Military Matters
37 - Military actions authorized by Congress since 2001.
14 - Countries attacked by the US since 2001.
1942 - Last year that Congress formally declared war.
11 - Number of formally declared wars fought by the US since its founding in 1776.
138 - Countries that the US is currently involved in militarily. (Source: Mariam Elba, "DC By the Numbers," The Nation, May 8/15, 2017).
New Labor
IM - People who marched in 2006's A Day Without Immigrants.
680 - People swept up in ICE raids the week before 2017's A Day Without Immigrants.
100+ - People fired the day after the march for participating.
1,488 - Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) statuses revoked under Trump and Obama combined as of April 19. (Source: Skanda Kadirgamar, "DC By the Numbers, The Nation, May 12/19, 2017).
GOP Lies About the AHCA
1. It protects people with preexisting conditions. Fact: States may waive coverage and high-risk pool costs may be too high.
2. It protects older Americans from increased premium costs. Fact: A 5 to 1 ratio in premium cost exceeds the 3 to 1 ratio found in the ACA.
3. It charges everyone the same for insurance. Fact: See 1. and 2.
4. It allows for every person to have access to kind of coverage that they want. Fact: I could have access to a $10 million home but wouldn't have anywhere near enough money to buy it. Also, the tax credits are, in many cases, insufficient to cover insurance costs.
5. Health and housing secretary Tom Price says that the elimination of $880 billion in Medicaid spending over ten years would allow the states to experiment more. Fact: This should stand as one of the most absurd statements made in U.S. political history. Because states and insured individuals couldn't pick up this mass money loss, the only alternative is to drop millions of people off the rolls.
ADDENDUM:
*A prisoner in Ohio, Ricky Jackson, spent 39 years on Death Row before a key witness admitted to lying in the testimony that led to his conviction.
*Wind industry jobs increased from about 50,000 to sightly over 100,000 from 2008 and 2016. Coal mining jobs dropped from about 260,000 in 1984 to about 50,000 in 2016. (Sources: American Wind Energy Association, US Department of Commerce, and Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Thursday, May 25, 2017
Wednesday, May 24, 2017
Higher Education Racism and De-Escalation Training
The Georgia Board of Regents, which oversees the university system, has instituted a policy barring undocumented students from the state's top five public schools. Georgia has thirty-five public colleges, serving about three hundred and ten thousand students, of which some five hundred are undocumented; only twenty-nine undocumented students are enrolled at the top five schools. Only two other states -- South Carolina and Alabama -- ban undocumented students from public universities. [1]
"Each year, about three thousand undocumented students graduate from high school in Georgia, but their opportunities for college are severely limited. At the public universities they're still allowed to attend, they must pay out-of-state tuition, more than double what state residents pay. To matriculate at private colleges, they have to apply as international students."
"The University of Georgia in Athens, did not accept black students until 1961. The following year, in an effort to maintain segregation, the state spent four hundred and fifty thousand dollars on grants and scholarships to send black students from Georgia to institutions in other states."
"Between 1954 and 1965, black children in Mississippi made up fifty-seven per cent of school-age students, but received only thirteen per cent of the state's spending for education." "In Prince Edward County, Virginia, in 1959, the local government shut down the public school system in order to resist integration." [2]
Police Need De-Escalation Training
Diane Dimond's Saturday column for the Albuquerque Journal often focuses on law enforcement issues, which, to my mind, too often reflect the "them against us" mentality of police officers; moreover, she adheres to Jeff Sessions's strong opposition to consent decrees. Yet, at times, she can present an informed insight into law enforcement failings, such as the article on de-escalation training appearing in this past Saturday's issue.
"Databases maintained by the Washington Post and the Guardian newspaper conclude that there were about 1,000 fatal encounters between police and civilians in 2016. So far this year, the Post reports more than 350 people have died at the hands of a duly sworn officer of the law. " Mental health figured into one in five of the fatal cases. [3]
"According to a recent American Public Media analysis, 34 states do not offer or require officers to take courses on the best ways to defuse a potentially explosive situation." "Teaching law enforcement recruits to demand immediate and total compliance from a citizen or that they should always 'shoot to kill' are outdated strategies."
ADDENDUMS:
*Mexican Economy Minister Guajardo told the Mexico Business Forum that "if you guys [the U.S.] think we're going to start negotiations with a trigger pulled on a U.S. exit in six months, forget about it." He added: "If you do that, just get out already -- because there's no way we're negotiating under those conditions."
*Despite Trump administration claims that the raid in Yemen netted extensive intelligence, reports surfaced that there were at least 30 civilian deaths. According to Reuters, U.S. military officials said that Trump approved his first counterterrorism operation without sufficient intelligence, ground support or adequate backup preparation.
Footnotes
[1] Jonathan Blitzer, "American Studies," The New Yorker, May 22, 2017.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Diane Dimond, "Officers need better de-escalation training," Albuquerque Journal, May 20, 2017.
"Each year, about three thousand undocumented students graduate from high school in Georgia, but their opportunities for college are severely limited. At the public universities they're still allowed to attend, they must pay out-of-state tuition, more than double what state residents pay. To matriculate at private colleges, they have to apply as international students."
"The University of Georgia in Athens, did not accept black students until 1961. The following year, in an effort to maintain segregation, the state spent four hundred and fifty thousand dollars on grants and scholarships to send black students from Georgia to institutions in other states."
