Concerned Families of Westchester Newsletter
June 17, 2018
Hello All – Yesterday's CFOW vigil/rally in Hastings protested our government's complicity in the bloodbath now underway in Yemen. Military forces of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, having intervened in Yemen's civil war three years ago, are now besieging/attacking Yemen's major port, Hodaideh. This port is the entryway for the bulk of food and medicine entering Yemen, a country on the brink of famine and ravaged by a cholera epidemic that has infected a million people. To the great shame of all of us, the US government gave the "green light" for this attack last week. And because the United States supplies Saudi Arabia and the UAE with arms, targeting advice, blockade support, and aerial refueling support, they could have stopped it – they could have pulled the plug. But they did not.
Today the UK's liberal newspaper The Guardian editorialized:
[Saudi Arabia and the UAE} are conducting this war with British-, American- and French-made arms. They are conducting it with western military training and advice; British and US officers have been in the command room for airstrikes, and this weekend Le Figaro alleged that there are French special forces on the ground in Yemen. They are conducting it with diplomatic shelter from the west. On Friday, the UK and the US blocked a Swedish drive for a UN security council statement demanding a ceasefire: Arms sales and security interests dictate.
US policy is clear: our government supports the attack on Hodaideh, whatever the cost. The urgent need is for a ceasefire. Yet at the United Nations last week, the Trump administration (and the UK) opposed a Resolution introduced by Sweden calling for a ceasefire. Last March, during the only serious discussion in the Senate over US policy in Yemen, ten Democrats joined with the Republican majority to defeat a Resolution that attempted to gain some congressional control over US assistance for the war in Yemen. And last week, Westchester's congressional representatives Lowey and Engel joined with other Democratic Party foreign-policy heavyweights in issuing a statement pointedly avoiding calls for a ceasefire in Yemen, expressing wishes instead that good faith efforts would be made to avoid civilian casualties. The world's major humanitarian disaster is about to get a lot worse.
Another tragedy unfolding this week is the escalating sadism of US immigration and asylum policy on our border with Mexico. Official US policy now is to separate children from parents seeking asylum, and to deny asylum to anyone presenting evidence that they are escaping from an abusive or gang-threatening environment. Several good/useful articles about these developments are linked below. One heartening development has been the proliferation of protests and demonstrations under the banner of "Families Belong Together." It may be that the Trump people have made their attack on the conscience of Americans "a bridge too far," and their actions may invoke a counterattack similar to the one that brought thousands of people to airports in January 2017 to protest Trump's attempt to prevent non-citizens from entering the country.
Finally, NB all peace and justice stalwarts are invited to CFOW's more-or-less annual July 4th picnic. Details are in the newsletter Calendar section, below.
News Notes
A rule of thumb for housing advocates is that an "affordable" rent is one-third or less of monthly income. Ha, ha, ha say most renters; and according to a new study of housing affordability, "People Earning Minimum Wage Cannot Afford To Rent Anywhere In the US." "The stark findings of this report," notes the article in The Huffington Post, "come at a time when affordable housing, already in crisis, is further threatened by Trump administration proposals to strip back the social security net.
Now that white nationalism is at home in the White House, this short US government anti-prejudice film from wartime 1943 could be ripped from today's presidential tweets. Check out "Don't Be a Sucker!" and weep for the USA.
After three years of legalized marijuana in California, how are things going? Check out this report from old friend Jonah Raskin, "Canabis in California."
While the Trump team loyally defends Israeli killings of Palestinians on the Gaza border, the rest of the world is not buying it. Last week 120 members of the UN General Assembly supported a Resolution introduced by Algeria and Turkey deploring Israel's use of "excessive force" against the Gaza protesters. Among those supporting the Resolution were Russia, China, France, and 11 other European states. This action of the General Assembly follows a UN Security Council vote on a similar Resolution that was defeated by the traditional US veto, with no other support.
Things to Do/Coming Attractions
Ongoing – CFOW holds a vigil/rally each Saturday at the VFW Plaza in Hastings (Warburton and Spring) from 12 to 1 p.m. Everyone invited; please join us!
