Editorial: Can California's legal cannabis industry survive while illegal competitors still operate?

2023/02/20

A photo from the Los Angeles County Sheriff’ s Department shows marijuana plants inside an illegal grow operation in the Antelope Valley. 

- L.A. County Sheriff’s Department/Handout/TNS

California voters' 2016 decision tolegalize the recreational use of cannabis was mostly driven by the idea that whether or not to use the drug should be a choice left up to adults — not be dictated by laws written in an era in which "reefer madness" was seen as a societal scourge. But it was also sold in part as a smart way to create a large new revenue stream for local and state governments. While Gavin Newsom, then lieutenant governor and now governor, made this argument as one of the leading voices for the Proposition 64 campaign, he also offered some notes of caution. In a May 2018 interview with The San Diego Union-Tribune Editorial Board, he said he expected it would take "five to seven years to substantively address the black market."

He's running out of time on that prediction. Five years later, California isn't anywhere close to the progress Newsom imagined. The latest evidence came last week with the report that revenue from the city of San Diego's cannabis tax was plunging, mostly because the city's two dozen authorized legal dispensaries are being undercut by illegal delivery services whose unregulated, untaxed products are much cheaper and which have proliferated because of comparatively tiny startup costs. The city now forecasts revenue of $19.8 million for the budget year that ends June 30, far less than the $25.7 million it previously expected. Broader struggles of the legal cannabis industry have led the Legislature to eliminate some cultivation taxes — and San Diego County supervisors to set low tax rates on the five authorized cannabis stores in unincorporated areas. Assemblymember Matt Haney, D-San Francisco, also wants to help the industry by legalizing the sale of food and nonalcoholic beverages at cannabis retailers and lounges.

It's a tall order. As long as illegal cannabis products cost half as much as legal ones — as documented last year by University of California, Davis economists Robin Goldstein and Daniel Sumner — they will dominate sales. Voters' 1996 approval of a law allowing legal "medicinal" cannabis — with buyers essentially self-attesting to why their health issues required its use — set up a multibillion-dollar industry that often skirted state laws. A prescient 2018 analysis by the Southern California News Group noted that the industry was only emboldened by the fact that Proposition 64 reduced the penalties for most cannabis crimes and eliminated others entirely.

Legal shops in California clearly need a more level playing field to thrive. Given that most illegal sellers advertise their services, authorities have a blueprint for an effective crackdown. But the longer that doesn't really materialize statewide, the less likely lawmakers who aren't enamored of a law-and-order agenda will be to pursue it. California will never "substantially address" the black market as a result.

Five years ago, Newsom said he felt "a deep sense of responsibility" to make sure Proposition 64 worked well. It's time for him to demonstrate that.

———

© The San Diego Union-Tribune

Jimmy Carter and the end of democratic capitalism

Robert Reich
February 20, 2023

Former President Jimmy Carter at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta in 2018.. - (Scott Cunningham/Getty Images)

I’m honoring Presidents’ Day by sharing with you some thoughts about Jimmy Carter, who is now in hospice care.

Carter’s administration marked the end of 45 years of democratic capitalism, whose goal had been to harness the private sector for the common good.

It’s important to understand what happened and why.

For years, the rap on President Carter has been that his presidency failed yet his post-presidency was the best in modern history.

This is way too simplistic.

Carter’s life after his presidency was exemplary for the same reason he was elected president after the disasters of Richard Nixon and Nixon’s vice president, Gerald Ford (who unconditionally pardoned Nixon for any crimes he may have committed): Carter’s modesty, decency, and humanity.

Not only were these traits the opposite of Nixon’s, but they would shine even brighter 40 years later in contrast to the loathsome Donald Trump.

One-term presidents are always presumed failures because voters didn’t reelect them. But Carter lost his reelection bid (as would George H.W. Bush 12 years later) not because his presidency failed but because the Federal Reserve Board hiked interest rates so high as to bring on a recession. Recessions do not just choke off inflation; they also choke off presidencies.

During Carter’s term of office, the OPEC oil cartel raised oil prices from $13 a barrel to over $34, resulting in double-digit price increases across the economy. Paul Volcker, Carter’s appointee as Fed chair, was determined to “break the back of inflation” by hiking interest rates to nearly 20 percent by 1981, bringing on a deep recession and causing millions of people to lose their jobs — including Carter.

It was not Carter’s fault that democratic capitalism ended with him. To the contrary, he appointed many consumer, labor, and environmental advocates to his administration.