"Between 1954 and 1965, black children in Mississippi made up fifty-seven per cent of school-age students, but received only thirteen per cent of the state's spending for education." "In Prince Edward County, Virginia, in 1959, the local government shut down the public school system in order to resist integration." [2]
Police Need De-Escalation Training
Diane Dimond's Saturday column for the Albuquerque Journal often focuses on law enforcement issues, which, to my mind, too often reflect the "them against us" mentality of police officers; moreover, she adheres to Jeff Sessions's strong opposition to consent decrees. Yet, at times, she can present an informed insight into law enforcement failings, such as the article on de-escalation training appearing in this past Saturday's issue.
"Databases maintained by the Washington Post and the Guardian newspaper conclude that there were about 1,000 fatal encounters between police and civilians in 2016. So far this year, the Post reports more than 350 people have died at the hands of a duly sworn officer of the law. " Mental health figured into one in five of the fatal cases. [3]
"According to a recent American Public Media analysis, 34 states do not offer or require officers to take courses on the best ways to defuse a potentially explosive situation." "Teaching law enforcement recruits to demand immediate and total compliance from a citizen or that they should always 'shoot to kill' are outdated strategies."
ADDENDUMS:
*Mexican Economy Minister Guajardo told the Mexico Business Forum that "if you guys [the U.S.] think we're going to start negotiations with a trigger pulled on a U.S. exit in six months, forget about it." He added: "If you do that, just get out already -- because there's no way we're negotiating under those conditions."
*Despite Trump administration claims that the raid in Yemen netted extensive intelligence, reports surfaced that there were at least 30 civilian deaths. According to Reuters, U.S. military officials said that Trump approved his first counterterrorism operation without sufficient intelligence, ground support or adequate backup preparation.
Footnotes
[1] Jonathan Blitzer, "American Studies," The New Yorker, May 22, 2017.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Diane Dimond, "Officers need better de-escalation training," Albuquerque Journal, May 20, 2017.
Tuesday, May 23, 2017
Sex Laws Go Back and Forth, and More
A Very Brief History of Sex Laws
There is a narrative in which the laws and conventions around sex have moved from more to less permissive and back again many times over. "The federal Comstock Act of 1873 made it a crime to send contraceptives or instructions to their use through the mail, and numerous 'little' Comstock acts introduced similar restrictions in the states." In 1972, the Supreme Court ruled in Eisenstadt v. Baird that the Constitution didn't permit states to treat married and unmarried couples differently with respect to contraceptive laws. In effect, the ruling defined a constitutional right to use birth control. [1]
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Buck v. Bell that forced sterilization didn't violate the Constitution. A consequence was that countless blacks and Native Americans were forcibly sterilized after being falsely diagnosed as "feeble-minded," a practice that lasted in some places into the 1970s. [2]
The Death Penalty Doesn't Deter and Kills the Innocent
"The Eighth Amendment prohibition against 'cruel and unusual' punishment served as a measure of the elastic morality that facilitates the death penalty." "Data from the Death Penalty Information Center show that, in the past forty years, there have been eleven hundred and eighty executions in the South, compared with four in the Northeast, yet homicide figures in 2015 were nearly seventy per cent higher in Southern states than in Northeastern ones." "Since 1973, a hundred and fifty-eight inmates on death row have been exonerated of the crimes for which they were sent there." [3]
"The condemned men perpetrated a litany of horrors, but the rationales for putting them to death -- a decades-delayed catharsis for the victims' families, a lottery-slim chance that some future violence will be deterred -- are as close to their extinction as Arkansas's supply of midazolam."
President Trump's Real Base
The polling firm designated as "Five-Thirty Eight" reported in May 2016 that "the median income of a Trump voter so far in the primaries is about $72,000," or roughly 130 percent of the national medium. "Trump's real base, the actual backbone of fascism, isn't poor and working-class and affluent whites." "Trump's most institutionally entrenched middle-class base includes police and Border Patrol unions."
"Location became the first rule of real estate, suburban homeowners nurtured racist attitudes, whites deluding themselves that they weren't excluding black people for reasons beyond their pocketbooks." "To the contrary, the form of economic anxiety propelling the racism of devoted Trump supporters is associated with paying taxes; with jealously guarding their modest savings; with stopping black people from moving nearby and diminishing the value of their property and thus the quality of their kids' schools; and with preserving the patriarchal family structure that facilitates it all." [4]
ADDENDUM:
*The San Antonio Express News has reported that the Texas state House has passed a bill that includes an amendment banning doctors from vaccinating children who are new entries to the foster care system.
Footnotes
[1] Anna North, "The Work of Equality," The Nation, May 22/29, 2017.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Jelani Cobb, "Out of Time," The New Yorker, May 8, 2017.
[4] Jesse A. Myerson, "White, Black & Red," The Nation, May 22/29, 2017.
