class Back In; The Recent Revival of the Labor Movement - webinar - December 16 (Socialist Education Project and Committees of Correspondence for Democracy & Socialism - CCDS)
Re: Why Impeachment Matters, Regardless of the Outcome
Lesson to be learned: While the left was busy doing identity politics and blasting the very concept of allies, while the academic left was obsessing about "microaggressions," the right was building a whole ecology of think tanks, publishers, radio and TV, and local groups. Result? We all know the result. We need local groups, books, music, art, and more groups. We need local candidates. We need unity.
Om Williamson
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
Re: The 2020 Elections and the Anti-War Cause
Howie makes an excellent case. The left has a platform to push in the election - and after, regardless of who runs and wins - namely Green New Deal. The peace movement should join this effort and push to make war and peace, challenging militarism and war moves, front and center. It won't be easy and will require a lot of discussion about how to bring an effective focus as we work to oust the GOP's right/far right bloc from power.
Ethan Young
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
An important essay on the intentional degradation of language as a political strategy.
Philip Specht
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
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Must read this.
Ted Reich
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
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Norberto Caraballo
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
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In reading this article these lines stood out to me. "the "lack of precision” in language can pose a danger to society and to political stability." Surrounded by the social medias, TV sound bytes and people talking just to make themselves heard, makes me wonder if anything is to be believed as fact based information any longer. My fear is that we, our society are making consequential decisions on health, the future, our politics and our relationships to others based on the quicksand of today's assumed truths.
Common sense seems to be the only saving grace in today's world for making any kind of reasonable evaluation of truth. Regretfully, that appears to be in short supply these days also.
William Davidowski
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
The Season for Taking -- cartoon by Mike Luckovich
Mike Luckovich
December 8, 2019
Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Re: Jobs, Jobs Everywhere, But Most of Them Kind of Suck
My daughter, a college grad, has 3 - just to make ends meet.
Marlene D McArthur
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
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More jobs does not mean more economic security.
Sid Kivanoski
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
Re: Key Takeaways in Newly Released Documents Detailing Failures of War in Afghanistan
Anyone who thinks any prominent and influential figures in the U.S. government were interested in helping Afghans democratize, improve women's rights and otherwise assist the country in stabilizing is either gullible, ignorant or intentionally spreading Pentagon/State Dept. p.r.
Where have they done this? The Soviet-assisted government in Afghanistan under Babrak Karmal was moving to achieve those goals, but they were hamstrung and sabotaged by the U.S. support of the reactionary fundamentalist groups that enjoyed lavish support in money, arms and propaganda by the same elements who have despoiled many other societies around the planet since then.
I went to Afghanistan twice in the 1980s and wrote about the country's experiences for Freedomways.
Swallowing and regurgitating the nonsense dished out by the U.S. mass media is not progressive.
John Woodford
Re: Labour’s Manifesto is Fit for Purpose. So, Why are the Middle Classes so Hostile to it?
(posting on Portside Labor)
The middle classes? This term is so vague and misleading. Large numbers of the 'middle strata' in Britain will vote Labour tomorrow. The paid commentators in the British media may be hostile to its manifesto but they are selected by the ruling class.
On Corbyn: To be clear, the Labour Party policy is not to keep Britain in the EU but to negotiate a better deal, then put the option to stay in or leave with the new agreement to a new referendum.
Dan Morgan
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
Re: How Charlottesville's Echoes Forced New Zealand to Confront Its History
And that’s what happens when your country has decent leadership.
Judith Disla
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
Re: Kansas City, Missouri, Approves Free Public Transit for All
Low fare, no Fare. It removes traffic, and accidents and pollution. It revitalized the cities. It breaks down inequality, it makes infrastructure more efficient. It makes culture available and helps small businesses.
Karl Edler
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
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We can do it in Metro NYC too:
IRUM - The Institute for Rational Urban Mobility, Inc.
A New York Not-for-Profit Corporation
Jeffrey Gold
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
Re: How I Get By: A Week in the Life of a McDonald’s Cashier
(posting on Portside Labor)
These big companies are exploiting us because we are poor and desperate..... And it needs to stop
Jacquelyn Larson
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
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If you can't afford to pay your employees, you can't afford to start a business. American taxpayers are subsidizing the greed of these giant companies that pay little to no taxes.
Niraj Shah
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
An important article on the health impact of living in a country in which corporate and right wing interests dominate our daily lives.
Judy Atkins
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
Re: U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement—Weak Tea, at Best
EPI's “analysis” of the new and improved NAFTA agreement is a prime example of Lesser Evil Economics. The U.S. lost 680,000 jobs due to Clinton's NAFTA. But Trump and Pelosi won back maybe 8,ooo jobs a year for the next 6 years. But, at least that's something. The stagnant wages of some 100 million U.S. Workers can wait for NAFTA 3.
