Hawaii’s high court cites ‘The Wire’ in rebuke of US Supreme Court decision that expanded gun rights



Two men walk past a gun club on June, 23, 2022, in Honolulu. A ruling by Hawaii’s high court saying that a man can be prosecuted for carrying a gun in public without a permit uses pop culture references in an apparent rebuke of a U.S. Supreme Court decision that expanded gun rights nationwide. (AP Photo/Marco Garcia, File)

Handguns are displayed at a gun shop on June 23, 2022, in Honolulu. A ruling by Hawaii’s high court saying that a man can be prosecuted for carrying a gun in public without a permit uses pop culture references in an apparent rebuke of a U.S. Supreme Court decision that expanded gun rights nationwide. (AP Photo/Marco Garcia, File)

BY JENNIFER SINCO KELLEHER
 February 8, 2024

HONOLULU (AP) — A ruling by Hawaii’s high court saying that a man can be prosecuted for carrying a gun in public without a permit cites crime-drama TV series “The Wire” and invokes the “spirit of Aloha” in an apparent rebuke of a U.S. Supreme Court decision that expanded gun rights nationwide.

“The thing about the old days, they the old days,” the unanimous Hawaii Supreme Court ruling issued Wednesday said, borrowing a quote from season four, episode three of the HBO series to express that the culture from the founding of the country shouldn’t dictate contemporary life.

Authored by Justice Todd Eddins, the opinion goes on to say, “The spirit of Aloha clashes with a federally-mandated lifestyle that lets citizens walk around with deadly weapons during day-to-day activities. ”

The ruling stems from a 2017 case against Christopher Wilson, who had a loaded pistol in his front waistband when police were called after a Maui landowner reported seeing a group of men on his property at night.

The handgun was unregistered in Hawaii, and Wilson had not obtained or applied for a permit to own the gun, the ruling said. Wilson told police he legally bought the gun in Florida in 2013.

Wilson’s first motion to dismiss the charges argued that prosecuting him for possession of a firearm for self-defense violated his right to bear arms under the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. It was denied.

Then in 2022, a U.S. Supreme Court decision known as New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen upended gun laws nationwide, including in Hawaii, which has long had some of the strictest gun laws in the country — and some of the lowest rates of gun violence.

Just as the Bruen decision came out, Wilson filed a second motion to dismiss the case. A judge granted the dismissal, and the state appealed.

Ben Lowenthal of the Hawaii public defender’s office, Wilson’s attorney, said Thursday his office is “taking stock of our options,” including seeking review from the U.S. Supreme Court.

Wilson denied trespassing and said he and his friends “were hiking that night to look at the moon and Native Hawaiian plants,” according to the recent ruling.

Hawaii Attorney General Anne Lopez hailed the ruling as a “landmark decision that affirms the constitutionality of crucial gun-safety legislation.”

The ruling reflects a “culture in Hawaii that’s very resistant to change” and a judiciary and government that has been “recalcitrant” in accepting Bruen, said Alan Beck, an attorney not involved in the Wilson case.

“The use of pop culture references to attempt to rebuke the Supreme Court’s detailed historical analysis is evidence this is not a well-reasoned opinion,” said Beck, who has challenged Hawaii’s gun restrictions.

Beck represents three Maui residents who are challenging a Hawaii law enacted last year that prohibits carrying a firearm on the beach and in other places, including banks, bars and restaurants that serve alcohol.

A federal judge in Honolulu granted a preliminary injunction, which prevents the state from enforcing the law. The state appealed, and oral arguments are scheduled for April before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Bruen set a new standard for interpreting gun laws, such that modern firearm laws must be consistent with the nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation.

“We believe it is a misplaced view to think that today’s public safety laws must look like laws passed long ago,” Eddins, of the Hawaii high court, wrote. “Smoothbore, muzzle-loaded, and powder-and-ramrod muskets were not exactly useful to colonial era mass murderers. And life is a bit different now, in a nation with a lot more people, stretching to islands in the Pacific Ocean.”

The Bruen ruling “snubs federalism principles,” Eddins wrote, asserting that under Hawaii’s constitution, there is no individual right to carry a firearm in public.

Dating back to the 1800s, when Hawaii was a kingdom, weapons were heavily regulated, Eddins wrote. He noted that in 1833 King Kamehameha III “promulgated a law prohibiting ‘any person or persons’ on shore from possessing a weapon, including any ‘knife, sword-cane, or any other dangerous weapon.’”

RESEARCH/STUDY

Among TV news networks, CNN was alone in consistently connecting California deluge to climate change

CNN’s Nick Watt and Bill Weir drove the network’s climate reporting

Media Matters / Molly Butler

WRITTEN BY ALLISON FISHER
PUBLISHED 02/08/24 

Corporate broadcast news networks and cable news networks, with the exception of CNN, largely failed to connect the storms wreaking havoc earlier this week in California and other parts of the western U.S. to climate change.