There is a narrative in which the laws and conventions around sex have moved from more to less permissive and back again many times over. "The federal Comstock Act of 1873 made it a crime to send contraceptives or instructions to their use through the mail, and numerous 'little' Comstock acts introduced similar restrictions in the states." In 1972, the Supreme Court ruled in Eisenstadt v. Baird that the Constitution didn't permit states to treat married and unmarried couples differently with respect to contraceptive laws. In effect, the ruling defined a constitutional right to use birth control. [1]
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Buck v. Bell that forced sterilization didn't violate the Constitution. A consequence was that countless blacks and Native Americans were forcibly sterilized after being falsely diagnosed as "feeble-minded," a practice that lasted in some places into the 1970s. [2]
The Death Penalty Doesn't Deter and Kills the Innocent
"The Eighth Amendment prohibition against 'cruel and unusual' punishment served as a measure of the elastic morality that facilitates the death penalty." "Data from the Death Penalty Information Center show that, in the past forty years, there have been eleven hundred and eighty executions in the South, compared with four in the Northeast, yet homicide figures in 2015 were nearly seventy per cent higher in Southern states than in Northeastern ones." "Since 1973, a hundred and fifty-eight inmates on death row have been exonerated of the crimes for which they were sent there." [3]
"The condemned men perpetrated a litany of horrors, but the rationales for putting them to death -- a decades-delayed catharsis for the victims' families, a lottery-slim chance that some future violence will be deterred -- are as close to their extinction as Arkansas's supply of midazolam."
President Trump's Real Base
The polling firm designated as "Five-Thirty Eight" reported in May 2016 that "the median income of a Trump voter so far in the primaries is about $72,000," or roughly 130 percent of the national medium. "Trump's real base, the actual backbone of fascism, isn't poor and working-class and affluent whites." "Trump's most institutionally entrenched middle-class base includes police and Border Patrol unions."
"Location became the first rule of real estate, suburban homeowners nurtured racist attitudes, whites deluding themselves that they weren't excluding black people for reasons beyond their pocketbooks." "To the contrary, the form of economic anxiety propelling the racism of devoted Trump supporters is associated with paying taxes; with jealously guarding their modest savings; with stopping black people from moving nearby and diminishing the value of their property and thus the quality of their kids' schools; and with preserving the patriarchal family structure that facilitates it all." [4]
ADDENDUM:
*The San Antonio Express News has reported that the Texas state House has passed a bill that includes an amendment banning doctors from vaccinating children who are new entries to the foster care system.
Footnotes
[1] Anna North, "The Work of Equality," The Nation, May 22/29, 2017.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Jelani Cobb, "Out of Time," The New Yorker, May 8, 2017.
[4] Jesse A. Myerson, "White, Black & Red," The Nation, May 22/29, 2017.
Monday, May 22, 2017
Some Perspectives on President Trump
Trump: the Populist Demagogue
"He [Trump] inherited his father's outer-borough real-estate empire -- a considerable enterprise distinguished by racist federal-housing violations -- using the language of populist demagogues, from Huey Long to George Wallace to Silvio Berlusconi, the new President implied that he, the Leader, was in perfect communion with the People, and that together they would repair the landscape of 'American carnage' and return it to its [prior] state of grace." [1]
"Trump has left open hundreds of important positions in government, largely because he sees no value in them." "[His] language, his tone, his personal behavior, all suggest, and foster, a politics of resentment."
"If we were ever naive enough to believe that progress in political life is inevitable, we are experiencing the contradiction." "Trump forces us to recognize the fragility of precious things." "The task now is to not merely recognize this presidency for the emergency it is, and to resist the assault on the principles of reality and the values of liberal democracy, but to devise a future, to debate, to hear one another, to organize, to preserve and revive precious things."
"Tearing Off the Mask"
There is a "more frightening thought than calling Trump a lunatic and an abomination. He is the logical extension of the way the Republican Party has been operating since Barry Goldwater. This is how the Republican Party has gotten votes for 50 years -- Trump is just tearing off the mask. Now he just says right out the racism that was only barely hidden for so long. An accurate history would show that it's always been there. We shouldn't just talk about how weird Trump is." [2]
Culture Wars
"Roughly 750,000 of the estimated 11 million people living in the United States without permission have successfully proven themselves to fit the DACA qualifications and thus have been deemed worthy neighbors." "[The] Trump administration isn't actually debating immigration policy; it seeks an ongoing debate about the criminality of people of color, a constant parsing of which among us are rapists, drug dealers, and terrorists, and which are the 'great people' that Trump allows do exist. If we accept these terms of debate, we accept our inhumanity, which is the point." [3]
"The Trump administration is staffed by people -- Jeff Sessions, John Kelly, Steve Bannon, the president himself -- who have been waging a cultural battle against the idea of the hero immigrant for years, choosing instead to emphasize immigrant criminality."
ADDENDUMS:
*President Trump's gallery of strongmen includes: Vladimir Putin, Kim Jong Um, Rodrigo Duterte, Recep T. Erdogan, and Abdel Fattah Sisi.
* Trump says he hasn't spoken to Roger Stone for "a long time;" Stone says they spoke recently.
*Preet Bharara, U.S. Attorney in New York, was fired after Trump told him personally he would not be fired, because he was involved in a very sensitive case that might have a connection to Trump.
*Alone in the Oval Office with James Comey, Trump opened the discussion by saying that Comey should consider putting reporters in prison for publishing classified information.
*Trump said that the Russians "tricked us" by having their photographer get exclusive pictures in the Oval Office.