Full disclosure: I was a Carter appointee, but met him only twice, once at a Rose Garden ceremony and years later at a dinner party at the home of Sen. Dianne Feinstein. (He was uncharacteristically late for dinner but made a surprise entry, coming down the stairs from a bedroom where he had taken a nap. He apologized profusely, making two un-Trump-like concessions in a single sentence: “I’m getting old and need my nap,” he said with a self-effacing grin, “but I should have told someone I was heading upstairs.”)

Many of his initiatives — ending funding for the B-1 bomber, seeking a comprehensive consumer-protection bill, proposing broad-based tax reform, opposing traditional “pork barrel” spending, establishing a “superfund” to clean up toxic waste sites, and deregulating the airline, trucking, and railroad industries (resulting in lower transportation costs for industry and consumers) — were commendable.

But much of what he did seemed to justify Lewis Powell’s warning to corporate America in a 1971 memo to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce that corporations must bulk up their lobbying muscle in Washington or suffer political defeat.

The untold story of the Carter years is the vast increase in corporate political firepower during this time. Trade associations, law firms, lobbying firms, political operatives, and public-relations specialists swarmed Washington, offering executives so much money that most retiring members of Congress also became lobbyists.

The city went from being a sleepy if not seedy backwater to the hub of America’s political wealth — replete with tony restaurants, upscale hotels, expensive bistros, and 25-bedroom mansions (one of them now owned by Jeff Bezos), and bordered by two of the richest counties in the nation.

With the defeat of Carter’s consumer protection legislation in 1978 at the hands of corporate lobbyists, Richard Lesher, then president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, presciently boasted that: “30 to 40 years from now people will look back and say ‘These were the years when the transition took place.’ … We're waking up. And big business is going to be in the forefront of this drive.”

Perhaps Carter could have staved this off had he been more politically cunning, but I doubt it. After 45 years playing defense, corporate America was eager to grab back the reins of power. Despite his best efforts, Carter paved the way for Ronald Reagan — and America’s return to the corporate capitalism that had dominated the nation before the Great Depression and Franklin D. Roosevelt.

ABOLISH THE DEATH PENALTY

Lamar Johnson calls on Missouri lawmakers to start compensation program for exonerees

Lamar Johnson, who St. Louis' circuit attorney says was wrongly convicted in a 1994 murder, speaks at Jefferson City Correctional Center in Jefferson City, Missouri, on Wednesday, April 20, 2022. - Emily Curiel/The Kansas City Star/TNS

2023/02/20

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. — Six days after a judge declared him a free man, Lamar Johnson told members of a Senate panel Monday that the state must compensate people who have been freed from prison for crimes they didn’t commit.

Johnson, 49, who served nearly three decades in the Missouri prison system for murder, said he and others who have been freed not only need a stream of income, but they need housing, a vehicle and a way to cover educational costs lost while they were locked up.

“It’s hard to put into words what it’s like to be free. Nothing can ever give me back what I lost,” Johnson said. “But this bill would provide the security I need to get on my feet.”

Johnson said he walked away from his prison term Tuesday with little more than clothes he received from friends.

“I have no car, no furniture and no place to call home,” he said.

At issue for members of the Senate Judiciary Committee are laws proposed by Democratic Sens. Brian Williams of University City and Steve Roberts of St. Louis that could give those who like Johnson are wrongfully imprisoned up to $65,000 for each year they spent in a cellblock.

In Johnson’s case, that would amount to more than $1.8 million.

The hearing marked the second year that lawmakers considered similar changes. Legislation debated last year failed to advance to the governor’s desk.

Johnson was joined by other exonerees at the hearing, including Ricky Kidd, a former cellmate who was exonerated in 2019.

“During that 23 years of being wrongfully convicted, I lost a lot,” Kidd said.

Under current state law, unless DNA evidence absolves an innocent person, Missouri doesn’t compensate prisoners released from custody for a crime they didn’t commit.

That has left Johnson reliant on fundraising efforts. Johnson’s GoFundMe account has generated more than $520,000 since he was released last Tuesday.

Johnson is the latest beneficiary of a new law that allows a prosecutor to file a motion for a judge to vacate or set aside a guilty verdict based on new information or evidence that clears the convicted person of wrongdoing.

Johnson was convicted of the 1994 murder of Markus Boyd. St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner’s office determined Johnson had not committed the crime. St. Louis Circuit Court Judge David C. Mason announced he agreed last week, saying there was “actual innocence” and constitutional errors in Johnson’s case.

Specifically, the legislation would grant damages of $179 per day for each day of imprisonment, topping out at a maximum of $65,000 per fiscal year,

Additionally, the damages awarded shall not be less than $25,000 for each additional year served on parole.