Heavy precipitation from an atmospheric river — the second one to hit Southern California in recent weeks — has caused destructive flooding that unleashed mudslides and gale-force winds, which knocked out power for hundreds of thousands in California and throughout the West, leaving at least three people dead. Los Angeles was hit with six months worth of rain in just a few days, and these storms carry the fingerprint of our warming climate: As reported by NPR, climate scientists say “the intensity of recent atmospheric rivers is almost certainly affected by human-caused climate change.”

In fact, the link between heavy precipitation and our warming climate is well understood by scientists. However, similar to coverage of the relentless rain that inundated California last January and the record rainfall in Texas last month, TV news largely failed to communicate the relationship between climate change and the flooding events unfolding this month.Key findings


From February 5, when a second atmospheric river hit California, through February 6:Cable news networks CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC aired 81 combined segments on the California rain. Just 10 segments, or 12% of the total, mentioned climate change. All 10 climate mentions appeared on CNN. The vast majority (7) came from correspondent Nick Watt. Chief climate correspondent Bill Weir appeared in two segments to discuss the connection between climate and the flooding. One link was made by CNN News Central co-anchor Sara Sidner. Corporate broadcast news networks ABC, CBS, and NBC aired a combined 30 segments on California storms during the same time period. Only one of these segments, by ABC’s Ginger Zee, mentioned climate change.

Extreme weather is happening year-round, and CNN showed how to situate these events within the climate crisis

Reporting from Los Angeles on February 5, CNN correspondent Nick Watt appeared in coverage throughout the day and consistently reported on the relationship between our warming climate and the heavy precipitation in California. On CNN News Central, for example, Watt explained, “Why is this happening? Well, the ocean of the Pacific is warmed by climate change.”

In a report which appeared on several CNN programs, Watt dove into even more detail, describing the atmospheric river as “a conveyor belt of moisture fueled by El Niño and the unusually warm Pacific” that “can carry 20 times more water than the Mississippi [River].” He added that this year’s “El Niño is now classed as very strong, only the fourth time it has reached that level in 50 years. Combined with oceans already warm from climate change, it is supercharging these types of storms.”

“LA and beyond, 14 million people now officially at high risk level for excessive rainfall,” Watt continued. “Remember this state was recently in a mega drought. Then record rainfall last winter. And now this. Scientists call that ‘weather whiplash,’ and say such violent swings will become increasingly common as the planet warms in years to come.”

CNN chief climate correspondent Bill Weir appeared in two segments during the period reviewed to discuss the relationship between the heavy precipitation and climate change. Appearing on The Lead with Jake Tapper, he built off of Watt’s reporting, explicitly identifying fossil fuel pollution as the driver of climate change through “the unnatural warming from man-made activities” and connecting it to “the double whammy effect that we are having” from this year’s strong El Niño. Going further, Weir also suggested that adaptation is needed for places that are repeatedly experiencing climate-fueled events:


BILL WEIR (CNN CHIEF CLIMATE CORRESPONDENT): El Niño could ease in the next year or two but we still have the climate change on top of that, so a lot of hope for folks is that these are lessons — it is not a storm to grit your teeth and get through, but these lessons for how to adapt and how to think about living in places like California in the future.

Earlier in the day, Weir appeared on CNN News Central. In addition to making the link between the flooding and climate, he emphasized the relationship between climate change and the burning of fossil fuels, explaining the need to see what’s unfolding in California not as a single event but part of the broader climate crisis.

Extreme weather is becoming a regular part of TV news coverage, but it has too often been reported without giving the context of the climate crisis. Watt and Weir demonstrate how extreme weather coverage can be better.

The U.S. experienced a record number of billion-dollar disasters in 2023, and the planet experienced its hottest year on record. A relentless heat wave claimed over 600 lives in Phoenix, Arizona, and some places in the U.S. are becoming virtually uninhabitable as insurance companies pull out of states that now regularly experience extreme weather.

So far, 2024 is already bringing back-to-back extreme weather in the U.S., while Chile is experiencing what will likely be its deadliest wildfires on record. With more climate-driven disasters surely on the horizon, it’s past time for consistent and clear-eyed coverage that places extreme weather events within the broader climate crisis.

Methodology


Media Matters searched transcripts in the SnapStream video database for all original episodes of ABC’s Good Morning America and World News Tonight, CBS’ Mornings and Evening News, and NBC’s Today and Nightly News as well as all original programming on CNN, Fox News Channel, and MSNBC for any of the terms “atmospheric river,” “boulder,” or “storm” or any variation of any of the terms “flood,” “rain,” “mud,” or “rock” within close proximity of any of the terms “California,” “Nevada,” “Los Angeles,” “San Diego,” or “west coast” from February 5, 2024, when a second atmospheric river hit California and other parts of the West Coast, through February 6, 2024.