"He [Trump] inherited his father's outer-borough real-estate empire -- a considerable enterprise distinguished by racist federal-housing violations -- using the language of populist demagogues, from Huey Long to George Wallace to Silvio Berlusconi, the new President implied that he, the Leader, was in perfect communion with the People, and that together they would repair the landscape of 'American carnage' and return it to its [prior] state of grace." [1]
"Trump has left open hundreds of important positions in government, largely because he sees no value in them." "[His] language, his tone, his personal behavior, all suggest, and foster, a politics of resentment."
"If we were ever naive enough to believe that progress in political life is inevitable, we are experiencing the contradiction." "Trump forces us to recognize the fragility of precious things." "The task now is to not merely recognize this presidency for the emergency it is, and to resist the assault on the principles of reality and the values of liberal democracy, but to devise a future, to debate, to hear one another, to organize, to preserve and revive precious things."
"Tearing Off the Mask"
There is a "more frightening thought than calling Trump a lunatic and an abomination. He is the logical extension of the way the Republican Party has been operating since Barry Goldwater. This is how the Republican Party has gotten votes for 50 years -- Trump is just tearing off the mask. Now he just says right out the racism that was only barely hidden for so long. An accurate history would show that it's always been there. We shouldn't just talk about how weird Trump is." [2]
Culture Wars
"Roughly 750,000 of the estimated 11 million people living in the United States without permission have successfully proven themselves to fit the DACA qualifications and thus have been deemed worthy neighbors." "[The] Trump administration isn't actually debating immigration policy; it seeks an ongoing debate about the criminality of people of color, a constant parsing of which among us are rapists, drug dealers, and terrorists, and which are the 'great people' that Trump allows do exist. If we accept these terms of debate, we accept our inhumanity, which is the point." [3]
"The Trump administration is staffed by people -- Jeff Sessions, John Kelly, Steve Bannon, the president himself -- who have been waging a cultural battle against the idea of the hero immigrant for years, choosing instead to emphasize immigrant criminality."
ADDENDUMS:
*President Trump's gallery of strongmen includes: Vladimir Putin, Kim Jong Um, Rodrigo Duterte, Recep T. Erdogan, and Abdel Fattah Sisi.
* Trump says he hasn't spoken to Roger Stone for "a long time;" Stone says they spoke recently.
*Preet Bharara, U.S. Attorney in New York, was fired after Trump told him personally he would not be fired, because he was involved in a very sensitive case that might have a connection to Trump.
*Alone in the Oval Office with James Comey, Trump opened the discussion by saying that Comey should consider putting reporters in prison for publishing classified information.
*Trump said that the Russians "tricked us" by having their photographer get exclusive pictures in the Oval Office.
Sunday, May 21, 2017
Some Trump Administration Lowlights
A Threat From the DOJ
Sanctuary policies lead to threats from the Department of Justice. The DOJ letters ask officials to show documentation validating their compliance with federal statute U.S.C. 1373, which prohibits any federal, state or local government entity from restricting government entities or officials from sharing information about an individual citizenship or immigration status. "Failure to comply with this condition could result in the withholding of grant funds...or other actions, as appropriate," the DOJ said in the letters. In the letters, the DOJ asks for proof of cooperation with immigration authorities, citing the terms of a specific funding mechanism, the Byrne Justice Assistance Grant or JAG program.
A report by the Pew Research Center, based on 2014 data, estimated the population of undocumented immigrants in New Mexico -- my state of residence -- at 85,000.
Trump Lowlights
Tamara Draut, writing in the 4/29/17 "The Hill," lists some Trump lowlights: Unraveling Dodd/Frank; repealing a host of EPA regulations; repealing Internet privacy protection; repealing work safety rules; and rescinding a rule that would have given 4 million workers access to overtime pay.
Draut says that Trump campaigned to serve the "forgotten men and women" and then proposed tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy, deregulation that enriches industries, and has proposed cuts to a whole host of agencies and programs that serve the very people he proposed to serve.
Easing Johnson Amendment Enforcement
A Trump executive order will ease enforcement of the Johnson Amendment, that bars religious institutions from endorsing or opposing political candidates and parties. The order directs the IRS to "exercise maximum enforcement discretion" of the amendment. Also, it orders regulatory relief for those who object to Obamacare's preventive service mandate on religious grounds.
High-Risk Pool Funding
The last-minute addition of $8 billion to the American Health Care Act was the action that swayed enough votes in the U.S. House to approve the bill by a two-vote margin. Those members who switched their votes due to it, probably didn't realize how little impact the $8 billion will have. The Center for American Progress has calculated that the funding will cover only 76,000 more people. To put this figure into perspective, the Center projects a need for $327 billion over ten years to offer a moderately subsidized high-risk pool coverage for the 1.5 million plus who qualify. The $8 billion to be paid, over five years added to the $130 billion already in the AHCA, will leave a shortage of $193 billion. The $8 billion will thus cover about four percent of the projected shortfall. It is important to keep in mind that this would be a "moderate" subsidy. Also, the 1.5 million figure is for those who fit into a high-cost preexisting condition category; it is a small percentage of those who have a preexisting condition. The Kaiser Family Foundation estimates that about a quarter of those adults under the age of 65 have a preexisting condition.
Trump's War Fever
Katrina vanden Heuvel of The Nation magazine opines that: "It is a testament to the absurdity of the 'Washington playbook' that one of the most irresponsible acts of Trump's madhouse presidency has also been one of the most applauded." [vanden Heuvel is referring to the U.S. attack on a Syrian airstrip after a chemical attack generally attributed to the Syria government].