The EPI author concludes that “only concessions obtained through tough negotiations by labor, environment, and consumer activists (when did that happen?) made it any better than the status quo. As a result, it is better than the alternatives.” This is the definition of lesser evil!
But, hey, it's good to see the healing taking place, with Demo cats, Republican, Capitalists and labor unions working together.
Pelosi said the Dems ate the GOP's lunch. Actually, it was the workers' lunches.
John Gallo
Re: A Canadian Mining Company Intensifies a Culture War in Oaxaca
But native Zapotec residents accuse the multinational of inciting violence that has killed five activists. Last year, they say, a spill at Fortuna’s San José mining project unleashed toxic waste into the Coyote River, leaving one town without drinking water.
Marlena Santoyo
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
Church's Nativity Scene Depicts Jesus, Mary, And Joseph as a Family Separated at the Border
by Alexis Nedd
December 8, 2019
Mashable
Claremont United Methodist Church transformed its Christmas nativity scene into a powerful statement about family separation by caging their figures of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph and releasing a theological statement on the United States' treatment of refugees.
SEE ALSO: Don't let Trump's executive order fool you — family detention is also inhumane
A Facebook post by Senior Minister Karen Clark Ristine includes a picture of the nativity and the aforementioned statement, which encourages onlookers to "consider the most well-known refugee family in the world." The statement continues:
"Shortly after the birth of Jesus, Joseph and Mary were forced to flee with their young son from Nazareth to Egypt to escape King Herod, a tyrant. They feared persecution and death.
What if this family sought refuge in our country today?"
Clark Ristine also wrote that the church building contains a second set of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph figures depicting the family's reunion.
Stirred to tears by the Claremont UMC nativity. Inside the church, the Holy Family is reunited.
The theological statement posted with the nativity: In a time in our country when refugee families seek asylum at our borders and are unwillingly separated from one another, we consider the most well-known refugee family in the world. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, the Holy Family. Shortly after the birth of Jesus, Joseph and Mary were forced to flee with their young son from Nazareth to Egypt to escape King Herod, a tyrant. They feared persecution and death.
What if this family sought refuge in our country today?
Imagine Joseph and Mary separated at the border and Jesus no older than two taken from his mother and placed behind the fences of a Border Patrol detention center as more than 5,500 children have been the past three years.
Jesus grew up to teach us kindness and mercy and a radical welcome of all people.
He said: “I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me.” Matthew 25:35
In the Claremont United Methodist Church nativity scene this Christmas, the Holy Family takes the place of the thousands of nameless families separated at our borders.
Inside the church, you will see this same family reunited, the Holy Family together, in a nativity that joins the angels in singing “Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace and good will to all.” Luke 2:14
#holyfamilyseparated #endfamilyseparation
Claremont UMC's website includes information on the church's previous work with asylum seekers at the U.S. border, and a recent post states the church raised $10,000 for Justice For Our Neighbors, an organization that provides legal counsel for detained and separated children. A blog post from 2018 also details the church's participation in joint ministries with Mexican churches at Border Field State Park.
The minister's Facebook post has gone moderately viral, with thousands of comments praising or excoriating the ch
Greta Thunberg: The Power of Youth (TIME Magazine Person of the Year)
The far right is increasingly active globally—at the level of governments, through civil society, and in the digital sphere. Their political parties are cooperating across borders, their anti- democratic actions are undermining the rule of law, their attacks on “globalists” are eroding the efficacy of international institutions, and their racist memes are spreading throughout culture.
According to the 80 academics, researchers, and activists interviewed in this report, this threat to democracy and internationalism is urgent.
Yet, the global response to this organizing on the far right has been muted. Those who oppose the far right have been focusing their efforts largely at a local and national level. Meanwhile, global threats such as climate change, a widening gap between rich and poor, and entrenched militarism require more, not less, international cooperation. A refocus on local and national struggles at the expense of organizing at the global level provides the far right with an opportunity to rewrite the rules of the international order along illiberal lines.
KEY FINDINGS:
- An international reaction to economic globalization has been key to the right’s success. Unlike the internationalist left, the new right has been more effective at channeling discontent into political success at a national level.
- Key to the new right’s success has been a story that can be applied effectively across borders: the “great replacement.” The argument that minorities, with help from “globalists,” will usurp the privileges of the dominant group has proven appealing to both an extremist fringe and more mainstream conservatives.
- The new right has achieved political success with its attacks on globalization in a way the left failed to do. But the new right has a key failing: It has nothing to say about an ever-worsening climate crisis.
- The 80 international experts overwhelmingly identified the school climate strikes as the present moment’s most promising international action and the Green New Deal as a framework that could defeat the right’s global narrative.
- A Global Green New Deal wouldn’t just address the environmental crisis. By creating enormous numbers of well-paying jobs, it would also speak to those left behind by economic globalization. Such a narrative would undermine the new right’s anti-globalist appeals while offering up a positive vision to rally around within and across borders.