We included segments, which we defined as instances when the extreme rain and flooding events due to the second atmospheric river were the stated topic of discussion or when we found significant discussion of the extreme rain and flooding. We defined significant discussion as instances when two or more speakers in a multitopic segment discussed the extreme rain and flooding with one another.

We did not include passing mentions, which we defined as instances when a single speaker in a segment on another topic mentioned the extreme rain and flooding without another speaker in the segment engaging with the comment, or teasers, which we defined as instances when the anchor or host promoted a segment about the extreme rain and flooding scheduled to air later in the broadcast.

We then reviewed the identified segments for mentions of the terms “climate” or “global warming.”

UW's Burke Museum working with Native tribes to repatriate Indigenous artifacts

Ann Dornfeld

February 08, 2024 / 

The Burke Museum on Dec. 20, 2022, at the University of Washington in Seattle.

KUOW Photo/Katie Campbell

Museums across Washington state may no longer display some Native artifacts without permission under a new federal rule.

The nationwide rule, which took effect in January, bars museums from displaying or doing research on sacred objects without consent from their tribes of origin — the sort of things looted from Native gravesites.

Some museums, like the American Museum of Natural History in New York, closed entire halls in response.

RELATED: Repatriation celebration as stolen Native Hawaiian remains stop in Sea-Tac on their way home

At the University of Washington’s Burke Museum in Seattle, Justice McNeeley’s job is to return items tribes want back. McNeeley said the Burke has long worked with tribes to ensure that its displays are appropriate, and its exhibits will remain open for now.

“We, of course, are going to continue consultation with tribes to ensure that we are still up to date with everything that we have on display and making sure that we are taking proper care," McNeeley said.

Burke officials said the new rules may speed up the process of repatriating tribal objects. Curator Sara Gonzalez said she hopes it will make it easier for tribes to reclaim artifacts they want returned.

"At current rates, it would take over 200 years — those are best estimates — to actually complete the work of repatriation," Gonzalez said. "I am hopeful that it will help speed up the process and ensure that we've taken care of this work sooner rather than in several generations from now."

RELATED: The lasting effect indigenous boarding schools have had on Washington state

That was the Biden administration's goal: to speed up repatriation.

According to The New York Times, those government efforts date back to 1990 with the passage of the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, or NAGPRA. The Act established rules for museums and other institutions to return human remains, funerary objects, and other items to tribes.

To Gonzalez's point, though, those efforts have been dragging on for the last three decades.

For example, the Times reports the American Museum of Natural History has repatriated the remains of about 1,000 Native people to tribal groups in the last 30 years, but the museum still has the remains of another 2,200 Native Americans and thousands more funerary objects.

RELATED: How an Indigenous rights battle in WA changed tribal law, from fishing to culverts

Elsewhere in Seattle, the Seattle Museum of Art recently decided to remove five indigenous cultural items from its displays. The Seattle Times reports that the artifacts originally came from the Tlingit people from the Southeast Alaska area, and that the items include a dagger, staff, and three headdresses.

No end in sight to Palestinian suffering after collapse of latest ceasefire plan


Kevin Clarke

February 08, 2024
AMERICAN MAGAZINE

THE JESUIT REVIEW

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken boards his plane at an airport in Tel Aviv, Israel, Thursday, Feb. 8, 2024. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein, Pool)


U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s Middle East shuttle diplomacy was shut down on Feb. 7 when Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu unequivocally rejected the latest pitch for a Gaza ceasefire from Hamas negotiators, calling it “delusional” and declaring that Israel intended to continue its offensive in Gaza until it achieves “absolute victory.”

The prime minister’s thorough rejection of a plan that U.S. negotiators argued had merit has been deemed a slap in the face for Mr. Blinken, who departed the region on Feb. 8 after his fifth visit in recent weeks. Public divisions between the United States and Israel have been rising and are now at perhaps their worst level since the conflict began in October. The collapse of the latest ceasefire offer portends weeks of more suffering for the people of Gaza.

Mr. Netanyahu told Israeli media that after rejecting the latest proposal, he told Mr. Blinken that “after defeating Hamas, we will make sure that Gaza will be demilitarized for good.”

What happens in the aftermath of the I.D.F.’s Rafah assault remains hard to discern. Where do the Palestinians go next? How will they live? How will they be fed and sheltered?

“The victory is within our reach,” Mr. Netanyahu said. “It’s not a matter of years or tens of years; it’s a matter of months.” The prime minister, continuing to reject suggestions of the possible role of the Palestinian Authority in Gaza after Hamas, said that only Israeli forces could ensure a peaceful transition in Gaza.

