Bangladeshis rush back to work as factories reopen despite virus surge


By AFP
Published July 31, 2021

People disembark from a ferry to return to work as the Bangladesh government relaxed the lockdown for all export oriented factories
- Copyright AFP Munir Uz zaman

Hundreds of thousands of Bangladeshi garment workers rushed back to major cities Saturday, besieging train and bus stations, after the government said export factories could reopen despite a deadly coronavirus wave.

With the economy badly hit by the pandemic, the government excluded the factories that supply top brands in Europe and North America from a nationwide lockdown order.

Authorities had ordered factories, offices, transport and shops to close from July 23 to August 5 as daily coronavirus infections and deaths hit record levels.

Officially, Bangladesh has reported 1.2 million cases and more than 20,000 deaths. Experts say the real figures are at least four times higher.

The government said however that the country’s 4,500 garment factories, which employ more than four million people, can reopen from Sunday, sparking a rush back to industrial cities.

The influential garment factory owners had warned of “catastrophic” consequences if orders for foreign brands were not completed on time.

Hundreds of thousands who had gone back to their villages to celebrate the Eid al Adha Muslim festival and sit out the lockdown, headed to Dhaka in any available transport — some just walking in the monsoon rain.

At the Shimulia ferry station, 70 kilometres (45 miles) south of Dhaka, tens of thousands of workers waited hours for boats to take them to the capital.

Garment factory worker Mohammad Masum, 25, said he left his village before dawn, walked more than 30 kilometres (20 miles) and took rickshaws to get to the ferry port.

“Police stopped us at many checkpoints and the ferry was packed,” he said.

“It was a mad rush to get home when the lockdown was imposed and now we are in trouble again getting back to work,” Jubayer Ahmad, another worker, told AFP.

Bangladesh is the world’s second largest garment exporter after China and the industry has become the foundation of the economy for the country of 169 million people.

Mohammad Hatem, vice president of the Bangladesh Knitwear Manufacturers and Exporters Association, said up to $3 billion worth of export orders were at risk if factories had stayed closed.

“The brands would have diverted their orders to other countries,” Hatem told AFP.

Malaysians stage anti-govt protest despite Covid curbs


ByAFP
Published July 31, 2021


Anger is growing at the Malaysian government's handling of the virus -

Copyright AFP Arif KARTONO

Hundreds of black-clad Malaysians staged an anti-government protest Saturday in defiance of a ban on public gatherings under coronavirus curbs, piling pressure on the embattled prime minister to resign.

The protesters, wearing masks and keeping a distance from one another, waved banners reading “failed government” as well as black flags.

It was the first sizeable demonstration in Malaysia for some time, as many had been reluctant to take to the streets due to virus curbs and for fear of getting infected.

But anger is growing at the government’s handling of the virus outbreak — which is escalating despite a lockdown — and Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin’s attempts to keep his crisis-riven administration in power.

“We fight because while the people are suffering, this government is busy playing politics,” Karmun Loh, taking part in the protest in downtown Kuala Lumpur, told AFP.

“This government is… crippling the economy and also destroying our country’s democracy.”

Muhyiddin “is a terrible prime minister”, added demonstrator Shaq Koyok.

“He needs to step down.”

There was a heavy police presence and officers blocked attempts by protesters to enter a central square before the rally peacefully dispersed.

Organisers said about 1,000 demonstrators took part but police put the number at around 400.

Police told local media that the protesters will be called in for questioning as they had violated the ban on gatherings.

Muhyiddin took power at the head of a scandal-plagued coalition last year without an election following the demise of a reformist administration.

But his government is on the verge of collapse after allies withdrew support.

He came under renewed pressure to step down this week after parliament convened following a months-long suspension as part of a virus state of emergency.

His government was accused of dodging a vote that would have tested its shaky majority — drawing a rare rebuke from the country’s revered king.

Sunday is the final day of the six-month state of emergency but the nationwide lockdown will remain in place. Malaysia has reported almost 1.1 million virus cases and more than 8,800 deaths.