"After railing against the foreign-policy establishment as a candidate, Trump has made it clear that his non-interventionist rhetoric, like his supposed economic populism, was a farce." "In March alone, according to "Airwars," more than 1,400 civilians were killed by US bombings in Syria and Iraq, far more than in Assad's apparent chemical attack." (Source: "Trump's War Fever," The Nation, May 8/15, 2017).
ADDENDUMS:
*A Reuters poll taken over March 28 trough April 3, found 36 percent rating the danger of racism and bigotry in America as an "imminent threat" to the country; 22 percent rated it a "serious threat;" and 18 percent rated it a "moderate threat." This poll lends weight to another poll taken in 2010, 2015 and early 2016, after a spate of police shootings of unarmed African Americans. The first poll found 30 percent of respondents believing the United States has a racial problem; the second found 60 percent believing that; and the third poll found the percentage raised to 63. The linkage here appears to be the highly publicized police shootings of unarmed, primarily minority males.
*Press secretary fill-in Sarah Huckabee Sanders said that Trump was apparently unhappy over Comey's "disloyalty" in not supporting his charge that Obama wiretapped him. He was also angry about Comey not pursuing leaks.
* CNN's Chris Cuomo told Kellyanne Conway: "Kellyanne, I've got to check what you're saying. I've got to provide the context for it. Because you're creating an image that doesn't reveal itself in facts." Kellyanne told CNN's "New Day" that it is "inappropriate" to raise questions about the timing of Trump's decision to fire James Comey. She said: "He'll do it when he wants to, just like he fired FBI Director Comey when he was faced with evidence that was unignorable."
*A new analysis has found that Wisconsin's voter-ID law reduced turn-out by 200,000 voters.
Sanctuary policies lead to threats from the Department of Justice. The DOJ letters ask officials to show documentation validating their compliance with federal statute U.S.C. 1373, which prohibits any federal, state or local government entity from restricting government entities or officials from sharing information about an individual citizenship or immigration status. "Failure to comply with this condition could result in the withholding of grant funds...or other actions, as appropriate," the DOJ said in the letters. In the letters, the DOJ asks for proof of cooperation with immigration authorities, citing the terms of a specific funding mechanism, the Byrne Justice Assistance Grant or JAG program.
A report by the Pew Research Center, based on 2014 data, estimated the population of undocumented immigrants in New Mexico -- my state of residence -- at 85,000.
Trump Lowlights
Tamara Draut, writing in the 4/29/17 "The Hill," lists some Trump lowlights: Unraveling Dodd/Frank; repealing a host of EPA regulations; repealing Internet privacy protection; repealing work safety rules; and rescinding a rule that would have given 4 million workers access to overtime pay.
Draut says that Trump campaigned to serve the "forgotten men and women" and then proposed tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy, deregulation that enriches industries, and has proposed cuts to a whole host of agencies and programs that serve the very people he proposed to serve.
Easing Johnson Amendment Enforcement
A Trump executive order will ease enforcement of the Johnson Amendment, that bars religious institutions from endorsing or opposing political candidates and parties. The order directs the IRS to "exercise maximum enforcement discretion" of the amendment. Also, it orders regulatory relief for those who object to Obamacare's preventive service mandate on religious grounds.
High-Risk Pool Funding
The last-minute addition of $8 billion to the American Health Care Act was the action that swayed enough votes in the U.S. House to approve the bill by a two-vote margin. Those members who switched their votes due to it, probably didn't realize how little impact the $8 billion will have. The Center for American Progress has calculated that the funding will cover only 76,000 more people. To put this figure into perspective, the Center projects a need for $327 billion over ten years to offer a moderately subsidized high-risk pool coverage for the 1.5 million plus who qualify. The $8 billion to be paid, over five years added to the $130 billion already in the AHCA, will leave a shortage of $193 billion. The $8 billion will thus cover about four percent of the projected shortfall. It is important to keep in mind that this would be a "moderate" subsidy. Also, the 1.5 million figure is for those who fit into a high-cost preexisting condition category; it is a small percentage of those who have a preexisting condition. The Kaiser Family Foundation estimates that about a quarter of those adults under the age of 65 have a preexisting condition.
Trump's War Fever
Katrina vanden Heuvel of The Nation magazine opines that: "It is a testament to the absurdity of the 'Washington playbook' that one of the most irresponsible acts of Trump's madhouse presidency has also been one of the most applauded." [vanden Heuvel is referring to the U.S. attack on a Syrian airstrip after a chemical attack generally attributed to the Syria government].
"After railing against the foreign-policy establishment as a candidate, Trump has made it clear that his non-interventionist rhetoric, like his supposed economic populism, was a farce." "In March alone, according to "Airwars," more than 1,400 civilians were killed by US bombings in Syria and Iraq, far more than in Assad's apparent chemical attack." (Source: "Trump's War Fever," The Nation, May 8/15, 2017).
ADDENDUMS:
*A Reuters poll taken over March 28 trough April 3, found 36 percent rating the danger of racism and bigotry in America as an "imminent threat" to the country; 22 percent rated it a "serious threat;" and 18 percent rated it a "moderate threat." This poll lends weight to another poll taken in 2010, 2015 and early 2016, after a spate of police shootings of unarmed African Americans. The first poll found 30 percent of respondents believing the United States has a racial problem; the second found 60 percent believing that; and the third poll found the percentage raised to 63. The linkage here appears to be the highly publicized police shootings of unarmed, primarily minority males.