Although the proposals call for the money to be paid out on a yearly basis, a judge could order the award to be paid in one lump sum.

In addition to the damages, the claimant also could receive attorney’s fees and court costs not to exceed a total of $25,000. The person also could receive housing assistance, counseling and tuition assistance.

Josh Kezer, a southeast Missouri man whose wrongful murder conviction was overturned in 2009, said the law doesn’t go far enough. He believes exonerees who chose to stay in Missouri should not have to pay taxes.

“We’ve already paid our debt to society,” said Kezer, who has been advocating for inmates in Missouri prisons whom he believes are innocent.

Kezer added that Johnson’s ability to raise more than $520,000 should not be a barrier to his receiving compensation from the state.

“That’s got nothing to do with why this law is needed,” Kezer told the Post-Dispatch.

The Missouri Association of Prosecuting Attorneys also backs the legislation.

No one testified in opposition to the legislation.

Along with efforts in the Senate to compensate wrongly imprisoned people, Democrats in the House are pushing similar legislation.

The legislation is Senate Bill 253 and Senate Bill 146.

© St. Louis Post-Dispatch

A neuroscientist explains why stupidity is an existential threat to America

Bobby Azarian, Raw Story
February 20, 2023

WASHINGTON, DC - U.S. Rep.-elect Lauren Boebert (R-CO) walks to the House Chamber during the third day of elections for Speaker of the House at the U.S. Capitol Building on January 05, 2023 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Nathan Howard/Getty Images)

It may sound like an insensitive statement, but the cold hard truth is that there are a lot of stupid people in the world, and their stupidity presents a constant danger to others. Some of these people are in positions of power, and some of them have been elected to run our country. A far greater number of them do not have positions of power, but they still have the power to vote, and the power to spread their ideas. We may have heard of “collective intelligence,” but there is also “collective stupidity,” and it is a force with equal influence on the world. It would not be a stretch to say that at this point in time, stupidity presents an existential threat to America because, in some circles, it is being celebrated.

Although the term "stupidity" may seem derogatory or insulting, it is actually a scientific concept that refers to a specific type of cognitive failure. It is important to realize that stupidity is not simply a lack of intelligence or knowledge, but rather a failure to use one's cognitive abilities effectively. This means that you can be “smart” while having a low IQ, or no expertise in anything. It is often said that “you can’t fix stupid,” but that is not exactly true. By becoming aware of the limitations of our natural intelligence or our ignorance, we can adjust our reasoning, behavior, and decision-making to account for our intellectual shortcomings.

To demonstrate that stupidity does not mean having a low IQ, consider the case of Richard Branson, the billionaire CEO of Virgin Airlines, who is one of the world’s most successful businessmen. Branson has said that he was seen as the dumbest person in school, and has admitted to having dyslexia, a learning disability that affects one’s ability to read and correctly interpret written language. But it wasn’t just reading comprehension that was the problem — “Math just didn’t make sense to me,” Branson has said. “I would certainly have failed an IQ test.”

So, what is responsible for his enormous success, both financially and in terms of being a prolific innovator? Branson attributes his success to surrounding himself with highly knowledgeable and extremely competent people. Branson’s smarts come from his ability to recognize his own limitations, and to know when to defer to others on topics or tasks where he lacks sufficient knowledge or skill.
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RELATED: Greene blasted for 'parroting Kremlin talking points' after Biden visits Kyiv

This means you don’t have to be traditionally intelligent or particularly knowledgeable to be successful in life, make good decisions, have good judgment, and be a positive influence on the world. Stupidity is a consequence of a failure to be aware of one’s own limitations, and this type of cognitive failure has a scientific name: the Dunning-Kruger effect.

The Dunning-Kruger effect is a well-known psychological phenomenon that describes the tendency for individuals to overestimate their level of intelligence, knowledge, or competence in a particular area. They may also simultaneously misjudge the intelligence, expertise, or competence of others. In other words, they are ignorant of their own ignorance. The effect has been widely written about, and investigated empirically, with hundreds of studies published in peer-reviewed journals confirming and analyzing the phenomenon, particularly in relation to the dangers it poses in certain contexts.

It is easy to think of examples in which failing to recognize one’s own ignorance can become dangerous. Take for example when people with no medical training try to provide medical advice. It doesn’t take much Internet searching to find some nutritionist from the “alternative medicine” world who is claiming that some herbal ingredient has the power to cure cancer. Some of these people are scam artists, but many of them truly believe that they have a superior understanding of health and physiology. There are many people who trust these self-proclaimed experts, and there is no doubt that some have paid their lives for it.