The Israel Defense Forces are now moving to the next stage in its campaign against Hamas, an incursion into Rafah. The city of Rafah has become the last presumed safe haven for hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who had been urged by Israeli military up to now to treat the city as a safe zone. Many have by now been displaced multiple times by the fighting. Humanitarian aid workers expect a catastrophe if the I.D.F. assault follows the tactical pattern set in its previous incursions into large population centers like Gaza City and Khan Younis.

Only hours after Mr. Netanyahu rejected the Hamas ceasefire, Israel air strikes on Rafah killed 13 people, including two women and five children. According to the Gaza Health Ministry, 123 bodies were brought to Gaza medical facilities on Feb. 7 as the Palestinian death toll from the war reached 27,585 people. More than 70,000 have been wounded, and more than 570,000 Gaza residents—25 percent of the population—are facing starvation, according to the United Nations.

“An expansion of hostilities could turn Rafah into a zone of bloodshed and destruction that people won’t be able to escape,” said Angelita Caredda, the Norwegian Refugee Council’s Middle East and North Africa Regional Director. “There is nowhere left for people to flee to.”

According to the N.R.C., any further deterioration in humanitarian conditions in Rafah would be catastrophic, as disease and starvation already persist among the displaced population. An N.R.C. assessment of conditions in Rafah’s impromptu camps reports that displaced Palestinians have no drinking water, showers or personal hygiene items.

Humanitarian aid workers expect a catastrophe if the I.D.F. assault follows the tactical pattern set in its previous incursions into large population centers like Gaza City and Khan Younis.

“Conditions in Rafah are already dire, and a full-scale Israeli military operation will lead to even more loss of civilian life,” Ms. Caredda said in a press statement. “Aid workers have been grappling with insecurity and insufficient aid for months. Attacks in areas where they provide food, water and shelter means this life-saving support will be impeded, if not entirely stopped.”

On Feb. 8, the U.N.’s top aid official, Martin Griffiths, added his voice to widespread international concern about a further escalation of the conflict. “More than half [of] Gaza’s population is crammed [into] Rafah, a town of originally 250,000 people right on Egypt’s doorstep,” he said. Mr. Griffiths directs the U.N.’s emergency humanitarian relief office. “Their living conditions are abysmal; they lack the basic necessities to survive, stalked by hunger, disease and death.”

Catholic aid agencies Caritas Internationalis and Catholic Relief Services have repeatedly called for an end to the violence in Gaza and the creation of unimpeded humanitarian access to the strip’s displaced communities. In northern Gaza, two small Christian communities have been largely cut off from assistance for weeks.

Egyptian officials reported on Feb. 7 that C.R.S. had delivered, since December, 100 tons of humanitarian aid to Gaza. The Egyptian Ministry of Supply and Internal Trade reports that C.R.S. has an additional 61 tons of aid ready to be delivered.

The Vatican has frequently urged a ceasefire and the restoration of efforts toward negotiating the long-proposed and by now increasingly distant two-state solution in Israel-Palestine. In a recent letter to “Jewish brothers and sisters in Israel,” deploring the global rise in antisemitism awakened by the fighting in Gaza, Pope Francis wrote: “My heart is close to you, to the Holy Land, to all the peoples who inhabit it, Israelis and Palestinians, and I pray that the desire for peace may prevail in all.”

He added: “In times of desolation, we have great difficulty seeing a future horizon where light replaces darkness, in which friendship replaces hatred, in which cooperation replaces war. However, we, as Jews and Catholics, are witnesses to precisely such a horizon.

“Conditions in Rafah are already dire, and a full-scale Israeli military operation will lead to even more loss of civilian life.”

“And we must act, starting first and foremost from the Holy Land, where together we want to work for peace and justice, doing everything possible to create relationships capable of opening new horizons of light for everyone, Israelis and Palestinians.”

U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres said on Feb. 7 that he was “alarmed by reports that the Israeli military intends to focus next on Rafah—where hundreds of thousands of Palestinians have been squeezed in a desperate search for safety.”

“Nothing justifies the horrific terror attacks launched by Hamas against Israel on October 7,” Mr. Guterres said. “Nor is there any justification for the collective punishment of the Palestinian people.”

Only an “immediate humanitarian ceasefire and the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages” could help to bring about peace, he said, along with “irreversible actions towards a two-state solution.”

Israel was broadly supported by the international community in the immediate aftermath of the Hamas attack, but global support has withered as the death tolls and civilian displacement in Gaza rose. Half of U.S. adults now say Israel’s military campaign in Gaza has “gone too far,” according to a new poll from The Associated Press-N.O.R.C. Center for Public Affairs Research.