In Tunis cafes, cynicism saps opposition to president's power grab


ByAFP
PublishedJuly 31, 2021

Under a blazing Tunis sun, cafe owner Radhi al-Chawich is chatting amicably with customers when he lets slip he supports the Islamist-inspired Ennahdha party, the main opponent of a power grab by President Kais Saied.

All five turn on him immediately, telling him that he doesn’t know what he’s talking about and that Ennahdha are all “hypocrites” and “liars”.

It is a widespread sentiment in the alleyways of Tunis’s Old City after 10 years in which Ennahdha has maintained its position as Tunisia’s largest party but has failed to win a parliamentary majority, forcing it to make sometimes unpalatable compromises.

Most people interviewed by AFP blame the party for Tunisia’s multiple crises, not the president it accuses of mounting a “coup”.

Last Sunday, Saied sacked prime minister Hichem Mechichi and suspended parliament for 30 days. On Wednesday, he ordered a graft crackdown targeting 460 businessmen for alleged embezzlement alongside an investigation into alleged illegal funding of political parties, including Ennahdha.


For supporters like Chawich, the cynicism about the party’s motives is a throwback to the dictatorship of president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, ousted 10 years ago in the Arab Spring uprisings.

The 61-year-old said the party deserved more respect for its share of the vote in successive elections since his ouster.

“We are back to the time of the dictatorship. It is a recognised party which ran for election… Let its mandate end and then we’ll see in the elections. It is the ballot box that must decide.”

Chawich said he would continue to support Ennahdha until investigators proves the party had done something wrong.


“If it turns out that they stole, and they are convicted, then I will not vote for them anymore.”

– ‘Chaos’ fears –

Chawich said he fears for the country’s future now that the standoff between the president and the party has come to a head. “I don’t want it to slide into chaos.”

It is a fear also voiced by the international community, which does not want to see the birthplace of the Arab Spring revert to authoritarianism or slip into violence.

But for now calm reigns on the streets of Tunis. After mobilising a few hundred supporters for a sit-in outside the shuttered parliament building on Monday, Ennahdha leader Rached Ghannouchi has adopted a more cautious approach.

He has appealed for a “national dialogue” and for early parliamentary and presidential elections to resolve the months-long standoff between Saied and the legislature.

For political scientist Selim Kharrat, it is a pragmatic response that acknowledges the party’s limitations.

The “failure of Ennahdha to mobilise its base” for larger protests on Monday had tipped the balance of power in the president’s favour, he said.


“Ennahdha has always been ready to compromise because the party is obsessed with its own survival, haunted by the possibility of a new ban like that imposed under the Ben Ali dictatorship.

For many ordinary Tunisians, it is those compromises that have shattered their trust in Ennahdha.

“I voted for their false promises,” said Ismael Mezir, 42. “They made a lot of promises, and in fact they were lies.”

Clothing store owner Taoufic Ben Hmida says he still supports Ennahdha but understands the disillusion among some voters.

“I like Ennahdha,” the 47-year-old told AFP.

“From the point of view of their programme, of what they imagine and plan, they are right. Ennahdha could have done great things in Tunisia. But the problem is that they have not been able to face the obstacles that have occurred.”

Read more: https://www.digitaljournal.com/world/in-tunis-cafes-cynicism-saps-opposition-to-presidents-power-grab/article#ixzz72DLvrvWW

The amount of ice lost in Greenland on Tuesday would cover Florida in 2 inches of water


By Karen Graham

Published July 31, 2021

High temperatures in the Arctic are melting Greenland’s ice sheets so rapidly that the ice melt from Tuesday alone would be enough to cover the entire state of Florida in two inches of water.

On Tuesday, Greenland lost more than 8.5 billion tons of surface mass from ice melt. Taking it a step further, in total, Greenland has lost 18.4 billion tons of surface mass from ice melt since Sunday, according to CNN.

This is the third extreme melting event Greenland has experienced in the last decade – where the melting has extended farther inland than in the entire satellite era, which began in the 1970s, according to CTV News Canada.

The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) says that while the extreme melting is not quite as bad as it was in 2019, scientists are saying the area of land that is melting is larger this time around.

On June 13, 2019, Over 40 percent of Greenland experienced melting, losing an estimated 2 gigatons (equal to 2 billion tons) on just that day alone.