*Press secretary fill-in Sarah Huckabee Sanders said that Trump was apparently unhappy over Comey's "disloyalty" in not supporting his charge that Obama wiretapped him. He was also angry about Comey not pursuing leaks.
* CNN's Chris Cuomo told Kellyanne Conway: "Kellyanne, I've got to check what you're saying. I've got to provide the context for it. Because you're creating an image that doesn't reveal itself in facts." Kellyanne told CNN's "New Day" that it is "inappropriate" to raise questions about the timing of Trump's decision to fire James Comey. She said: "He'll do it when he wants to, just like he fired FBI Director Comey when he was faced with evidence that was unignorable."
*A new analysis has found that Wisconsin's voter-ID law reduced turn-out by 200,000 voters.
Thursday, May 18, 2017
Creating Freedom Excerpts
Excerpts from: Raoul Martinez, "Creating Freedom" (New York: Pantheon Books, 2016)
p. 34 - "The incidence of recidivism in the US and UK hovers between 60 and 65 per cent. This is roughly 50 per cent higher than rates in less punitive nations such as Sweden, Norway, and Japan."
After reading 50 studies of recidivism, Canadian criminologist Paul Genheau could not find a single one that indicated imprisonment reduced recidivism. In fact, longer sentences were associated with a three per cent increase in reoffending rates, supporting the theory that a prison can function as a "school for crime." "In the US, almost seven out of ten males will find themselves back in jail within three years of release. And of the countries with the highest homicide rates, the top five that employ the death penalty average 41.6 murders per 100,000 people, whereas the top five with no death penalty average roughly half that number at 21.6 murders per 100,000 people." One explanation is that severe institutional punishment has a brutalizing impact on the general culture.
p. 37 - In "supermax" prisons, inmates are kept in solitary confinement 23 hours a day. It's estimated that 80,000 prisoners are currently living under these conditions.
p. 39 - Norway has a prison in which prisoners live in comfortable houses, six men to a house. That prison has a reoffend rate of 16 percent, versus an average of 70 percent for Europe.
One of the most effective strategies to stop criminals from reoffending has been to provide inmates with the opportunity to study and earn formal qualifications.
p. 41 - The U.S. Department of Education for the 2011 to 2012 school year saw 130,000 students expelled from school and seven million suspended (one for every seven students).
p. 44 - "The most established environmental determinant of violence in a society is income inequality."
p. 45 - "In the US, ten times as many people with serious mental illnesses -- such as Bipolar disorder and schizophrenia -- are in prison than in a state hospital."
p. 46 - "Across the US today, black people are more than six times as likely to be imprisoned than whites, 31 per cent more likely to be pulled over while driving than white drivers, and twice as likely to be killed by a cop (and more likely to be unarmed when killed)."
p. 47 - "A study from the University of Wisconsin in 2015 found that states with private prisons have higher rates of reoffending, and that private prisons are keeping inmates locked up longer."
p. 49 - "Today, a quarter of the world's convicts reside in America. In 2004, 360 of these [convicts] were serving life sentences for the heinous crime of shoplifting."
p. 54 - "The sea of inequality on which the legal system floats makes a mockery of the principle of equal rights before the law."
p. 64 - "For instance, in the US, only 9 per cent of students in elite universities come from the poorer half of the population."
p. 137 - The data shows that ordinary citizens have virtually no influence over what their government does in the United States. Economic elites and interest groups have a substantial degree of influence.
p. 161 - "That poverty reduces economic freedom has long been ignored or denied by the political right."
p. 167 - "Decades of studies have produced robust results confirming that advertising and the materialism it fosters is psychologically damaging."
"In the US, 10 per cent of children have moderate or severe difficulties in the areas of emotions, concentration, behavior, or being able to get along with people, and more than half of adults will suffer from some form of mental illness in their lifetimes."
p. 187 - "Two wire agencies, Associated Press (AP) and Reuters, provide the majority of the international news, pictures and video for the media."
p. 203 - "The forces that shape media output combine to create a structural bias which favors the selection of information and perspective that are supportive of elite interests. ..."
p. 274 - "Trillions of dollars rest in international tax havens while billions of people go without clean water, a nutritious diet, life-saving medicine or basic liberties."
p. 293 - "Even in the richest countries, the need for social spending is immense -- to reduce university fees, to increase the supply of affordable housing, defend adequate pensions and provide universal healthcare. To close the gap between rich and poor there is also great need for a living wage, capped incomes, comprehensive child support, stricter inheritance laws, and increased investment in deprived areas."