Interfaith peacemakers cannot remain neutral on Gaza Mohammed Abu-Nimer

Even the Biden administration, a stalwart supporter of Israel, has in recent weeks stepped up its criticism of Israeli tactics. But within Israel itself, there is little appetite for restraining the I.D.F. campaign and strong support for concluding the aim of the complete neutralization of Hamas as a political and military force.

Families of hostages held by Hamas have repeatedly blocked humanitarian aid into Gaza. Hamas is believed to be holding 136 hostages, but Israeli officials said on Feb. 6 that they believe at least 30 of the remaining hostages are likely dead. More than 100 hostages were freed in November in exchange for 240 Palestinians imprisoned by Israel.

What happens in the aftermath of the I.D.F.’s Rafah assault remains hard to discern. Where do the Palestinians go next? How will they live? How will they be fed and sheltered? Egypt has said that it will not accept Palestinians into Sinai as part of yet another large-scale Palestinian displacement. Though it is not official policy, that final outcome has been endorsed by a number of members of Mr. Netenyahu’s hard-right ruling coalition.

According to humanitarian sources, as much as 80 percent of Gaza’s housing stock has been obliterated or rendered uninhabitable. U.N. officials believe that it will take three years just to clear the rubble and decades to restore Gaza to its condition on the day before Hamas led a homicidal campaign into southern Israel on Oct. 7, provoking the more than four months of carnage that followed.

With reporting from The Associated Press

NFL reports lobbying spending increase ahead of Super Bowl LVII

By Joanne Haner

OPEN SECRETS
February 8, 2024

A general view of the Vince Lombardi Trophy with the San Francisco 49ers and Kansas City Chiefs helmets before a press conference ahead of Super Bowl LVIII at Allegiant Stadium on Feb. 5, 2024 in Las Vegas, N.V. 

(Photo by Perry Knotts/Getty Images)

As the National Football League prepares for the Super Bowl LVIII, year-end reports show that the league continues to lead the recreation and live entertainment industry in federal lobbying spending. The NFL’s $1.46 million in 2023 federal lobbying spending exceeded its prior year lobbying spending, up from $1.33 million in 2022.

The San Francisco 49ers and Kansas City Chiefs are scheduled to play in Super Bowl LVII February 11 at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas. Neither team had recorded lobbying data in 2023. Super Bowl viewership has been on the rise since 2021, hitting a record 115 million viewers last year. Each year, the Super Bowl is the most-watched television event, with the NFC Championship between the Detroit Lions and the 49ers reaching a whopping near 56 million viewers.

Frequently followed by Major League Baseball, the NFL has led the industry in federal lobbying spending for over a decade.

Several individual NFL teams also pay their own lobbyists, notably the Washington Commanders. In 2023, the team spent $240,000 on federal lobbying expenditures, less than half of the $580,000 spent in 2022. The team recently acquired new ownership under the investment group of Josh Harris in July, taking over Dan Snyder’s previous role.

Of the 30 lobbyists working directly for the NFL, 23 had “revolving door” profiles, meaning that they have previously held jobs in government.

The NFL lobbied on three bills last year, none of which have been passed.

One bill endorsed by the NFL was the Personal Health Investment Today Act of 2023. The legislation, also known as the PHIT Act, has been introduced into both chambers and would allow athletes to use a portion of their pre-tax health savings account and flexible spending account on qualified fitness expenses.

The NFL also endorsed the Access to AEDs Act, which also has been introduced to both chambers. The legislation would award grants to lower educational institutions for increased heart defibrillator access. Automatic external defibrillators, also known as AEDs, are crucial to respond to sudden cardiac arrest. In January 2023, Damar Hamlin, a football safety for the Buffalo Bills, collapsed from sudden cardiac arrest on live television during a game, but was administered proper care through AEDs and CPR that led to his full recovery. He has since spoken on Capitol Hill advocating for access to AEDs in schools to help student athletes who might suffer the same fate.

A third bill supported by the NFL, the Safeguarding the Homeland from the Threats Posed by Unmanned Aircraft Systems Act of 2023, would regulate government counterattacks to drones. It would expand the federal government’s ability to reauthorize existing authorities and create new opportunities for federal agencies to coordinate counter-drone measures at the state and local level. The NFL supported both the House and Senate companion bills.

“This common sense, urgently needed legislation would more effectively protect our homeland – including mass gatherings and critical infrastructure – from the serious and rising security risks posed by rogue drones,” NFL Chief Security Officer Cathy Lanier said in a statement on the bill’s introduction in June 2023. “Keeping fans safe at our games is our top priority, and this legislation would give local law enforcement the tools they need to protect our fans from the threats of illicit drone use. We call on Congress to enact this vital legislation as soon as possible.”