Ongoing – Added to the Hastings farmers market on Saturdays is the opportunity to recycle food scraps, including meat and anything that was once alive, according to coordinator EZ. Look for the big bin at the market; and for more info email hastingscompost@gmail.com.
Ongoing – Sign the "People's Peace Treaty"! Code Pink writes: "Inspired by the Vietnam-era People's Peace Treaty, we have initiated a People's Peace Treaty with North Korea, to raise awareness about the past U.S. policy toward North Korea, and to send a clear message that we, the people of the U.S., do not want another war with North Korea. This is not an actual treaty, but rather a declaration of peace from the people of the United States." To sign the Treaty, go here.
Ongoing – The Poor Peoples' Campaign is now under way, with actions across the country. For more information and to get involved with the action in Westchester, contact Rev. Joya Colon-Berezin.
Thursday, June 21st – Churches for Peace in the Middle East (CMEP) invites us to "a conversation about peace-building in Palestine and Israel." One of the speakers will be a Palestinian woman from the West Bank village where nonviolent resistance to the Occupation inspired the animated film, "The Wanted 18." The program will be held at the White Plains Presbyterian Church, 39 N. Broadway in White Plains, starting at 7:30 p.m.
Wednesday, July 4th – Come one and all to the CFOW 4th of July picnic. Celebrate true Independence in the company of peace & justice stalwarts. We'll assemble in the afternoon at the Dobbs Ferry Historical Society, 12 Elm St. in Dobbs. More details forthcoming.
Sunday, July 15th – CFOW will host Korean expert Soo Bok Kim for a discussion about what's happening on the Korean peninsula. The program will be at the Hastings Community Center, starting at 2 p.m. More details forthcoming.
CFOW Nuts & Bolts
Please consider getting involved with Concerned Families of Westchester. We meet for a protest/rally each Saturday in Hastings, from 12 to 1 p.m., at the VFW Plaza (Warburton and Spring St.) Our leaflet and posters for our rallies are usually about war or climate change, but issues such as racial justice or Trump's tax cut legislation are often targeted, depending on current events. We meet on the first Sunday of each month, from 7 to 9 p.m., at the Dobbs Ferry Historical Society. Our weekly newsletter is archived at https://cfow.blogspot.com/; and news of interest and coming events is posted on our CFOW Facebook page. If you would like to make a financial contribution to our work, please send your check to CFOW, PO Box 364, Hastings-on-Hudson, NY 10706. Thanks!
This Newsletter
Articles linked in the CFOW newsletter are intended to illuminate some of the main action-issues about which we are concerned. Coming mostly from the "dissenting media," they provide an alternative to the perspectives of the mainstream media. In addition to the excellent "Featured Essays," I especially recommend the sets of articles on the war in Yemen, the Trump-Kim summit on Korea, and our immigration/asylum crisis; Tom Engelhardt's article on the decline of the USA ("War & Peace"); and several good articles on the "Great March of Return" in Gaza.
Rewards!
This week's rewards for stalwart readers come from the newsletter's favorite Stalin-era composer, Dmitri Shostakovich. Young Dmitri's innovations shook the musical world in the late '20s and early '30s, ran into Stalin's cultural counter-revolution in the mid-30s, trembled through the purge trials/murders of the late 1930s, and triumphed with his seventh ("Leningrad") symphony during the dark days of World War II. But by 1947 the cultural night had fallen again. Thus Shostakovich's 1st violin concerto, the second part of which is played here by the amazing violinist Hillary Hahn, was not performed in public until after Stalin's death. One of my favorites from Shostakovich is his "24 Preludes and Fugues," finished in 1951, but criticized by the Party music police for having succumbed to "constructivist complexity, gloom moods, and individualistic aloofness." Listen to them here and judge for yourself; and enjoy this reminiscence by the pianist, Tatiana NIkolayeva, about her friendship with Shostakovich. (h/t LS). The English writer Julian Barnes wrote a good novel about Shostakovich ("The Noise of Time") in 2016; but I much prefer the (more fantastic) fictional portrayal of Dmitri in William Vollmann's wonderful "Europe Central." After all that … enjoy!