"In 1945, corporate tax accounted for 35 per cent of federal receipts; by 2003, it was 7 per cent."
p. 205 - In 2009, the top five health insurance companies increased their profits by an impressive 56 per cent, despite the fact that 2.9 million Americans lost their health insurance that year."
p. 315 - "The world's fossil fuel reserves are owned by corporations and governments. In 2011, these reserves were estimated to be worth $27 trillion. Market valuations change, but, barring a miraculous advance in technology, if we are to stay within a safe carbon budget, we will need to write off trillions of dollar's worth of fuel."
p. 333 - "The optimum scale of the economy is one that enables the health of the ecosystem to be preserved, renewable resources to be extracted at a rate no faster than they can be regenerated, non-renewable resources to be consumed at a rate no faster than they can be replaced by renewable substitutes, and waste to be deposited into the environment at a rate no faster than it can be safely absorbed."
p. 335 - "For every $100 of global economic growth that occurred between 1990 and 2001, only 60 cents went to those living below the $1 per day household."
p. 356 - "As of November 2014, attempts to kill forty-one targeted individuals under the US drone program sacrificed an estimated 1,147 innocent people."
p. 34 - "The incidence of recidivism in the US and UK hovers between 60 and 65 per cent. This is roughly 50 per cent higher than rates in less punitive nations such as Sweden, Norway, and Japan."
After reading 50 studies of recidivism, Canadian criminologist Paul Genheau could not find a single one that indicated imprisonment reduced recidivism. In fact, longer sentences were associated with a three per cent increase in reoffending rates, supporting the theory that a prison can function as a "school for crime." "In the US, almost seven out of ten males will find themselves back in jail within three years of release. And of the countries with the highest homicide rates, the top five that employ the death penalty average 41.6 murders per 100,000 people, whereas the top five with no death penalty average roughly half that number at 21.6 murders per 100,000 people." One explanation is that severe institutional punishment has a brutalizing impact on the general culture.
p. 37 - In "supermax" prisons, inmates are kept in solitary confinement 23 hours a day. It's estimated that 80,000 prisoners are currently living under these conditions.
p. 39 - Norway has a prison in which prisoners live in comfortable houses, six men to a house. That prison has a reoffend rate of 16 percent, versus an average of 70 percent for Europe.
One of the most effective strategies to stop criminals from reoffending has been to provide inmates with the opportunity to study and earn formal qualifications.
p. 41 - The U.S. Department of Education for the 2011 to 2012 school year saw 130,000 students expelled from school and seven million suspended (one for every seven students).
p. 44 - "The most established environmental determinant of violence in a society is income inequality."
p. 45 - "In the US, ten times as many people with serious mental illnesses -- such as Bipolar disorder and schizophrenia -- are in prison than in a state hospital."
p. 46 - "Across the US today, black people are more than six times as likely to be imprisoned than whites, 31 per cent more likely to be pulled over while driving than white drivers, and twice as likely to be killed by a cop (and more likely to be unarmed when killed)."
p. 47 - "A study from the University of Wisconsin in 2015 found that states with private prisons have higher rates of reoffending, and that private prisons are keeping inmates locked up longer."
p. 49 - "Today, a quarter of the world's convicts reside in America. In 2004, 360 of these [convicts] were serving life sentences for the heinous crime of shoplifting."
p. 54 - "The sea of inequality on which the legal system floats makes a mockery of the principle of equal rights before the law."
p. 64 - "For instance, in the US, only 9 per cent of students in elite universities come from the poorer half of the population."
p. 137 - The data shows that ordinary citizens have virtually no influence over what their government does in the United States. Economic elites and interest groups have a substantial degree of influence.
p. 161 - "That poverty reduces economic freedom has long been ignored or denied by the political right."
p. 167 - "Decades of studies have produced robust results confirming that advertising and the materialism it fosters is psychologically damaging."
"In the US, 10 per cent of children have moderate or severe difficulties in the areas of emotions, concentration, behavior, or being able to get along with people, and more than half of adults will suffer from some form of mental illness in their lifetimes."
p. 187 - "Two wire agencies, Associated Press (AP) and Reuters, provide the majority of the international news, pictures and video for the media."
p. 203 - "The forces that shape media output combine to create a structural bias which favors the selection of information and perspective that are supportive of elite interests. ..."
p. 274 - "Trillions of dollars rest in international tax havens while billions of people go without clean water, a nutritious diet, life-saving medicine or basic liberties."
p. 293 - "Even in the richest countries, the need for social spending is immense -- to reduce university fees, to increase the supply of affordable housing, defend adequate pensions and provide universal healthcare. To close the gap between rich and poor there is also great need for a living wage, capped incomes, comprehensive child support, stricter inheritance laws, and increased investment in deprived areas."
"In 1945, corporate tax accounted for 35 per cent of federal receipts; by 2003, it was 7 per cent."
p. 205 - In 2009, the top five health insurance companies increased their profits by an impressive 56 per cent, despite the fact that 2.9 million Americans lost their health insurance that year."
p. 315 - "The world's fossil fuel reserves are owned by corporations and governments. In 2011, these reserves were estimated to be worth $27 trillion. Market valuations change, but, barring a miraculous advance in technology, if we are to stay within a safe carbon budget, we will need to write off trillions of dollar's worth of fuel."
p. 333 - "The optimum scale of the economy is one that enables the health of the ecosystem to be preserved, renewable resources to be extracted at a rate no faster than they can be regenerated, non-renewable resources to be consumed at a rate no faster than they can be replaced by renewable substitutes, and waste to be deposited into the environment at a rate no faster than it can be safely absorbed."
p. 335 - "For every $100 of global economic growth that occurred between 1990 and 2001, only 60 cents went to those living below the $1 per day household."
p. 356 - "As of November 2014, attempts to kill forty-one targeted individuals under the US drone program sacrificed an estimated 1,147 innocent people."