What’s particularly disturbing about the Dunning-Kruger effect is that people are attracted to confident leaders, so politicians are incentivized to be overconfident in their beliefs and opinions, and to overstate their expertise. For example, Donald Trump — despite not having any real understanding of what causes cancer — suggested that the noise from wind turbines is causing cancer (a claim that is not supported by any empirical studies). It is well documented that on topics ranging from pandemics to climate change, Trump routinely dismissed the opinions of the professionals who have dedicated their lives to understanding those phenomena, because he thought that he knew better. It’s bad enough that politicians like Donald Trump and Marjorie Taylor Greene don’t recognize their own ignorance and fail to exercise the appropriate amount of caution when making claims that can affect public health and safety — but what is really disturbing is that they are being celebrated for their over-confidence (i.e., stupidity).

It is less surprising that politicians who regularly exhibit the Dunning-Kruger effect are being elected to office when one realizes that they are being voted in by people who also display the Dunning-Kruger effect. A 2008 study by the political scientist Ian Anson surveyed over 2000 Americans in an attempt to see whether or not the effect was playing a role in one’s ability to overestimate their political knowledge. The results clearly showed that the people who scored lowest on political knowledge were the very same people who were the most likely to overestimate their performance. While this is shocking, it also makes perfect sense: the less we know about something, the less of an ability we have to assess how much we don’t know. It is only when we try to become an expert on some complex topic that we truly realize how complicated it is, and how much more there is to learn about it.

This new theory of stupidity I have proposed here — that stupidity is not a lack of intelligence or knowledge, but a lack of awareness of the limits of one’s intelligence or knowledge — is more important right now than ever before, and I’ll tell you why. The same study by Anson mentioned above showed that when cues were given to make the participants “engage in partisan thought,” the Dunning-Kruger effect became more pronounced. In other words, if someone is reminded of the Republican-Democrat divide, they become even more overconfident in their uninformed positions. This finding suggests that in today’s unprecedently divided political climate, we are all more likely to have an inflated sense of confidence in our unsupported beliefs. What’s more, those who actually have the greatest ignorance will assume they have the least!

What we are dealing with here is an epidemic of stupidity that will only get worse as divisions continue to increase. This should motivate all of us to do what we can to ease the political division. When we can clearly see the social factors that are causing people to become increasingly stupid, our anger and hatred toward them should dissipate. We do not have much control over our level of intelligence or ignorance, or our ignorance of our ignorance.

But this does not mean that we should accept stupidity as the result of deterministic forces that are beyond our control. After gaining a deeper awareness of our own cognitive limitations and limited knowledge base, we should do what we can to instill this higher awareness in others. We must not just educate the public and our youth; we must teach them to become aware of their own ignorance, and give them the skills they need to search for more knowledge, and to detect when they or others are overestimating their knowledge or competency.

We have good reason to be optimistic that this is possible. A 2009 study showed that incompetent students increased their ability to estimate their class rank after being tutored in the skills they lacked. This suggests that we can learn a type of “meta-awareness” that gives us the power to more accurately assess ourselves and our own limitations. Once we can do that, then we can know when we need to do more research on a given topic, or to defer to experts. We can also get better at distinguishing between true experts and those who only claim to be experts (but are really just demonstrating the Dunning-Kruger effect).

We are all victims of the Dunning-Kruger effect to some degree. An inability to accurately assess our own competency and wisdom is something we see in both liberals and conservatives. While being more educated typically decreases our Dunning-Kruger tendencies, it does not eliminate them entirely. That takes constant cognitive effort in the form of self-awareness, continual curiosity, and a healthy amount of skepticism. By cultivating this type of awareness in ourselves, and making an effort to spread it to others, we can fight back against the stupidity crisis that threatens our nation.

Bobby Azarian is a cognitive neuroscientist and the author of the new book The Romance of Reality: How the Universe Organizes Itself to Create Life, Consciousness, and Cosmic Complexity. He is also a blogger for Psychology Today and the creator of the Substack Road to Omega. Follow him @BobbyAzarian.

Double whammy: Top Kansas Republican wants to roll back food tax relief to afford flat tax plan

Sherman Smith, Kansas Reflector
February 20, 2023

Senate President Ty Masterson appears Jan. 20, 2023, before the Senate tax committee to urge lawmakers to support plans to limit tax relief on food to “healthy” items in order to afford a lower income tax rate. (Sherman Smith/Kansas Reflector)


TOPEKA — Senate President Ty Masterson’s “broader picture” for tax policy changes came into focus Monday with a plan that involves rolling back tax relief on food so the state can afford to cut income taxes for the highest wage earners.