 

US Trade Bank Defies Biden to Expand Oil

Drilling in Bahrain

Jennifer A. Dlouhy, Bloomberg News

(Bloomberg) -- US Export-Import Bank leaders are moving forward with plans to underwrite the drilling of more than 400 oil and gas wells in Bahrain, even as President Joe Biden halts new liquefied natural gas export licenses over climate concerns. 

The bank’s board voted behind closed doors Thursday to notify Congress about the project — a required precursor to formal approval, which could happen as soon as next month. No transaction is final until it has board approval.

The potential loan of more than $100 million to expand production in the prolific Bahrain Field marks the credit agency’s latest move to support the kind of foreign fossil-fuel projects the Biden administration promised in 2021 to forgo. 

“Ex-im is going rogue” and “continuing to undercut Biden’s ambitious climate agenda,” said Kate DeAngelis, international finance program manager for the environmental group Friends of the Earth. “Just as Biden is limiting US LNG exports, ex-im is propping up similar infrastructure in Bahrain.”

In the past year, the lender also has backed the expansion of an Indonesian oil refinery and helped boost purchases of US LNG for customers in Europe. Overall, the bank approved at least $910 million in international fossil-fuel finance in 2023, according to analysis by Oil Change International — all of it coming after the US signed a pledge with 33 other nations to halt direct support for international fossil-fuel projects.

The approvals have drawn outrage from environmental advocates, sparked frustration among some Biden administration officials and even prompted two members of the bank’s climate advisory council to step down in protest. 

The Bahrain project targets new drilling in an oil field that started yielding crude nearly a century ago. The venture is primarily designed “to increase the production of oil and the availability of gas to meet the future energy demands of the Kingdom of Bahrain,” according to bank documentation. Potential beneficiaries include the oil services company SLB, as well as the field’s operator, National Oil and Gas Holding Company B.S.C. unit Tatweer Petroleum-Bahrain Field Development Company W.L.L.

Biden vowed to curb public funding of foreign fossil fuel projects in 2021 with an executive order issued during his first week in the White House. Yet, he’s had trouble forcing development banks and other US public finance institutions to go along. A spokesperson for the White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The ex-im bank is an independent agency intended to bolster US exports, thereby supporting American jobs. Its charter rules out denials of financing “based solely on the industry, sector or business.” 

“Ex-im seeks to align with the administration’s climate agenda while still complying with Ex-im’s statutory requirements, including the charter prohibition against discrimination,” as well as “its mission to support US jobs,” the bank said in an emailed statement. “Any change to ex-im’s charter must be passed through congressional action.”

Bahrain is an ally of the US; the Middle East island nation hosts US naval forces, and the two countries signed a strategic security and economic agreement last year meant to strengthen collaboration and intelligence sharing.

Climate activists say the bank has enough discretion to rule out financing for fossil fuel projects, based on their environmental impacts. And, they say, Biden can intervene. The agency’s charter authorizes the president to direct the trade bank to deny applications when doing so would “clearly and importantly advance United States policy” in specified policy areas such as promoting “environmental protection.”

“Ex-im hasn’t yet found a fossil fuel project it will reject putting US taxpayer dollars behind,” said Jake Schmidt, senior strategic director of international climate at the Natural Resources Defense Council. At this rate, “it is possible at the end of the Biden administration they will have put more money behind fossil fuels than climate reductions.”

©2024 Bloomberg L.P.

Inside the Beatles’ messy breakup, 53 years ago

More than 50 years later, there's still more to learn about the world's greatest band.

Tim Riley

Upworthy Staff
02.08.24

via TM on music / Twitter

Fifty years ago, when Paul McCartney announced he had left the Beatles, the news dashed the hopes of millions of fans, while fueling false reunion rumors that persisted well into the new decade.

In a press release on April 10, 1970 for his first solo album, "McCartney," he leaked his intention to leave. In doing so, he shocked his three bandmates.

The Beatles had symbolized the great communal spirit of the era. How could they possibly come apart?

Few at the time were aware of the underlying fissures. The power struggles in the group had been mounting at least since their manager, Brian Epstein, died in August of 1967.
'Paul Quits the Beatles'

Was McCartney's "announcement" official? His album appeared on April 17, and its press packet included a mock interview. In it, McCartney is asked, "Are you planning a new album or single with the Beatles?"

His response? "No."

via The Daily Mirror

But he didn't say whether the separation might prove permanent. The Daily Mirror nonetheless framed its headline conclusively: "Paul Quits the Beatles."

The others worried this could hurt sales and sent Ringo as a peacemaker to McCartney's London home to talk him down from releasing his solo album ahead of the band's "Let It Be" album and film, which were slated to come out in May. Without any press present, McCartney shouted Ringo off his front stoop.