“It’s a significant melt,” Ted Scambos, a senior research scientist at the National Snow and Ice Data Center at the University of Colorado, told CNN. “July 27th saw most of the eastern half of Greenland from the northern tip all the way to the southern tip mostly melted, which is unusual.”

As anthropogenic climate change has warmed the planet, ice loss has increased at a more rapid pace. According to a recent study published in the journal Cryosphere, Earth has lost a staggering 28 trillion tons of ice since the mid-1990s, much of it in the Arctic, including the Greenland ice sheet.

“In the past decade, we’ve already seen that surface melting in Greenland has become both more severe and more erratic,” said Thomas Slater, a glaciologist at the University of Leeds and a co-author on that report, according to The Hill. “As the atmosphere continues to warm over Greenland, events such as yesterday’s extreme melting will become more frequent.”

In a study published in the journal Nature last year, researchers estimated that the rate of Greenland’s ice melt over the course of the 21st century will be between 8,000 gigatons and 35,900 gigatons tons per century, nearly six times faster than the early-Holocene era rate.

More countries increasing climate pledges, piling pressure on big emitters


By Karen Graham
Published  July 31, 2021

The town of Erftstadt was badly damaged by a landslide triggered by the floods. — © AFP

Over 100 countries, many of them smaller than the likes of China or the United States, submitted new, more ambitious climate pledges to the United Nations this week, raising pressure for big emitters to do more ahead of the U.N. climate summit in November.

Reuters is reporting that U.N. climate chief Patricia Espinosa said that as of Saturday the United Nations had received new pledges from 110 countries, out of the nearly 200 that signed the 2015 Paris climate accord.

“It is still far from satisfactory since only a little over half the parties (58 percent) have met the cut-off deadline,” Espinosa said in a statement, urging laggards to “redouble their efforts” and make more ambitious commitments to protect the planet.

Ahead of the July 30 deadline to submit new pledges in order to be counted in the UN report, 15 smaller countries with relatively low CO2 emissions met the deadline, including Sri Lanka, Israel, Malawi, and Barbados.

Pine trees burn on a hillside at the Dixie Fire, in Twain, California. — Photo: © AFP

Malaysia, Nigeria, and Namibia were among some of the larger countries to submit tougher climate targets this week, according to US News.

This year has been deadly, with extreme heatwaves, flooding, and forest fires occurring around the globe, leading to urgent calls for more action in reducing CO2 emissions worldwide.

The UN’s analysis of the latest data on climate pledges shows that more than 90 countries have so far submitted a new or updated national action plan, however, when taken all together, would still lead to global warming far beyond the 1.5-degree limit that would avoid the worst impacts of climate change by 2030.

“I truly hope that the revised estimate of collective efforts will reveal a more positive picture,” Espinosa said, reports Texas News Today.

Most emissions come from just a few countries – Source – UN Climate Action

Putting the numbers into perspective, the UN is reporting that most emissions come from just a few countries, with China being the biggest greenhouse gas (GHG) emitter.

The United States and European Union, the world’s second and third-biggest emitters, hiked their targets in recent months, promising to slash emissions faster this decade.

This means that including the top three countries, the 10 biggest GHG emitters are responsible for 68 percent of total GHG emissions. At least 100 countries, combined, only contribute about 3.0 percent of GHG emissions.

The UN is, of course, giving laggards a chance to fulfill their obligations, saying they can still submit new pledges before the summit in November, by which time every country is expected to submit a new pledge.


Read more: https://www.digitaljournal.com/tech-science/more-countries-increasing-climate-pledges-piling-pressure-on-big-emitters/article#ixzz72DHR3N5H

 

Litigation by citizens leading to better climate change policies, Irish research finds

FRI, 30 JUL, 2021 - 

PÁDRAIG HOARE

Taking national governments to court over climate policies, such as happened when an environmental body won a case at the Irish Supreme Court last year, can help spur real and meaningful change.

That is according to a new paper from the Dublin-based international affairs think tank, the Institute of International and European Affairs (IIEA), which looked at the increasing litigation taken across Europe by citizens and groups over perceived shortfalls in action taken on the climate crisis.