Best wishes,
Frank Brodhead
For CFOW
FEATURED ESSAYS
Bringing Julian Assange Home
By John Pilger, ZNet [June 17, 2018]
---- The persecution of Julian Assange must end. Or it will end in tragedy. The Australian government and prime minister Malcolm Turnbull have an historic opportunity to decide which it will be. They can remain silent, for which history will be unforgiving. Or they can act in the interests of justice and humanity and bring this remarkable Australian citizen home. … Julian Assange has committed no crime. He has never been charged with a crime. The Swedish episode was bogus and farcical and he has been vindicated. Katrin Axelsson and Lisa Longstaff of Women Against Rape summed it up when they wrote, "The allegations against [Assange] are a smokescreen behind which a number of governments are trying to clamp down on WikiLeaks for having audaciously revealed to the public their secret planning of wars and occupations with their attendant rape, murder and destruction… The authorities care so little about violence against women that they manipulate rape allegations at will." This truth was lost or buried in a media witch-hunt that disgracefully associated Assange with rape and misogyny. The witch-hunt included voices who described themselves as on the left and as feminist. They willfully ignored the evidence of extreme danger should Assange be extradited to the United States. [Read More]
Alabama's Lynching Memorial and the Legacy of Racial Terror in the South
By Liliana Segura, The Intercept [
---- Today, the legal framework governing the death penalty is complex and impenetrable — and executions are more secretive and sanitized than ever. This long evolution can make the link between lynching and the death penalty feel tenuous and disorienting in 2018. Last year in Charleston, South Carolina, I watched as Dylann Roof was sentenced to die for the slaughter of nine black people, under the authority of a black president. … I came to Alabama to bridge another disconnect, one that spans my own lifetime: the distinction we created between the "modern death penalty era" and everything that came before. In between are the four years separating two landmark Supreme Court rulings: Furman v. Georgia, which struck down the death penalty in 1972, and Gregg v. Georgia, which upheld it in 1976. Gregg ushered in an age of state-sanctioned killing that would transform executions to look modern and humane, while closing a chapter in death penalty history that is now rarely invoked. For all the data we have amassed showing discrimination in capital punishment, its roots in racial terror have been severed from our collective memory. [Read More]
The Mueller Indictments Still Don't Add Up to Collusion
By Aaron Maté, The Nation [June 13, 2018]
---- In just over one year, special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation of the Trump campaign and Russia has generated five guilty pleas, 20 indictments, and more than 100 charges. None of these have anything to do with Mueller's chief focus: the Russian government's alleged meddling in the 2016 election and the Trump campaign's suspected involvement. While it's certainly possible that Mueller will make new indictments that go to the core of his case, what's been revealed so far does not make a compelling brief for collusion. … The January 2017 intelligence report begat an endless cycle of innuendo and unverified claims, inculcating the public with fears of a massive Russian interference operation and suspicions of the Trump campaign's complicity. The evidence to date casts doubt on the merits of this national preoccupation, and with it, the judgment of the intelligence, political, and media figures who have elevated it to such prominence. [Read More]
The Trump spectacle is overshadowing the more urgent scandals of this administration
, Editor of The Nation [June 12, 2018]
---- Breaking news: President Trump tweeted. He's feuding with a foreign leader — or a football team. Special counsel Robert S. Mueller III is investigating the administration. In today's media environment, these "breaking" political news alerts are nearly constant. They dominate cable news and serve primarily to agitate rather than inform. Though the tendency to focus on spectacle over substance is not a new media phenomenon, it has noticeably worsened under the influence of a president who has devoted his public life to making a spectacle of himself. And as recent events have shown, it is leaving little to no oxygen for important issues that have real consequences on the American people's lives. Perhaps the most brazen example is the media's neglect of hurricane-ravaged Puerto Rico. Last month, a new Harvard study estimated that 4,645 deaths can be linked to the storm and its immediate aftermath, a toll far higher than the official estimate of 64. If accurate, that's more than the number of Americans killed on 9/11 or during the Iraq War. Yet on the day it was released, the study was treated as an afterthought on cable news, [Read More]