Wednesday, May 17, 2017
American Criminal Justice Excerpts
Excerpts from: William J. Stintz, "The Collapse of American Criminal Justice" (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2011)
p. 92 - "Felony courts 'often' docked 60 felony indictments in a day. Court business is conducted in a swirl of activity as judges seek to 'move' crowded calendars."
p. 105 - "[There] exist in some places a culture of resistance among prosecutors even to providing the discovery that is legally required." "As measured by DNA evidence from the crime scenes, approximately 25 percent of those the police initially believed to be the perpetrators were not guilty."
p. 117 - "Increasing punishment was driven by public moods of fear and then punitiveness..."
p. 120 - "Recommendations are to have many more cases go to juries and not be plea bargained; less bureaucracy; and more public funding for public defenders."
p. 141 - "And we could require probable cause as determined by an 'impartial magistrate' as a precondition for interrogation at all, conceding, in effect, that detectives will inevitably want to win the 'game' of interrogation of the 'competitive' enterprise of ferreting out crime." "Interrogations should be taped and there should be a prohibition on deceptiveness in the interrogation process, especially lying about the existence of physical evidence."
Excerpts from: Raymond Bonner, "Anatomy of Injustice" (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2012)
p. 34 - In the mid-1960s: "Nearly half the individuals being executed were black (even though they made up some 13 percent of the population)."
p. 37 - "The Court's decision in Furman overturned the death penalty in the forty states where it could be applied and in the District of Columbia as well for the federal government."
p. 147 - "Innocence alone does not entitle a defendant to a new trial. In Herrera v. Collins, Chief Justice William Rehnquist said in the majority opinion that after a defendant has had a fair trial, 'the presumption of innocence disappears.' " "Justice Blackmun said that it was 'contrary to any standard of decency to execute someone who is actually innocent.' He said it 'comes perilously close to simple murder.' "
p. 268 - "In Atkins v. Virginia, the Supreme Court, in a 6 to 3 decision, ruled that the execution of someone mentally retarded was proscribed by the Eighth Amendment."
ADDENDUMS:
*Of 192 questionnaires in the [Phil, music impresario] Specter case, 40% of the jurors believe a criminal defendant is obligated to prove his or her innocence. (Source: Richard Gabriel, "Acquitted" (New York: Berkley Books, 2014, p. 38).
*"American children spend an average of 900 hours per year in school; they spend 1,500 hours per year watching television." (Source: Gabriel, p.25).
*"And while almost 60 percent of Americans can name the Three Stooges, only 17 percent can name three justices on the Supreme Court." (Source: Gabriel, p. 25).
*Just this year, up to mid-February, 46 bills had been introduced in 21 states to make it harder to vote. (Source: The Nation Reports, February 2017).
p. 92 - "Felony courts 'often' docked 60 felony indictments in a day. Court business is conducted in a swirl of activity as judges seek to 'move' crowded calendars."
p. 105 - "[There] exist in some places a culture of resistance among prosecutors even to providing the discovery that is legally required." "As measured by DNA evidence from the crime scenes, approximately 25 percent of those the police initially believed to be the perpetrators were not guilty."
p. 117 - "Increasing punishment was driven by public moods of fear and then punitiveness..."
p. 120 - "Recommendations are to have many more cases go to juries and not be plea bargained; less bureaucracy; and more public funding for public defenders."
p. 141 - "And we could require probable cause as determined by an 'impartial magistrate' as a precondition for interrogation at all, conceding, in effect, that detectives will inevitably want to win the 'game' of interrogation of the 'competitive' enterprise of ferreting out crime." "Interrogations should be taped and there should be a prohibition on deceptiveness in the interrogation process, especially lying about the existence of physical evidence."
Excerpts from: Raymond Bonner, "Anatomy of Injustice" (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2012)
p. 34 - In the mid-1960s: "Nearly half the individuals being executed were black (even though they made up some 13 percent of the population)."
p. 37 - "The Court's decision in Furman overturned the death penalty in the forty states where it could be applied and in the District of Columbia as well for the federal government."
p. 147 - "Innocence alone does not entitle a defendant to a new trial. In Herrera v. Collins, Chief Justice William Rehnquist said in the majority opinion that after a defendant has had a fair trial, 'the presumption of innocence disappears.' " "Justice Blackmun said that it was 'contrary to any standard of decency to execute someone who is actually innocent.' He said it 'comes perilously close to simple murder.' "
p. 268 - "In Atkins v. Virginia, the Supreme Court, in a 6 to 3 decision, ruled that the execution of someone mentally retarded was proscribed by the Eighth Amendment."
ADDENDUMS:
*Of 192 questionnaires in the [Phil, music impresario] Specter case, 40% of the jurors believe a criminal defendant is obligated to prove his or her innocence. (Source: Richard Gabriel, "Acquitted" (New York: Berkley Books, 2014, p. 38).
*"American children spend an average of 900 hours per year in school; they spend 1,500 hours per year watching television." (Source: Gabriel, p.25).
*"And while almost 60 percent of Americans can name the Three Stooges, only 17 percent can name three justices on the Supreme Court." (Source: Gabriel, p. 25).
*Just this year, up to mid-February, 46 bills had been introduced in 21 states to make it harder to vote. (Source: The Nation Reports, February 2017).
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