The IIEA said that the historic signing of Ireland's Climate Bill, which commits Ireland to a 51% reduction in emissions by 2030, was hugely influenced by action taken by the Friends of the Irish Environment (FIE) group.

In July last year, the Supreme Court unanimously quashed the Government’s 2017 plan under the Climate Action Act of 2015, following a case taken by FIE that argued it was inadequate.

The IIEA research paper, authored by former Labour Communications Minister, Alex White, and senior researcher on climate and energy Policy at the IIEA, Luke O’Callaghan-White, said the judgment was hailed variously as a “turning point” , a “landmark judgment” , and a “watershed moment”. 

"Without question this was a significant moment in the evolution of Irish public policy on climate change: a critical plan adopted by government was deemed inadequate, and therefore unlawful," the paper said.

Climate cases against national governments are on the increase throughout the world, and particularly in Europe, the analysis found. 

"The resulting judgments are frequently grounded on the robust consensus now evident in the scientific community on the need to limit global temperature increases. In many high-profile cases, apex courts have found in favour of litigants and ordered states to enhance climate action measures."

The majority of such cases - 58% - taken outside of the US have led to outcomes entailing more effective climate regulation, the analysis found.

Mr O’Callaghan-White said: "There is a perception that climate cases are typically unsuccessful. This is not true. 

A majority of cases taken against national governments result in better climate regulations. This will inspire more cases in different jurisdictions.

“What we have found and argue in this paper, is that climate litigation will continue to be an effective method to accelerate climate action, as it affords citizens the opportunity to scrutinise and supervise government action through court intervention."

Mr White said the analysis looked at three leading cases from the Netherlands, Ireland, and Germany.

"It represents a real opportunity for citizens and activist groups to lead public scrutiny of governments and of the extent to which they are truly implementing their own policies," he said.

Joyce Fegan: It's not just plastic straws — make the powerful take action on climate crisis

Framing our climate change action only in terms of micro-steps lets those responsible for most of the damage off the hook 

Cooling off at the Forty Foot in Dublin during the heatwave last week. It was a good news story. Finally. Some fine weather, that’s all it was — just a good news story. Until it wasn’t. Picture: Leah Farrell/RollingNews.ie

SAT, 31 JUL, 2021 - 12:30

Joyce Fegan

THERE was something about July’s extreme heat that didn’t feel quite right. Met Éireann put out a weather warning, not the usual one we’re used to — the howling winds and torrential rain — but because it was going to reach 30C-plus in Roscommon.

I don’t remember ever hearing a weather warning in the summer before. My mum said she doesn’t remember a summer where it was as hot. 

The front pages of our newspapers were covered in the usual photographs — teens in mid air as they jumped off piers and children licking already melted 99s. It was a good news story. Finally. Some fine weather, that’s all it was — just a good news story.

Until it wasn’t.

The effect of the pandemic or any other ongoing major news stories is that it pushes every other issue off the agenda; off the front pages and down the radio bulletins.

Until this day last week, when this newspaper ran with “Extreme heatwave ‘almost certainly’ linked to climate change, expert warns” as its main front-page story.

The crisis is worse than we'd imagined

One fact was that we’d experienced two tropical nights in a row in Ireland last week where temperatures fell no lower than 20C. This has only happened six times in 80 years of Irish records. The North reached its highest ever temperature three times in less than a week.

Climate expert Alastair McKinstry, environmental programme manager with NUI Galway’s Irish Centre for High-End Computing, went on the record to state that the extreme weather is “almost certainly” due to climate change.

This followed an open letter from Irish Doctors for the Environment (IDE) which said the scale of current extreme weather has led to the conclusion that the climate crisis is actually worse than has previously been understood.

But it’s grand. Just do stuff like put your plates in the dishwasher without rinsing them. These types of actions are what global leaders now call “micro steps”.

But you can only channel your eco anxiety through micro steps for so long.

That particular piece of advice came from Boris Johnson’s climate spokesperson, Allegra Stratton, last week, writing in The Telegraph. Other micro-steps she suggested included replacing shampoo bottles with shampoo bars and freezing your leftover bread.