WAR & PEACE
How the Last Superpower Was Unchained: American Wars and Self-Decline
By Tom Engelhardt, Tom Dispatch [June 15, 2018]
By Tom Engelhardt, Tom Dispatch [June 15, 2018]
---- The history of greed in our time has yet to be written, but what a story it will someday make. In it, the greed of those geopolitical dreamers will intersect with the greed of an ever wealthier, ever more gilded 1%, of the billionaires who were preparing to swallow whole the political system of that last superpower and grab so much of the wealth of the planet, leaving so little for others. Whether you're talking about the urge to control the planet militarily or financially, what took place in these years could, in the end, result in ruin of a historic kind. To use a favored phrase from the Bush years, one of these days we may be facing little short of "regime change" on a planetary scale. And what a piece of shock and awe that's likely to prove to be. All of us, of course, now live on the planet Bush's boys tried to swallow whole. They left us in a world of infinite war, infinite harm, and in Donald Trump's America where cluelessness has been raised to a new power. [Read More]
The War in Yemen
(Video) A Humanitarian Catastrophe: U.S.-Backed Forces Attack Key Yemeni Port Imperiling Millions
From Democracy Now! [June 13, 2018]
----In Yemen, a coalition led by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates has launched an all-out offensive against the key port city of Hodeidah. The offensive is expected to be the biggest battle in the ongoing 3-year war between the U.S.-backed, Saudi-led coalition and Houthi rebels. The war has already killed 15,000 civilians, sparked the world's worst cholera epidemic and pushed the country to the brink of famine. Humanitarian organizations have warned the offensive could be a catastrophe for a quarter of a million civilians living in the port city, and for the rest of the Yemen, which is highly dependent on aid that travels through this port. For more, we speak with Congressmember Ro Khanna in Washington, D.C. He recently co-authored a bipartisan letter calling for Defense Secretary James Mattis to help prevent an attack on Hodeidah. [See the Program]
The Saudi & UAE Slaughter in Yemen isn't a Proxy Conflict with Iran
By Sheila Carapico, Informed Comment [June 2018]
---- Alongside their throttlehold over which reporters can visit what parts of Yemen, and thus what story they can tell, Saudi and Emirati investments in public relations, lobbying, think-tanks, and political consultants are shaping the narrative about their war there. … The US- and UK- supported Saudi and UAE dynasties and their hired analysts insist that their Yemeni adversary is a proxy of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. The inference is that Arab Gulf monarchies righteously resist Iranian – or Shi`a — influence in the Peninsula. Therefore, forty months of relentless bombing and blockade are justified as self-defense. Poppycock. [Read More]
The Disaster Awaiting Yemen After Al Hudaydah Falls
By Alex De Waal, The New York Times [June 14, 2018]
---- Last-ditch diplomatic efforts could not stop the Saudi Arabian and Emirati coalition's offensive on the Yemeni port city of Al Hudaydah this week. With no real prospect for peace talks of any kind, the city, a fief of the Houthi rebels who control much of the country and a hub for humanitarian assistance for millions of desperate Yemeni civilians, could fall within days. If the offensive goes according to the Saudis' and Emiratis' plan, promptly after that, the Houthis, who also control the capital Sana, will sue for peace. The maritime blockade in place since 2015 could then be lifted. After that, a vast humanitarian operation could unfold, saving Yemen from a devastating famine. But nothing in this war has gone according plan so far, and the risks of mass starvation are greater than ever, even if Al Hudaydah falls fast. … Famine isn't just about masses of people going hungry; famine tears societies apart. It means mass exodus caused by desperation. It means humiliation and collective trauma. Some people profit from the misery of others, hiking food prices or buying land at fire-sale prices. Those who pay the price — and their children and then those children's children — can only resent the opportunists for their plight. Not to mention the aggressors. As the British learned in Ireland in the mid-19th century, and the Soviets in Ukraine in the 1930s, starving people is a dangerous and loaded strategy: It leaves behind a bitter legacy, and a long trail of rancor. [Read More]
Also useful/illuminating on Yemen – Patrickk Cockburn, "Attacking Hodeidah is a deliberate act of cruelty by the Trump administration," The Independent [UK] [Link]; and Iona Craig, "UAE Says It Can't Control Yemeni Forces — Even as It Hands Them Bags of Cash," The Intercept [June 7, 2018] [Link].