Lennon had kept quiet

Lennon, who had been active outside the band for months, felt particularly betrayed.

The previous September, soon after the band released "Abbey Road," he had asked his bandmates for a "divorce." But the others convinced him not to go public to prevent disrupting some delicate contract negotiations.

Still, Lennon's departure seemed imminent: He had played the Toronto Rock 'n' Roll Festival with his Plastic Ono Band in September 1969, and on Feb. 11, 1970, he performed a new solo track, "Instant Karma," on the popular British TV show "Top of the Pops." Yoko Ono sat behind him, knitting while blindfolded by a sanitary napkin.

In fact, Lennon behaved more and more like a solo artist, until McCartney countered with his own eponymous album. He wanted Apple to release this solo debut alongside the group's new album, "Let It Be," to dramatize the split.

By beating Lennon to the announcement, McCartney controlled the story and its timing, and undercut the other three's interest in keeping it under wraps as new product hit stores.

Ray Connolly, a reporter at the Daily Mail, knew Lennon well enough to ring him up for comment. When I interviewed Connolly in 2008, he told me about their conversation.

Lennon was dumbfounded and enraged by the news. He had let Connolly in on his secret about leaving the band at his Montreal Bed-In in December 1969, but asked him to keep it quiet. Now he lambasted Connolly for not leaking it sooner.

"Why didn't you write it when I told you in Canada at Christmas!" he exclaimed to Connolly, who reminded him that the conversation had been off the record. "You're the f–king journalist, Connolly, not me," snorted Lennon.

"We were all hurt [McCartney] didn't tell us what he was going to do," Lennon later told Rolling Stone. "Jesus Christ! He gets all the credit for it! I was a fool not to do what Paul did, which was use it to sell a record…"

It all falls apart

This public fracas had been bubbling under the band's cheery surface for years. Timing and sales concealed deeper arguments about creative control and the return to live touring.

In January 1969, the group had started a roots project tentatively titled "Get Back." It was supposed to be a back-to-the-basics recording without the artifice of studio trickery. But the whole venture was shelved as a new recording, "Abbey Road," took shape.

When "Get Back" was eventually revived, Lennon – behind McCartney's back – brought in American producer Phil Spector, best known for girl group hits like "Be My Baby," to salvage the project. But this album was supposed to be band only – not embroidered with added strings and voices – and McCartney fumed when Spector added a female choir to his song "The Long and Winding Road."

"Get Back" – which was renamed "Let it Be" – nonetheless moved forward. Spector mixed the album, and a cut of the feature film was readied for summer.

McCartney's announcement and release of his solo album effectively short-circuited the plan. By announcing the breakup, he launched his solo career in advance of "Let It Be," and nobody knew how it might disrupt the official Beatles' project.

Throughout the remainder of 1970, fans watched in disbelief as the "Let It Be" movie portrayed the hallowed Beatles circling musical doldrums, bickering about arrangements and killing time running through oldies. The film finished with an ironic triumph – the famous live set on the roof of their Apple headquarters during which the band played "Get Back," "Don't Let Me Down" and a joyous "One After 909."



The album, released on May 8, performed well and spawned two hit singles – the title track and "The Long and Winding Road" – but the group never recorded together again.

Their fans hoped against hope that four solo Beatles might someday find their way back to the thrills that had enchanted audiences for seven years. These rumors seemed most promising when McCartney joined Lennon for a Los Angeles recording session in 1974 with Stevie Wonder. But while they all played on one another's solo efforts, the four never played a session together again.

At the beginning of 1970, autumn's "Come Together"/"Something" single from "Abbey Road" still floated in the Billboard top 20; the "Let It Be" album and film helped extend fervor beyond what the papers reported. For a long time, the myth of the band endured on radio playlists and across several greatest hits compilations, but when John Lennon sang "The dream is over…" at the end of his own 1970 solo debut, "John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band," few grasped the lyrics' implacable truth.

Fans and critics chased every sliver of hope for the "next" Beatles, but few came close to recreating the band's magic. There were prospects – first bands like Three Dog Night, the Flaming Groovies, Big Star and the Raspberries; later, Cheap Trick, the Romantics and the Knack – but these groups only aimed at the same heights the Beatles had conquered, and none sported the range, songwriting ability or ineffable chemistry of the Liverpool quartet.

We've been living in the world without Beatles ever since.

Tim Riley is Associate Professor and Graduate Program Director for Journalism, Emerson College

This article was originally published by The Conversation on 4.10.20. You can read it here.

Trump Killed Abortion Rights. But Voters Still Don’t Blame Him.

He appointed three of the five Supreme Court justices who overturned Roe—but most voters don’t hold him responsible, a new poll found.