While she did make a feeble attempt to add the disclaimer that these micro-steps alone would not solve the pressing issue of reducing our planet’s carbon emissions, the paltry clause was not enough to avoid the wrath of environmentalists.

Individual choice versus collective action 

The narrative that “individual choices” are to blame for any one problem — poverty (not inequality, not racial injustice, not gender disparity) or climate change (not huge fossil fuel companies’ emissions, not mass deforestation) — no longer holds water.

When we continue to make a problem about one’s individual choices, we do two things: We shift the focus away from systems and structures of power and we light fires of anxiety in ordinary citizens, who have absolutely no wherewithal to stem the tide of climate change by switching to a metal straw.

To make climate change about switching straws and freezing food is to let people and organisations in power off the hook.

Focus on those really responsible 

In 2017, a study found that just 100 companies were responsible for 71% of global emissions. And, of that 100, more than 50% of global industrial emissions since 1988 could be traced to just 25 companies, said the Carbon Majors report.

So maybe every time our guilt spikes about the pile of unrecyclable soft plastics we accrued at the supermarket or each time our stomach flips as we read about another fire in the Amazon or a flood in Germany, we could channel that anxiety-induced powerlessness not into switching to metal straws but into asking those in actual power for concrete action.

Maybe that’s how we take climate action from now on. Instead of feeling paralysed by eco-anxiety and powerless to do anything about the very thing we worry about, we could channel it towards those who can make change.

Last Monday, RTÉ managing director Jon Williams sent a tweet about climate change.

“We were wrong not to make clear [the] connection between extreme weather events & climate change. Sin of omission & reported in good faith. But truth matters. So when we get it wrong, we should say so. Lesson learned. Work to do,” he wrote.

He posted a link to how RTÉ was covering climate change and how the national broadcaster would rectify its reporting.

Extinction Rebellion Ireland, the Irish arm of the international environmental group, reacted to his tweet saying the social media statement followed “weeks of mounting pressure from environmental NGOs, climate scientists, and climate activists”.

Prior to this tweet, the Irish group had been planning two separate actions of civil disobedience targeting the State broadcaster for its “lack of urgent discussion on the climate crisis”.

Extinction Rebellion Ireland said it was taking Mr Williams’ statement with a “healthy dose of scepticism” and called upon RTÉ and all other news organisations to enact recommendations made by the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland (BAI) when it comes to reporting on climate change.

The idea being that increased coverage of climate change and focus on environmental issues would “inspire green behaviour change among audiences”.

There are few people I know who don’t recycle, carry a reusable water bottle, compost, and consider their carbon footprint and, if they have young children, the amount of nappies that go out in the black bin every week. The masses want change, but the system has to change to enable us to have different choices to make.

Channelling anxiety into action  

We’ve lived through a year and a half of being on high alert, if not times of being hyper-alert, and we continue to live with the uncertainty of the pandemic — tackling climate change is not exactly going to provide a reprieve from that anxiety.

But instead of being crippled by climate anxiety at an individual level, let’s look to those people and organisations in power who can make changes that have major consequences.

Imagine a media landscape that holds systems and organisations to climate account the way it focuses on holding politicians to account. 

 

UK Olympics presenter 'proud' of accent after criticism from former minister

"Never allow judgments on your class, accent, or appearance (to) hold you back"

Alex Scott (Peter Byrne/PA)

SAT, 31 JUL, 2021 - 15:45

MAX MCLEAN, PA

BBC presenter Alex Scott has said she is “proud of my accent” after former UK Labour minister and ex-House of Lords member Digby Jones criticised her pronunciation.

Mr Jones, who was educated at private Bromsgrove School, tweeted on Friday that “Alex Scott spoils a good presentational job on the BBC Olympics Team with her very noticeable inability to pronounce her ‘g’s at the end of a word”.

Scott responded by saying she was proud to be from a working class family in east London.

“I’m from a working class family in East London, Poplar, Tower Hamlets & I am PROUD,” she tweeted.

“Proud of the young girl who overcame obstacles, and proud of my accent! It’s me, it’s my journey, my grit.