The Senate tax committee passed a flat tax plan that would lower the income tax rate for all wage brackets to 4.75% at an estimated cost of about $566 million in the next calendar year. The impact on state revenue would be lessened by applying the sales tax on food to just “healthy” items.

Masterson appeared before the committee to promote the two pieces of legislation.

“Is this meant to only help those less fortunate? I think the answer is no,” Masterson said. “They’re to be helped, but it’s to help all Kansans, not just those less fortunate, because the structure’s there. The best thing for them is a job. We can’t keep on the train of buying economic development. You have to put a tax structure in place where those jobs remain. And so that helps everybody.”
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He praised Gov. Laura Kelly for effectively using her “axe the tax” line during last year’s gubernatorial campaign, where she touted passage of legislation to gradually eliminate the 6.5% state sales tax on food. But he urged lawmakers to consider the “broader picture.”

Masterson’s proposal would repeal the gradual elimination of state sales tax on food, which would reduce annual revenues by about $450 million when fully implemented on Jan. 1, 2025. Instead, Senate Bill 248 would exempt select food items from both state and local sales tax, reducing state revenues by about $284 million in the next fiscal year.

The goal, Masterson said, is not to incentivize healthy food choices. The plan is to afford tax cuts elsewhere, he said.

“You can do things in an overall package, like take tax off Social Security, and if you’re truly interested in helping those in their golden years, you want to look at stuff like that,” Masterson said. “The other thing we need to do is look at the structure that we’re under. The states that are doing the best are the zero income tax states. And this is not even an attempt to get there. The second tier are those with the single rate flat tax. So the structure is actually the most important thing to get to. And this would allow you to get to a structure with a lower rate.”

Opponents of the “healthy foods” legislation include grocers and family advocates who say the change would be confusing, difficult to implement, and reduce revenue for local governments. They also raised concerns about which items qualify as “healthy.”

The list of healthy items is based on foods that qualify for the federal Women, Infants and Children nutrition program. The legislation specifies fruits and vegetables; meat, poultry and fish; eggs, milk, cheese and yogurt; infant formula; whole wheat or whole grain bread; corn or flour tortillas; pasta; brown rice, bulgur, oatmeal and whole grain barley; breakfast cereals; beans and nuts; and peanut butter.

Jami Reever, executive director of Kansas Appleseed, said one in four Kansas kids lives in a household that cannot afford to eat nutritious meals.

Additionally, Reever said, one in six Kansans lives in a food desert, which means they don’t have access to a grocery store. Those who get their food from a convenience store, for example, might have to choose white rice over brown rice because that is what is available.

“Families have to make really tough choices every single day about what they feed their families,” Reever said. “I think it’s better that kids go to bed with a full tummy than with no food at all. And I’m worried that by just adding on to the food bill, they’ll have to make some really impossible choices.”


Sen. Caryn Tyson, a Parker Republican who chairs the tax committee, took issue with mailers sent by Kansas Appleseed that urged support for eliminating the sales tax on food. Tyson’s complaint: The sales tax reduction passed last year applied to “groceries,” not “food.”

Tyson: “Your fliers were absolutely misleading, then, because you said remove it on food.”

Reever: “We called it the food sales tax.”

Tyson: “Yeah, which is misleading.”

Reever: “I thank you for pointing that out.”

The committee concluded the hearing on the sales tax bill in the morning, then met again over the lunch hour to consider other proposals. They included Senate Bill 169, an alternative to the Kansas Chamber’s proposed flat tax plan.

Under current law, the income tax rate is 3.1% for income under $15,000, 5.25% for income between $15,000 and $30,000, and 5.7% for income above $30,000. The dollar amounts are doubled for couples filing jointly.

SB 169 would eliminate the income tax for those earning less than $5,225 annually and apply a 4.75% rate to all others.

Critics of the flat tax compare it to former Gov. Sam Brownback’s “tax experiment” because it involves a dramatic sudden reduction in state revenue and disproportionately favors the highest wage earners.

“For the life of me, I don’t understand why the committee is going down this path,” said Sen. Tom Holland, D-Baldwin City. “We tried something very similar with the Brownback tax experiment. My concern is not only is it a more aggressive tax, once again, it’s really effectively reducing the tax rate for the wealthiest Kansans. The second thing is that we simply can’t afford this.”

Sen. Virgil Peck, R-Havana, said he wanted to “make sure it’s on the record” that the flat tax is different from legislation passed in 2012, which cut the rate for top earners and eliminated the income tax for businesses.

Peck said he supported the 2012 plan and believes it would have worked if the Legislature had controlled spending.