The Trump-Kim Korean Summit
[FB – The Trump-Kim summit in Singapore was an optimistic beginning to an intricate and probably long peace process. In a nutshell, in response to steps taken by North Korea prior to the summit (an announced end to bomb and missile testing, the destruction of the nuclear test site), and building on the impressive steps taken by North and South Korea along a path towards reconciliation and national unification, Trump announced the suspension of the "provocative" (Trump's word) war games which involved the United States practicing the destruction of the North. The best assessment of the summit and its context that I have come across is The Nation magazine interview with our most able historian of the Koreas, Bruce Cumings. A very useful background piece, imo, remains this month-old Democracy Now! interview with Korean expert, Prof. Christine Hong.]
Trump Meets Kim, Averting Threat of Nuclear War—and US Pundits Are Furious
By Tim Shorrock, The Nation [June 13, 2018]
---- On Tuesday, President Trump and Kim Jong-un met and shook hands on Singapore's resort island of Sentosa, curbing decades of deep and bitter hostility between the two countries and possibly opening a new chapter for the United States in East Asia. Afterward, Trump even boasted that he had created a "special bond" with the North Korean dictator. The unprecedented meeting was the climax of months of intensive negotiations that began in earnest in March, when Kim, through the mediation of South Korean President Moon Jae-in, unexpectedly invited Trump to meet and settle their vast differences. As their initial encounter began, Trump declared that times had changed—irrevocably. … The "joint statement" included a pledge to build "a lasting and robust peace regime on the Korean Peninsula" and reaffirmed the DPRK's commitment, made in Kim's April 27 "Panmunjom Declaration" with President Moon, to "work toward complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula." In a last-minute addition, the statement also committed each side to restart a project abandoned years ago to jointly recover the remains of US soldiers killed and missing in action during the Korean War of 1950 to 1953. … Even as the first images flashed across the world of Trump and Kim shaking hands against the unusual background of US and DPRK flags flapping together, social media and op-ed sections of media sites were filled with denunciations of Trump. Democratic leaders in the House and Senate led the attack. [Read More]
War with Iran?
With new pro-Iran Iraq Coalition, Tehran Outmaneuvers Trump-Saudi-Israeli Axis
---- It is likely that Trump's violation of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), the deal signed between Iran and the five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany, was intended to set the stage for a push to contain Iran. The push against Iran would involve again subjecting it to severe economic sanctions, in hopes of bankrupting it and depriving it of the means with which to continue to play a role in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon. … So far, the new alliance of Trump, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Israel against Iran formed in spring of 2017 has had no successes at all. If anything, in the last year Iran's hand has been strengthened in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon. While the Houthi rebels in Yemen may ultimately be defeated by the Saudi-UAE Axis, which is now attacking the Red Sea port of Hodeida, Iran is only marginally involved in Yemen– contrary to what Saudi propaganda would have us believe. … Some 18 months into the Trump administration, Trump hasn't laid a finger on Tehran, which is still in the catbird seat in the eastern stretches of the Middle East. [Read More]
The Enhanced Cruelty of US Immigration/Asylum Policy
Protect Immigrants' Rights; End The Crises That Drive Migration
By Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers, Popular Resistance [June 16, 2018]
---- Immigration is tied into issues of corporate trade agreements, regime change, US Empire, the drug war and capitalism. These issues are forcing a race to the bottom for worker rights and wages and destruction of the environment. They are driving a growing security state, militarization of law enforcement and mass incarceration. Border patrols lock people into countries where they face poverty, pollution and violence with little chance of escape. Immigrants are the scapegoats, but it is the systems that are driving migration. Most people would prefer to remain in their home countries where they have roots, family and communities. Extreme conditions drive people to abandon everything and endure harsh and dangerous travel in hope of finding safety and the means of survival. [Read More]
(Video) Trauma at the Texas-Mexico Border: Families Separated, Children Detained & Residents Fighting Back
From Democracy Now! [June 14, 2018]
----- We look at growing outrage over the Trump administration's policy of separating immigrant families who cross the U.S.-Mexico border, many fleeing dangerous conditions and seeking asylum. At least 600 immigrant children were removed from their parents last month, after Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced the new rule. On Wednesday, 10 members of Congress protested by blocking the entrance to the headquarters of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the agency tasked with carrying out the forced removal of children from their parents. More protests in at least 60 cities are planned today by the group Families Belong Together, which formed in response to the new policy. We go to the epicenter of this "zero tolerance" crackdown, the Rio Grande Valley in South Texas, where more than half of all migrant families and children have been apprehended by Border Patrol agents since mid-May, for a special report by Democracy Now! correspondent Renée Feltz, who spoke with residents taking action in response to the widely condemned practice of separating families. [See the Program] For another sad/useful article about this family-separation policy, check out "The U.S. Has Been in the Business of Breaking Up Families For Years" [Link].