“A quick one to any young kids who may not have a certain kind of privilege in life.

“Never allow judgments on your class, accent, or appearance (to) hold you back.

“Tweets like this just give me the energy to keep going.”

The former Arsenal and England footballer, who was recently announced as the new host of the BBC’s Football Focus, received support from colleagues, athletes and politicians.

“I like natural, authentic accents. What annoys me is people putting on posh accents,” wrote Andy Burnham, Greater Manchester mayor.

Labour MP Dawn Butler replied “Keep rising” and Jess Phillips tweeted that regional accents add “to the joy of the Olympics coverage”.

Golfer Thomas Bjorn, former footballer Micah Richards and ex-rugby international Will Carling added to the many voices of support, while Arsenal Women tweeted: “Keep being you, @AlexScott. Forever proud!”

[social=twitter]https://twitter.com/EilidhBarbour/status/1421368777225261057[social]

BBC colleague Eilidh Barbour also took to Twitter to defend Scott.

She wrote: “This thread is what makes @AlexScott such a wonderful role model. Keep rising girl.”

Mr Jones is a former director-general of the Confederation of British Industry, and was a Labour transport minister and a member of the House of Lords between 2007 and 2020.

A LIBERAL ICON
Watch Norman Lear’s 99th Birthday Surprise Video From Woody Harrelson and Justin Theroux


By Michael Schneider
Plus Icon

Robert Trachtenberg for Variety

Norman Lear celebrated the dawn of his second century on the planet by probably accomplishing more than you did in the past month. Not only did he gather with family and friends, but Lear also published an op-ed in The Washington Post, warning of the erosion of voting rights in America, and TBS sealed a deal to develop a new version of his iconic 1970s late-night soap “Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman.”

“How about that,” said Lear, on the phone from New York. “I can’t overstate how exciting I find that.”

Brent Miller, who runs Lear’s Act III production company, credited Sony for “for really pushing through in the way they have. To make sure that we could close that [TBS] deal right on his birthday was a nice gift.” The updated show is set to star Emily Hampshire (“Schitt’s Creek”) in the title role; Hampshire and Jacob Tierney (“Letterkenny”) are writing and executive producing.



Norman Lear’s ‘Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman’ Remake, From ‘Schitt’s Creek’ Star Emily Hampshire, Lands at TBS

“I feel like there’s been a lot of announcements for Norman’s birthday, which have been great,” Miller added, pointing to the recent news that Amazon Prime and IMDB TV have started streaming several shows from Lear’s library, including “All in the Family” and “Sanford and Son.” “Strategically you can’t really hide that that’s also a great birthday present to give to Norman as he’s entering that 100th year.”

Added Lear: “I can’t hear that without laughing… I’m so awash, I think I would like to turn 99 many times. The quantity and quality of the love I’ve been getting, couldn’t be more exciting. And unusual, but then, 99 is unusual.”

Lear said he spent his July 27 birthday at his farm in Vermont, “and we were all there, all my kids and grandkids, so it was fabulous and then the phone never stopped ringing, and I loved every call. And loved hearing from you guys.”

Many of those grandkids are just now discovering some of Lear’s old shows, thanks to the streaming deal. “It’s a real kick,” he said. “I wish I had my mother to call. I’m always reminded of her reaction when I called her when I learned that they were starting a Hall of Fame, and I was among the first inductees. And I called her excitedly to tell her that with Lucille Ball and Milton Berle, the people whose names she knew so well. And I said I was being inducted with them. And she said, ‘Well, if that’s what they want to do. Might as well.'”

In the Washington Post piece, Lear wrote, “I am proud of the progress we’ve made in my first 99 years, and it breaks my heart to see it undermined by politicians more committed to their own power than the principles that should bind us together. Frankly, I am baffled and disturbed that 21st-century Americans must still struggle to protect their right to vote.”

Asked about the editorial, Lear — a World War II veteran — said he’s deeply concerned about what he now sees happening in the country, just as he was back then. “I feel as close to losing what is most precious,” he said. “It seems so impossible that I could feel threatened again in the same lifetime. That we could lose what is most precious about our democracy.”