“That’s ancient history — or at least history, not ancient,” Peck said. “And so I just thought that I would mention that this is not the Brownback tax plan. This is the Legislature’s attempt to do some things to make our state more competitive for our workers, for bringing business and citizens to our state.”

The committee passed the flat tax bill on a party line vote, sending it to the full Senate for consideration.

Kansas Reflector is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Kansas Reflector maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Sherman Smith for questions: info@kansasreflector.com. Follow Kansas Reflector on Facebook and Twitter.

S.Korean court recognises spousal insurance coverage for same-sex couple

While South Korea does not recognise same-sex marriages, gay relationships are not criminalised. — Reuters pic

Tuesday, 21 Feb 2023

SEOUL, Feb 21 — A South Korean court on Tuesday recognised spousal coverage by state health insurance for a same-sex couple, overturning a lower court’s ruling that denied the benefits.

The Seoul High Court’s ruling is the court’s “first recognition of the legal status of a same-sex couple,” said lawyer Ryu Min-hee, part of a team of lawyers that represented the plaintiff.

South Korea does not legally recognise same-sex marriage.

The plaintiff, So Sung-wook, filed a suit against the National Health Insurance Service in 2021 after the state health insurer denied spousal benefits to him despite granting such rights to other common law couples.

A lower court had said a same-sex union cannot be considered a common law marriage under current law and ruled in favour of the insurer.

According to Ryu, the appellate court said the spousal coverage system under the state health insurance scheme was not just for families as defined by law, and not granting the rights to people in same-sex relationships was discrimination.

Protecting the rights of minorities is the “biggest responsibility” of the court as the “last bastion” of human rights, the court added.

The National Health Insurance Service said it will appeal the ruling.

“This is an important decision that moves South Korea closer to achieving marriage equality,” Amnesty International’s East Asia researcher Boram Jang said.

“There is still a long way to go to end discrimination against the LGBTI community, but this ruling offers hope that prejudice can be overcome.” — Reuters

THE CARL SCHMITT REFORM

Israeli government advances controversial judicial reforms

Plan would give Prime Minister Netanyahu’s coalition more power over who becomes a judge

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends a vote on the plan to overhaul Israel's legal system. Reuters

The National
Feb 20, 2023

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Israeli government voted to move on a plan to overhaul the country’s legal system on Tuesday.

The vote sparked protests in Israel and calls for calm from the US and other nations.

It gave initial approval to a plan that would give Mr Netanyahu’s coalition more power over who becomes a judge.

It is part of a broader package of changes that seeks to weaken the country’s Supreme Court and transfer more power to the ruling coalition.

READ MORE
Israel's Netanyahu calls for calm amid opposition to judicial reforms

"A great night and a great day," Mr Netanyahu tweeted after the preliminary vote.

He won 64 of the Knesset's 120 seats, making it likely his two revisions on the agenda, the other limiting the Supreme Court's ability to strike down legislation, will be ratified.

Polls have shown most Israelis want the reforms slowed to allow dialogue, or put off completely, Reuters reported.

The vote on part of the legislation is the first of three readings required for parliamentary approval, a process that is expected to take months.


The opposition, including tens of thousands of protesters in front of the Knesset in Jerusalem and in Tel Aviv, saw Monday’s vote as the coalition’s determination to barrel ahead.

“We are fighting for our children’s future, for our country’s future. We don’t intend to give up,” said opposition leader Yair Lapid.


After the shekel fell 1 per cent weaker versus the dollar, many economists and leaders of high-tech and banking have warned of investor and capital flight from Israel.

But Knesset Finance Committee chairman Moshe Gafni, the head of the ultra-Orthodox United Torah Judaism party, said: "There is no link between the justice system reforms and any blow to Israel's economy. Any attempt at linkage is politicised."

Opposition politicians protested against Mr Gafni's statement, calling the committee "a circus".

Updated: February 21, 2023

The International Political Thought of Carl Schmitt: Terror, Liberal W (routledge.com)

https://aeon.co/essays/carl-schmitts-legal-theory-legitimises-the-rule-of-the-strongman

Carl Schmitt's legal theory legitimises the rule of the strongman - Aeon 

Jun 12, 2020 ... Within that tradition, one thinker stands out: the conservative German constitutional lawyer and political theorist Carl Schmitt (1888-1985).

https://theconversation.com/carl-schmitt-nazi-era-philosopher-who-wrote-blueprint-for-new-authoritarianism-59835

Carl Schmitt: Nazi-era philosopher who wrote blueprint for New ... 