JULIANNE MCSHANE

MOTHER JONES

News & Engagement Writer


Few voters hold Trump accountable for his foundational roll in eradicating abortion rights across the country, according to a new poll.Allison Dinner/EFE/ZUMA

Despite Trump appointing three of the Supreme Court justices that were part of the majority that overturned the constitutional right to abortion established in Roe v. Wade, most voters don’t hold him responsible for rising abortion restrictions nationwide, according to the results of a new poll released Monday. 

The poll, conducted in December by the progressive think tank and polling firm Data for Progress, found that less than a quarter of voters overall (only 36 percent of Democrats—and, oddly, only 11 percent of Republicans) see Trump as “responsible for new bans or restrictions on abortions in states across the U.S.” So who do voters hold more responsible? Republicans in state office (33 percent), Republicans in Congress (34 percent), and the Supreme Court (50 percent). That’s not necessarily surprising, given that it was the high court that ruled in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization to overturn Roe; that Republicans in Congress have already introduced several bills over the last few years aimed at essentially eliminating abortion rights; and that Republicans in statehouses across the country continue to say unhinged things as they seek to curtail abortion access. 

But, still, Data for Progress says the poll results—as well as another data point from that poll, showing that 52 percent of voters overall, and 67 percent of Democrats, believe the outcome of the next election will be significant for addressing abortion—show that “Biden’s focus on directing the blame to Trump” for the end of Roe “could help voters make more of a connection to the role Trump has played in curtailing abortion rights.”

To be fair, the Biden-Harris re-election campaign has been vocal about abortion rights being an important issue in the next election—and they have blamed Trump directly. Last month, on the 51st anniversary of the Roe ruling, Biden released a statement noting that “Vice President Harris and I are fighting to protect women’s reproductive freedom against Republicans officials’ dangerous, extreme, and out-of-touch agenda”; the White House also announced a slate of new initiatives aimed at bolstering protections for abortion access, including new guidance from the Treasury, Labor and Health and Human Services departments aimed at expanding access to contraception under the Affordable Care Act and defending the right to emergency abortion care under the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act. Biden has also called on Congress to codify the protections Roe offered, pledging to “immediately” sign such a bill into law if it passed. 

An ad released by the Biden campaign last month highlights Trump saying he’s “proud” to have had a hand in facilitating the overturning Roe, and that “there has to be some form of punishment” for people who get abortions—a comment he later walked back after widespread outrage, stating that “the doctor or any other person performing this illegal act upon a woman would be held legally responsible, not the woman.” In addition to those comments, the Biden campaign ad also features footage of Kate Cox and Brittany Watts as examples of people who are “living with the consequences” of Trump’s anti-abortion politics. 

 

A Biden-Harris campaign spokesperson also noted that other polls have shown that a candidate’s support for abortion rights is a particularly important issue for majorities of swing voters and that most independent voters believe Republicans will try to further restrict abortion access—alleging that these findings show that voters are, indeed, aware of Biden’s and Trump’s different stances on abortion rights. 

But Biden has also continued to attract criticism from some reproductive rights and justice activists who say he’s too tepid in his support for abortion rights, given that polling shows a majority of Americans not only disapprove of Dobbs, but also believe that abortion should be legal in all or most instances.

The Hill reported that at a fundraiser in New York City on Wednesday, Biden repeated a talking point he has said before: “I’m a practicing Catholic. I don’t want abortion on demand but I thought Roe v. Wade was right.” That quote attracted a lot of criticism on X, where abortion rights experts and supporters said the statement emboldened restrictions on abortion that are already in place as a result of Dobbs and undermined longer-term efforts to re-enshrine protections that go beyond what Roe did.  

“Can we be clear about what ‘abortion on demand’ is? It’s getting an abortion when we need it,” said Renee Bracey Sherman, co–executive director of the abortion storytelling advocacy organization We Testify, adding that Biden was “stigmatizing abortion.” 

A report published by Vox earlier this week found that while leaders of many abortion rights groups demand more be done to protect abortion access, none will explicitly call Biden out for his messaging around “restoring Roe.” Alexis McGill Johnson, the president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Action Fund, perfectly highlighted this tension in comments she made to Vox. On the one hand, she said the upcoming election presents voters with “a very clear choice between holding the line or descending further into what will be irreparable chaos and confusion”; on the other, she also said, “you can be certain that we are fighting for more than Roe v. Wade.” 

That’s the same needle Biden has chosen to thread ahead of November: appear moderate enough to appeal to the majority of Americans who believe in some restrictions on abortion, according to Pew Research, while also keeping in mind that most Americans broadly favor abortion access—and that there are a lot more protections many activists, and Democrats, want to see enshrined in the future.