But that doesn’t mean that he has lost hope: ” I’m one of those people who I don’t want to wake up in the morning and have no hope. So if I sound like I’m not hopeful, then I’m miscommunicating. Because I am hopeful. This is America, and we’ll get through it. But it’s as tough a time as I have ever seen.”

Beyond “Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman,” Act III is also busy on an animated version of Lear’s “Good Times,” which has been picked up to series at Netflix. “We are cooking. We’re very excited about progress we’re making,” Miller said of that series, which is being led by showrunner Carl Jones. “We’re deep into all 10 scripts, all 10 episodes. We’re first obviously writing all the scripts and then we’ll go into the actual animation part of it. I think that people are going love the authenticity.”

Act III is also developing the comedy series “Clean Slate,” starring Laverne Cox and George Wallace, for IMDb TV, and is working with Shonda Rhimes’ Shondaland on the anthology series “Notes on Love,” for Netflix. Lear is writing an episode with Aaron Shure. Plus Act III has the Heidi Ewing film “I Carry You with Me” and the Rita Moreno doc “Just a Girl Who Decided to Go for It.”

“And I’m opening at the Copacabana, I’m doing standup,” Lear quipped.

Meanwhile, among those celebrating Lear’s birthday: Woody Harrelson and Justin Theroux; here’s an exclusive look at the tongue-in-cheek birthday video they sent the TV legend:

5 Takeaways From Julie K. Brown’s New Book On Jeffrey Epstein
Flannery Dean 

In 2016, Miami Herald journalist Julie K. Brown was on the hunt for a new story. So, the award-winning investigative reporter turned her attention to re-examining a decade-old case against shady Palm Beach money manager Jeffrey Epstein. She had a timely hook for taking a second pass on the story: the federal prosecutor, Alex Acosta, who had signed off on an extraordinary plea deal that let Epstein and his co-conspirators avoid sex trafficking charges in 2008 was settling in as then-President Donald Trump’s new labor secretary. Meanwhile, the 63-year-old Epstein had put his brief stint in jail as a sex offender behind him and was living a life of luxury, criss-crossing the globe when not in his palatial seven-storey townhouse in New York City.

 Provided by Chatelaine A photo of the author Julie. K Brown and the cover of her book on Jeffrey Epstein

After two years of reporting, Brown published a three-part series about Epstein, his victims and his uniquely successful journey through the justice system in the Herald. The public outcry that resulted was significant. New sex trafficking charges were filed against Epstein in the state of New York. In July 2019, Acosta resigned from Trump’s cabinet, a month before Epstein would be found dead in his NYC prison cell. In 2020, his former ally and alleged accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell, was also arrested and charged with conspiracy and sex trafficking. (She is currently in jail awaiting trial.)

The Epstein saga is a big story that boasts a huge cast of characters and a lot of moving parts, all of which Brown pieces together in her new book, Perversion of Justice: The Jeffrey Epstein Story, which is out now. Here are five things to know before you dive in.
The book breaks down the original case against Epstein

If you’ve ever wanted to know what went down in Palm Beach in the early 2000s with Epstein, this is the book for you. But brace yourself: it’s a dark tale. Brown identified 80 women who said they were abused by Epstein from 2001 to 2006 alone, of which eight agreed to be interviewed.

It began in 2005, when a woman called Palm Beach police to say that Epstein had sexually assaulted her 14-year-old stepdaughter (the number of young women claiming they’d been lured to Epstein’s villa under false pretences and then assaulted would grow into the many dozens as the investigation continued). Evidence mounted that this was not an average sexual assault case, but one incident in a network of exploitation that preyed on young women for the benefit of wealthy men.

In 2008, Epstein was indicted for sex trafficking charges, but in an unusually generous move, then-U.S. Attorney Acosta allowed Epstein to plead to two counts of solicitation of prostitution instead, a deal that cast the minor girls he abused as sex workers rather than victims of abuse. He and his accomplices were also granted immunity from prosecution of the more serious trafficking charges. (A 2020 Department of Justice review would later determine Acosta showed “poor judgment” in resolving the investigation into Epstein with a non-prosecution agreement.)