May 25, 2016 ... Carl Schmitt, a brilliant jurist and political philosopher, both predicted the collapse of the Weimar Republic, and was – for a short time – a ...

https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262192446/political-theology

Political Theology - MIT Press 

Studies in Contemporary German Social Thought. Political Theology. Four Chapters on the Concept of Sovereignty. by Carl Schmitt. Translated by George Schwab.

Tens of thousands in Israel rally against 'dictator's bill' as lawmakers vote on judicial overhaul

Kenny Stancil, Common Dreams
February 20, 2023

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu GALI TIBBON POOL:AFP:File

Tens of thousands of people opposed to the far-right Israeli government's proposed judicial overhaul once again hit the streets of Jerusalem and Tel Aviv on Monday, where they implored lawmakers to vote against the measures during the afternoon's first reading.

"On the morning of the vote, small groups of protesters sat down outside the front doors of some coalition lawmakers' homes in a bid to block them from leaving for parliament. They were removed by the police," The New York Timesreported. After blocking highways to Jerusalem, protesters gathered outside parliament, where doctors "set up a mock triage station for 'casualties of the judicial reform.'"

Despite weeks of massive demonstrations, members of the Israeli Knesset are expected to pass the legislation, which is supported by right-wing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his close ally, Justice Minister Yariv Levin.

If that happens, the Supreme Court's ability to overrule parliament would be weakened, as a simple 61-vote majority could override the court's decisions; the Supreme Court's ability to review and strike down attempts to change Israel's 13 quasi-constitutional "Basic Laws" would be abolished; and the ruling coalition would gain control of the Judicial Appointments Commission, a panel tasked with picking new judges.

The legislation must be approved three times to become law, with Monday afternoon's vote marking the first step in the process. Israeli President Isaac Herzog, a largely ceremonial figure, and opposition leader Yair Lapid have pleaded for Netanyahu's government to delay the legislation, to no avail.

On the eve of the initial vote, Levin said, "We won't stop the legislation now, but there is more than enough time until the second and third readings to hold an earnest and real dialogue and to reach understandings."

But as the Times noted, "critics have dismissed the government's position as disingenuous, arguing that once the bills have passed a first vote, only cosmetic changes will be possible."

Organizers, for their part, said Monday that "with the passage of the dictator's bill, the protests will intensify," according toi24 News.

Opponents "say the proposed overhaul would place unchecked power in the hands of the government, remove protections afforded to individuals and minorities, and deepen divisions in an already fractured society," the Times reported. They also worry that "Netanyahu, who is standing trial on corruption charges, could use the changes to extricate himself from his legal troubles."

In addition, Al Jazeerareported, opponents fear that "Netanyahu's nationalist allies want to weaken the Supreme Court to establish more settlements on land the Palestinians seek for a state. But settlements, which are considered illegal under international laws, have continued under successive Israeli governments. Nearly 600,000-750,000 Israelis now live in illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem."

Last week, Netanyahu's administration granted retroactive "legalization" to nine such settlements, and the prime minister has also intensified deadly raids, killing at least 50 Palestinians in occupied territories so far this year.

A right-wing neutering of the Supreme Court could exacerbate Israel's regime of violent dispossession and ethnic cleansing.

But the weekslong demonstrations against the proposed judicial overhaul "include very few Palestinians," Jewish Currents editorPeter Beinart observed Sunday in a Times op-ed titled "You Can't Save Democracy in a Jewish State."

"In fact, Palestinian politicians have criticized them for having, in the words of former Knesset member Sami Abu Shehadeh, 'nothing to do with the main problem in the region—justice and equality for all the people living here,'" Beinart wrote.

"The reason is that the movement against Mr. Netanyahu is not like the pro-democracy opposition movements in Turkey, India, or Brazil—or the movement against Trumpism in the United States," he added. "It's not a movement for equal rights. It's a movement to preserve the political system that existed before Mr. Netanyahu's right-wing coalition took power, which was not, for Palestinians, a genuine liberal democracy in the first place. It's a movement to save liberal democracy for Jews."

For Palestinians, Israel is not a democracy but rather an apartheid state, an assessment shared by numerous human rights groups around the world. The Israeli government has enacted discriminatory laws against Palestinians and colonized their land for decades, including under Lapid.

According to Beinart: "The principle that Mr. Netanyahu's liberal Zionist critics say he threatens—a Jewish and democratic state—is in reality a contradiction. Democracy means government by the people. Jewish statehood means government by Jews. In a country where Jews comprise only half of the people between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, the second imperative devours the first."

"Ultimately, a movement premised on ethnocracy cannot successfully defend the rule of law," he added. "Only a movement for equality can."