The Misogynistic Logic of Asylum Policy
By Natasha Lennard, The Intercept [June 15, 2018]
---- When the United Nations adopted the Declaration on the Elimination of Violence Against Women in 1993, it gave long overdue recognition to the fact that gendered domestic violence is not a private issue, but a public health and human rights concern for the international community. Attorney General Jeff Sessions's decision this week to stop giving asylum protections for domestic violence victims stands in grim conflict with this principle. … Victims of domestic and gang violence, in other words, won't even be able to have their claims for asylum heard. The effect of Sessions's ruling could be sweeping and immediate. Immigration attorneys have said this decision could invalidate tens of thousands of pending asylum claims from women fleeing domestic and gang violence, which often intersect, in Central America and Mexico. [Read More]
---- When the United Nations adopted the Declaration on the Elimination of Violence Against Women in 1993, it gave long overdue recognition to the fact that gendered domestic violence is not a private issue, but a public health and human rights concern for the international community. Attorney General Jeff Sessions's decision this week to stop giving asylum protections for domestic violence victims stands in grim conflict with this principle. … Victims of domestic and gang violence, in other words, won't even be able to have their claims for asylum heard. The effect of Sessions's ruling could be sweeping and immediate. Immigration attorneys have said this decision could invalidate tens of thousands of pending asylum claims from women fleeing domestic and gang violence, which often intersect, in Central America and Mexico. [Read More]
ISRAEL/PALESTINE
Debunking Myths About the Palestinian Protests
By Muhammad Shehada and Jamie Stern-Weiner, VICE News [June 12, 2018]
---- Over the past ten weeks, tens of thousands of Palestinians in Gaza have participated in the "March of Return", mass nonviolent demonstrations to protest Israel's illegal siege. Throughout, Israel has responded with violent force. As of the 7th of June, Israeli forces had killed more than 110 Palestinians in the course of the protests, including 14 children, and injured more than 3,700 with live ammunition. In order to brutalise the people of Gaza into submission while minimising the international criticism that accompanies lethal force, Israeli snipers deployed along Gaza's perimeter fence methodically shot the legs of Palestinian demonstrators. "The aim", reports the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz, was "to leave as many young people as possible with permanent disabilities". To this end, the snipers used expanding bullets that "pulverised" bones and left exit wounds the size of a fist. According to the Secretary-General of UNRWA, the United Nations agency providing education and healthcare for refugees in Gaza, "many" of those shot will suffer "life-long disabilities". Mission accomplished. In order to legitimise its resort to overwhelming force, Israel has sought to cast doubt on the popular character of the demonstrations in Gaza and to present them as a threat to its security. A number of myths about the Gaza protests have consequently gained widespread traction. Here are some of the most prominent myths about these recent protests, and why they're not true. [Read More]
The Great Return March and the Women of Gaza
By Fadi Abu Shammalah and Jen Marlowe, Tom Dispatch [June 12, 2018]
By Fadi Abu Shammalah and Jen Marlowe, Tom Dispatch [June 12, 2018]
---- The Return March, which has just ended, was unique in recent history in Gaza for a number of reasons. Palestinians there are known for engaging in militant resistance against the Israeli occupation and also for the internal political split in their ranks between two dominant factions, Fatah and Hamas. Yet, in these weeks, the March has been characterized by a popular, predominantly nonviolent mobilization during which Gaza's fractured political parties have demonstrated a surprising degree of unity. And perhaps most noteworthy of all, women activists have played a visibly crucial role in the protests on a scale not seen for decades, possibly indicating what the future may look like when it comes to activism in the Gaza Strip. [Read More]
Media Tutorial
[FB – The newsletter's occasional "media tutorials" highlight articles that analyze media bias: what it is, how it works, and how it is produced. For those interested in this topic, I recommend the book by Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky, Manufacturing Consent. In a nutshell, they develop a "propaganda model" that attempts to explain how the free-market media develops a news/information product that is in lock-step with the needs of the people/corporations that run the USA and much of the rest of the world.]