Institute for Policy Studies
1301 Connecticut Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20036
202-234-9382
The Dirty Tricks Game is a new board game to engage people on the many devious ways politicians use to deny them their right to vote. Players are directed to resources to learn how to push back to protect their rights.
Players compete for their election by hook and by crook. They must choose between running a clean campaign or resorting to dirty tricks to suppress the vote to defeat their opponent. The Game costs $25, with all profits going to groups fighting for voter rights. Or people can print their own version of the Game from the internet for free.
More game details here.
#DirtyTricksGame
Dogs and batons were used to stop voters in Selma. The dogs are gone, but voter suppression is still here, more widespread than ever. Most people aren’t even aware how their right to vote is being stolen.
When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.
The Dirty Tricks Game is a fun way to engage people on the many devious ways politicians use to deny them their right to vote. Players are directed to resources to learn how to push back to protect their rights.
Players compete for their election by hook and by crook. They must choose between running a clean campaign or resorting to dirty tricks to suppress the vote to defeat their opponent. The Game costs $25, with all profits going to groups fighting for voter rights. Or people can print their own version of the Game from the internet for free. Leave no voter behind!
Please support the Dirty Tricks Game KickStarter campaign with just $1 or more, and tell others about it too. Thank you!
Two or more players attempt to be the first to get 270 votes and to cross the finish line. Random events, just like in a real campaign can give a campaign a boost or set them back. Players draw cards that simulate campaign events which decide how many steps they move forward or back.
Each player also has dirty tricks cards that they can use to hurt a rival’s progress by suppressing their supporters’ votes. A winning campaign can suddenly be upset and the election stolen by someone playing dirty tricks.
Kickstarter campaign - click here
"These two have most of the grassroots energy, most of the enthusiasm, and most of the ideas that are critical for winning in 2020."
by Jake Johnson
December 10, 2019
Common Dreams
Former U.S. Labor Secretary Robert Reich released a video Tuesday explaining his case for why Sens. Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren pose a far better chance of defeating President Donald Trump in 2020 than "some billionaire-backed milquetoast moderate."
"These two have most of the grassroots energy, most of the enthusiasm, and most of the ideas that are critical for winning in 2020," said Reich, a professor at the University of California, Berkeley.
"Most importantly, both Warren and Sanders understand that our system is rigged and that economic and political power must be reallocated from a corporate Wall Street elite to the vast majority," Reich added. "This is why both Warren and Sanders are hated by the corporate Wall Street wing of the Democratic Party."
Calling the notion that Sanders and Warren are too far to the left "total rubbish," Reich said the progressive senators stand the best chance to beat Trump in the general election.
Nominating a moderate like former Vice President Joe Biden or South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg, Reich argued, "will increase the odds Trump gets a second term."
On December 14th 2014, African American Policy Forum (AAPF) launched the #SayHerName campaign to bring awareness to the names and stories of Black women and girls who have been killed by police, and to provide support to their families. On December 14th 2019, in honor of the campaign’s 5-year anniversary, AAPF invites you to an intimate gathering to honor those we have lost and reflect on the lives that should have been. Please join us for this remembrance ceremony.
December 14, 2019, 5:00PM
Columbia University School of Law
Jerome Greene Hall | JG Room 701
435 W. 116th Street | New York, NY 10027
If you can't make it in person, we invite you to hold your own event or create your own ritual honoring the anniversary of #SayHerName. A list of names to read aloud can be downloaded and printed here.
#SayHerName #SHN5
Bringing Class Back In; The Recent Revival of the Labor Movement - webinar - December 16
Photo by Paul Krehbiel
CCDS SOCIALIST EDUCATION PROECT (SEP)
December 16, 2019, 9 to 10:30 pm EST
Open to all
BRINGING CLASS BACK IN: The Recent Revival of the Labor Movement
There has been a recent resurgence of workers struggles from the Fight for $15 to organizing fast food and health care workers to union struggles in auto, steel, and other sectors,. Most visibly in recent months public school teachers have mobilized and gone on strike in West Virginia, Arizona, Southern California, and Chicago, Illinois. Organized labor is also mobilizing around the candidacies for political office, particularly in support of Bernie Sanders bid for the presidency.
This panel of labor activists will discuss the significance of the recent resurgence of workers all across the nation for rebuilding labor, progressive and socialist movements in the United States.
Paul Krehbiel, Moderator, Chair CCDS Labor Committee, long-time union organizer, Labor for Bernie Campaign
Donna DeWitt, Co-Chair CCDS Labor Committee , former president of the South Carolina AFL-CIO
Frank Hammer, retired UAW activist and supporter of labor struggles for justice in Latin America
Erika Alvarez, teacher and member of United Teachers of Los Angeles, a leader of LA Labor for Bernie
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Socialist Education Project and Committees of Correspondence for Democracy & Socialism - CCDS