#Jarrell Ross, "Who made Juneteenth?" TIME, June 21/June 28, 2021. - [Robert C. Conner, author of 'General Gordon Granger Behind Juneteenth'] Gen. Granger's General Order No. 3 "declared absolute equality of personal rights and rights of property between former masters and slaves." "As word spread, so did jubilation, shock, religious awe and anger. But Black people have always been involved in the fight to make our own American lives, demanding something of the country that stole so much from us, that fact is by folktale and firm record, key to the Juneteenth story."
#Michael Specter, "In the Midnight Hour," The New Yorker, June 14, 2021. - "ACT UP was born, in 1987, when tens of thousands of Americans -- mostly gay men -- had died of AIDS, and more were dying every day, even as the government remained largely indifferent."
"ACT UP helped establish the first successful needle-exchange programs in New York City. It also took on insurance practices like the exclusion of single men who lived in predominantly gay neighborhoods."
"By 1990, the F.D.A. had adopted this approach (known as the 'parallel track'), which would make selected drugs available to H.I.V. patients." "Today, drug candidates for life-threatening conditions are frequently put on a parallel track for 'expanded access.' "
"The politics of AIDS -- 'gay-related immune deficiency,' or GRID -- was an early designation, as if a medical condition might have a sexual orientation, was inevitably a connection with homophobia."
"During the late eighties, countless T-shirts bore the logo, and 'Silence = Death' stickers could be found on what seemed like every newspaper box or wall in New York City." "When people of color raised issues of particular concern to them, they routinely met the rejoiner, 'What does this have to do with AIDS?, or were told, 'We don't have time.' " "In the end, in what was called ACT UP's 'tragic split,' was precipitated more by disagreements over research than by disagreements over race."
"Any list of the most important medical trials of modern times would have to include the AIDS Clinical Trials Group Protocol 076 study, which was launched in 1991. That study was designed to determine whether the antiretroviral AZT, administered during advanced pregnancy, would have prevented H.I.V. transmission from mother to child."
#Sue Halpern, "Anti-democratic," The New Yorker, June 14, 2021. - "Based on data collected by the conservative Heritage Foundation, the incidence of voter fraud in the two decades before last year's election was about 0.00006 percent of total ballots cast." "Texas was already the most difficult state in which to cast ballots, according to a recent study by Northern Illinois University." "In Iowa, officials could be fined ten thousand dollars for 'technical infractions,' such as failing to sufficiently purge voters from the polls." "Even before the pandemic, sixty-five per cent of jurisdictions in the country were having trouble attracting poll workers."
"The real, and imminent, danger is that all the noise will make it easier for a cohost of Americans to welcome the dissolution of the political system, which appears to be the the ultimate goal of the current Republican effort. It's up to Democratic leaders to impress upon their colleagues that their legacies, and that of their party, are now entwined with the survival of American democracy."
ADDENDUMS:
*Letter writer Annamarie Pluhar, The New Yorker, June 21, 2021. - "There are millions of spare bedrooms in the United States, many of them in the homes of seniors who live alone. In the midst of an affordable-housing crisis, helping seniors find housemates who can offer companionship in exchange for reduced rent is a win-win proposition."
*Letter writer Arthur Hoolerman, The New Yorker, June 21, 2021. - "As the country's population ages, the loneliness epidemic will only become more pronounced. A higher moral imperative than objectivity is the alleviation of suffering. If a senior's life is improved by the harmless private fiction of rebo-pet possessing real emotions, it is a good thing."
*Hannah Fry, "Maps Without Places," The New Yorker, June 21, 2021. "Back when long distance travel was provided by horse-drawn stagecoaches, departure timetables were suggestive rather than definitive."
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