'The Israeli military said,' the New York Times reports
By Norman G. Finkelstein, Mondoweiss [June 14, 2018]
---- New York Times reporter David M. Halbfinger didn't know whether the demonstrations in Gaza were "peaceful protests or violent riots." So he embedded himself with Israeli snipers poised on the perimeter of Gaza concentration camp to find out ("At Gaza Protests: Kites, Drones, Gas, Guns and the Occasional Bomb," June 8, 2018). One might suppose if he wanted an answer to that question, the obvious place to go would be among the demonstrators. But never mind. According to human rights organizations, the weekly Gaza demonstrations have been overwhelmingly nonviolent. But from day one, Halbfinger and his Times colleagues have recurrently portrayed them as armed confrontations in which Israeli snipers return the fire of protesters. They rely on official Israeli statements that are quoted without demurral, without further investigation, and without independent corroboration from, say, human rights monitors: [Read More] For another insightful analysis of New York Times reporting bias, read "Acts and Omissions: The NYT's Flawed Coverage of the Gaza Protest," by L. Michael Hager [Link].
OUR HISTORY
Oliver Law, the Lincoln Brigade's Black Commander
Oliver Law was among a brave band of 2800 American men and women (including 90 other African Americans) who rushed to help the Spanish Republic Spain during its Civil War (1936-1939). Their aim was to stop Hitler and Mussolini from seizing and using Spain to launch their march across Europe. This was a crucial Nazi warm-up for World War II. These brave Americans were joined by 40,000 other men and women from 52 countries who also volunteered to save Spain's Republican government from Hitler and Mussolini and General Francisco Franco, their Spanish fascist ally. For the only time in world history a global volunteer force left their homelands to defend democracy in a distant land. Though few volunteers had any military training they aimed to shame and prod their governments to stop fascist aggression "at the agates of Madrid." But at this point England, France, the US and other democratic governments did nothing about fascist aggression – and England and France encouraged it. So, as one American volunteer said, "some one had to do something!" [Read More]
American Nativism: From the Chinese Exclusion Act to Trump
---- Since nativism is largely responsible for the election of Donald Trump, the left is obligated to understand its roots as well as the impact it is having on those who are its most visible victims. Two new documentaries will help us develop both the historical and personal dimensions of the great stain across the body politic that has existed almost since the beginning of what Robinson Jeffers called our "perishing republic". "The Chinese Exclusion Act" premiered last month on PBS but is thankfully available now on-demand. Directed by Ric Burns, It is a history of a racist immigration law that was passed in 1882 and remained on the books until it was repealed by the Magnuson Act in 1943 when China became a key ally in the war against Japan. … To be shown at the Human Rights Film Festival in New York on June 21st, "The Unafraid" derives its title from the chant of DACA students sitting in at a state college in Athens, Georgia: "We are undocumented; we are unafraid!" It tracks the struggle of four high school seniors brought to the USA from Mexico as young children to now overcome the obstacles they face in one of the country's most viciously anti-immigrant states. They formed a local activist group called Freedom University that sought to end the punitive practice of forcing undocumented students to pay non-resident tuition fees even though they lived nearly their entire lives in Georgia. Coming from hard-pressed families barely scraping by, the non-resident tuition fees costing triple what residents paid stood in the way of getting a college degree. [Read More]