Tomato shortage hits British supermarkets after poor weather across Europe and Africa

21 February 2023, 

Cold weather is Spain has affected crop availability, Tesco has said. Picture: Social media/Getty

 

By Kieran Kelly@kellyjourno

Supermarkets across Britain have been hit with a shortage of tomatoes after a wave of bad weather across Europe and Africa disrupted supply chains.

Growers and suppliers in Morocco have had to contend with cold temperatures, heavy rain, flooding and cancelled ferries over the past three to four weeks.

Production problems in Morocco began in January with unusually cold night-time temperatures that affected tomato ripening.

Shoppers across the country have taken to social media to point out the lack of tomatoes at their local stores.

UK importers have become increasingly reliant on Morocco due to Brexit, which has affected with other tomato-producing European nations.

Spain remains a primary source of tomatoes for the UK, which has also been affected by colder weather in recent weeks.

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Andrew Opie, director of food and sustainability at the British Retail Consortium, said: "Difficult weather conditions in the south of Europe and northern Africa have disrupted harvest for some fruit and vegetables including tomatoes.

"However, supermarkets are adept at managing supply chain issues and are working with farmers to ensure that customers are able to access a wide range of fresh produce."

A spokesperson for the British Tomato Growers Association (BTGA) said recent shortages are “predominantly a consequence of the lack of imported product”.

“The British tomato season will soon begin and we expect significant volumes of British tomatoes on shelves by the end of March and into April 2023," they added.

Howard Schultz declined Bernie Sanders’ request to testify before Congress

By Dayun Park
Updated 4:55 PM EST, Wed February 15, 2023

CNN —

Howard Schultz has declined Bernie Sanders’ request to testify before Congress.

In a refusal relatively rare on Capitol Hill, Starbucks Chief Executive Schultz turned the Vermont senior senator down Tuesday when asked to appear and testify about the coffee giant’s compliance with federal labor laws.

Sanders, who chairs the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee, along with 10 other members of it, asked Schultz last week to attend a public hearing on March 9 and answer questions on the company’s history of suppressing union-organization efforts.

In the invitation, Sanders said that Starbucks (SBUX) “has fought their workers every step of the way, including refusing to bargain a first contract in good faith, delay tactics, and a significant escalation in union busting.”

Starbucks has faced a labor battle since a Buffalo store became the first to unionize in 2021. While Starbucks Workers United has sought better pay and benefits, the company has apparently put efforts into retaliating against workers who tried to unionize.

The National Labor Relations Board regional offices have issued 76 complaints against Starbucks alleging illegal layoffs, closing stores and threatening to withhold pay hikes and benefits, mostly filed since 2021.

About 100 Starbucks stores across the U.S staged a three-day strike in December, following a one-day strike in November, to protest unfair labor practices. So far, Starbucks has not negotiated a contract with any of the stores that voted to unionize.

Schultz, an interim CEO, rejoined Starbucks in April 2022 after two previous multi-year stints at the company. He plans to step down in April and therefore cannot join the hearing as he is in “fully transition” model, according to Starbucks general counsel Zabrina Jenkins.

“Given the timing of the transition, his relinquishment of any operating role in the company going forward, and what we understand to be the subject of the hearing, we believe another senior leader with ongoing responsibilities is best suited to address these matters,” the general counsel’s statement said.

Starbucks announced that its chief public affairs officer and executive vice president AJ Jones II, will attend instead. Jones is a former senior aide to Democratic Representative James Clyburn.

“It is unfortunate that Howard Schultz, the architect of Starbucks’ unprecedented union-busting campaign, is refusing to take accountability for his actions and is instead sending a subordinate in his place. One of the main reasons Starbucks workers organized is to hold billionaire executives, like Schultz, accountable for their actions,” Starbucks Workers United said in a statement to CNN.

Said Sanders in his statement, “Apparently, it is easier for Mr. Schultz to fire workers who are exercising their constitutional right to form unions… than to answer questions from elected officials. I intend to hold Mr. Schultz and Starbucks accountable for their unacceptable behavior and look forward to seeing him before our committee.”

Last week, Sanders told The Associated Press that he would consider using the committee’s subpoena power if Schultz declined his invitation. Sander’s office didn’t respond to CNN’s inquiries regarding that possibility.

A total of 338 Starbucks stores have voted to unionize since 2021, 282 have been certified across 36 states and 56 didn’t get certified. An additional three elections are currently in progress.

Starbucks said to CNN: “At those stores where our partners have chosen to petition for union representation, we have fully honored the process laid out by the NLRB and have worked to ensure that partners can trust the process is fair, their voice is heard, and that the outcome is accurate.”