From the Now This YouTube web page:
The Donald Trump administration is reportedly planning a policy that will define a person’s gender by their genitalia at birth. Transgender people and allies nationwide are speaking out against this anti LGBTQ policy. 1.4 million transgender people are standing up and declaring that they will not be erased. The hashtag #WontBeErased has become a rallying cry for the transgender community.
By John White / San Diegans For Gun Violence Prevention
How many times have you told yourself that?
Did you tell yourself that after Sandy Hook, when gun violence took the lives of 20 children and six adults?
Or after Las Vegas, when a man with guns left 58 people dead and 851 injured?
Or after Parkland, when 14 high school students and three adults died because of guns in the hands of somebody who shouldn’t have had them?
Or after Tree of Life in Pittsburgh last week, when gun violence combined with anti-Semitism to kill 11 and injure six in a rampage described as one of the deadliest against the Jewish community in U.S. history?
When you’re finally able to put down the remote control and step away from social media for a minute, that sentence is still nagging you, isn’t it? [Read more…]
The level of anxiety in the pre-midterm zeitgeist has been cranked up to 11.
It hurts to listen, just like it did at the Newport Festival in 1969 (?) when the band who invented heavy metal, Blue Cheer, took to the stage and literally blew (parts of) the audience away during their rendition of Summertime Blues. I know, I was there. People got up and ran. (I’m just not sure what year it was. It was the 60s, y’know.)
I urge you to remember all this noise is deliberate; aimed at inducing a nihilist stupor on the left and a rabid frenzy on the right. One thing you must not forget is your participation in the election. (Don’t worry, there’s more to do past November 6th. We’re just not there yet.)
Daily Kos
It’s unclear just why the Trump administration is so absolutely insistent that refugees with the well-established right to seek asylum in this nation are an existential danger, but—oh, wait, it’s not unclear at all. They’re rancid racists who have been stoking anti-immigrant, anti-refugee fear as an existential danger to this country solely as cheap electoral theater; now we are learning that ploy will include up to 14,000 active-duty U.S. military troops, many of them armed, to be deployed to the border to intercept a caravan of unarmed men, women, and children. [Read more…]
In his acceptance speech for BAFTA’s Charlie Chaplin Excellence in Comedy Award, Jim Carrey reminded the audience that Chaplin’s comedy included pointed social commentary that took on the American right-wing of his day. He went on to draw parallels to current events, saying that “we are fighting those same evils today” and dedicating the award to Chaplin and contemporary heroes, including Christopher Steele, Christine Blasey Ford and Colin Kaepernick. [h/t to Shelly P.] [Read more…]
As a mainstay of the American Dream–family home ownership– is declining, the land barons of the twenty-first century have been busy using that foundational yearning to disguise their true intent.
Dressing a corporate crusade as a defense of the small investor is a trick as old as the hills. It’s especially useful when the actual behavior –if known–of the corporate entities involved would be considered repugnant.
This was the crux of the successful petition drive leading up to the San Diego City Council’s rollback of regulations aimed at the overnight stay market locations in
By Stephanie Corkran of SanDiego350, and these six young people of San Diego who were interviewed.
“We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors; we borrow it from the children” is a quote attributed to the iconic environmentalist David Brower. Isn’t it time that we listen to what the children have to say? After all, they will be the ones who will inherit an overheated planet with extreme weather events, including intense storms, floods, droughts, and sea level rise.
The big question is: Will the children will have their say in court? Juliana v. U.S. is a constitutional climate lawsuit filed by 21 youths, ages 11 to 22. Since climate change is the overarching issue of our times (and perhaps of all time for our species), Juliana v. U.S. may well become the “trial of the century”. [Read more…]
“Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.” – Voltaire
A week of horror: Bombs mailed, black people executed, Jews slaughtered at prayer while a well-armed lunatic shrieked, “All Jews must die!”, all as the heedless Nationalist in the White House blathers, “It’s a terrible thing what’s going on with hate in our country.”
There were abundant signs: Michael Moore has outtake footage of a bulked-up Cesar Sayoc yelling “CNN Sucks!” at an early Trump rally, another sorry soul full of fear and anger, looking for someone to hate, “a lost dog with no direction home.”
With the midterms a little more than a week out there is a good amount of handwringing in progressive circles about whether or not the “blue wave” will actually happen.
Nervous Democrats pore over the latest posts on the polling at
With decision day looming, the collective anxiety is getting more and more palpable. In between ranting about Russia and the Mueller investigation, the unthinkable question is on the tip of many a liberal’s tongue: could we actually blow it again?
Federal dollars are supplementing deep pocketed Destroy Public Education (DPE) forces in an effort to privatize schools in San Antonio, Texas. The total monetary support for the preferred charter school systems exceeds $200,000,000.
One “DPE” publication, The 74, published a lengthy piece glorifying the attack on San Antonio’s democratically run schools and praised local elites including the school superintendent trained by Arne Duncan and Eli Broad for leading the decimation of public schools in San Antonio’s poorest neighborhoods. [Read more…]
By Michael Flanders
From the Now This YouTube page:
Women, young people, and people of color are making history in the 2018 midterm elections. The 2018 midterm elections are just around the corner and we’re celebrating all of the history makers this political cycle. There are 262 women on the ballot for Congress. Young people are running for office and stepping up like never before. People of color and LGBTQ people are shattering barriers. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ayanna Pressley, Andrew Gillum, Stacey Abrams, and Christine Hallquist are just some of the history makers.