It paints a grim picture of the U.S. justice system

The evidence that Epstein was a serial abuser who also engaged in sex trafficking girls and young women was always compelling—so why did he get off so easily? That question formed the heart of Brown’s original series, and it informs the book as well. The answer is bleak and predictable: it’s because he had the means and the influence, and he shared his spoils among men with the same. As such, Brown’s book isn’t just about Jeffrey Epstein. It’s also about how individuals like him are able to use their wealth and connections to avoid the consequences and punishments the criminal justice system metes out on poor people daily.

Privilege trumping justice is a story as old as time, but in Brown’s hands that storyline is broken down in infuriating detail. She also identifies the cast of powerful figures that helped Epstein on his remarkable journey through the system, a list of high-profile names that include famed lawyer and Harvard professor Alan Dershowitz, and Ken Starr, the White House prosecutor that led the Whitewater/Lewinsky investigation into former U.S. President Bill Clinton, for which he was impeached. There’s also a remarkably flexible population of sheriffs, prosecutors, officials and even prison guards who appeared willing to bend the rules for Epstein’s benefit. But it’s not just villainy Brown isolates; she also illuminates how complicity works: some people tried to do the right thing but ultimately didn’t want to face the consequences of being on the wrong side of power.

It’s a tangled web of connections and compromises that indicts more than just one predatory male millionaire. “Epstein got away with his crimes because nearly every element of society allowed him to get away with it,” writes Brown. “Professional, legal, and moral ethics were set aside for a broken system of ethics that places corporate profits, personal wealth, political connections, and celebrity above some of the most sacred tenets of our faiths, our teachings and our democracy.”

It’s an informative account of the process of reporting a big story

The reporter offers a rare behind-the-scenes look at the gruelling slog entailed in investigating the case against Epstein more than a decade after the first allegation was made. Brown chronicles the challenges inherent in taking on a story with this kind of scope, especially in an industry that is contracting. Over much of the 435-page book, Brown reveals the stops and starts of her investigation and the amount of effort required to take the largely redacted 100-plus-page police report and build out a story. She details how she gained the trust of some of Epstein’s victims, who were justifiably angry with how the case had been handled. She also recounts her experiences dealing with the aggressive tactics of many of Epstein’s most vocal and powerful supporters.
It is a tale of tenacity, too

Perversion of Justice reveals what Brown terms the “lopsided” nature of justice when the accused is a wealthy friend to world leaders and billionaires and the victims are girls and young women with no money, no status and no cultural currency. But it is also revelatory as to the ways in which injustices can be exposed when people use what leverage they do possess to hold power to account. Brown carves out significant space to honour the perseverance of lesser-known individuals who continued to pursue Epstein regardless of his vast wealth and connections to world leaders like Donald Trump and Bill Clinton and whatever you’d call Prince Andrew.

She gives space and recognition to Palm Beach police officers like Joe Recarey, who was one of the original investigators into Epstein, and to the tireless advocacy of women like Virginia Giuffre, who is largely responsible for Ghislaine Maxwell’s current incarceration. Courtney Wild, who was abused by Epstein and worked for him to recruit girls, also launched a suit against the Department of Justice, claiming the 2008 plea deal violated the Crime Victims’ Rights Act (the case was unsuccessful). That Wild acted, sometimes from a jail cell, (unlike Epstein’s, Wild’s cell door was locked), only puts the system to further shame.

It’s a tribute to the influence of #MeToo on journalism

Brown wasn’t the first writer to attempt to take on Epstein. Others before her had tried, but were either ignored, intimidated by his influence, or had their stories reduced to the status of innuendo, or saw them simply go unpublished. Brown took Epstein on at the precise moment the culture was actively engaged in looking at the ubiquity of sexual violence against girls and women.

It was thanks to the social justice movement #MeToo and to the many legions of women who came forward to reveal their stories publicly that the cultural climate and momentum shifted from compliance to confrontation, and from appeasement to prosecution.

#MeToo made more space for better journalism to thrive and opened the door for holding the powerful to account when it comes to discussing the epidemic of sexual abuse of girls and women. Brown shows just how powerful that journalism can be when the reporter is fearless and the timing is right.