Amazon is 'obstructing' congressional probe of Illinois warehouse tornado deaths, AOC and other House Dems say

wsoon@insider.com (Weilun Soon) -

© (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson)A heavily damaged Amazon fulfillment center is seen Saturday, Dec. 11, 2021, in Edwardsville, Ill. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson)

Last December, a tornado tore through an Amazon warehouse in Illinois, killing six workers.

In March, House members launched an investigation into Amazon's severe weather safety practices.

 
But, they said, Amazon failed to comply and accused the company of "obstructing" the investigation.

Congressional Democrats have slammed Amazon, saying the company has made it difficult to investigate whether its labor practices resulted in workers' deaths after a tornado struck one of its Illinois warehouses last December.

In March, in response to the incident, House Oversight Committee members Carolyn Maloney and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Cori Bush of Missouri reached out to Amazon CEO Andy Jassy for information on Amazon's severe weather policies. They gave Jassy and Amazon an April 14 deadline to hand over documentation.

But weeks after the deadline, the group said they still hadn't received any documentation from Amazon. In a letter dated June 1, the Maloney, Ocasio-Cortez, and Bush reached out to Jassy again, noting that "nearly seven weeks have passed since the April 2022 deadline, yet Amazon still has not produced any of the key categories of documents identified by Committee staff."

Amazon "has failed to meaningfully comply with the Committee's requests, obstructing the Committee's investigation," the group wrote.

Amazon now has until June 8 to submit the documents. "If Amazon fails to do so, the Committee will have no choice but to consider alternative measures to obtain full compliance," the letter said.

Amazon spokesperson Kelly Nantel told Bloomberg on Friday that the company was surprised by the letter because it had provided more than 1,500 pages of documents to assist in the investigation.

"As we have done from the start, we will continue to work with committee staff on further document production — which includes the most recent materials we shared on June 1," Nantel said.

Amazon did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.

THE LAW IN CANADA 

A tornado ripped through an Amazon warehouse in Edwardsville, Illinois, on December 10, killing six workers. In the days following the deadly event, the workers' families, their coworkers, lawmakers, and investors questioned Amazon's decision not to evacuate workers prior to the storm. Two warehouse workers told Insider they were expected to report for work even though a tornado warning was in place.

The family of one worker filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Amazon.

In response to the lawsuit, company spokesperson Nantel told Insider: "We believe our team did the right thing as soon as a warning was issued, and they worked to move people to safety as quickly as possible."

"Severe weather watches are common in this part of the country and, while precautions are taken, are not cause for most businesses to close down," she continued.

Investigators from the Department of Labor's Occupational Safety and Health Administration said in April the online retailer met "minimal federal safety guidelines" at the warehouse. However, they added, "the company should make improvements to further protect workers and contract drivers in future emergencies."

Last month, a group of Amazon investors submitted a proposal at its annual shareholder meeting requesting that the company report on workplace safety issues at its warehouses. That motion was voted down by shareholders with only 43.7% of votes in favor, according to Amazon's May 25 SEC filing.

New program offered in Edmonton connects coding to traditional Indigenous knowledge

Kashmala Fida Mohatarem - 

Traditional knowledge is meeting up with technology and coding in an innovative program recently introduced to Edmonton's Indigenous youth.

The INDIGital program is a four-week course created by the Indigenous Friends Association, a not-for-profit organization. The program's goals are to teach digital literacy to Indigenous youth while connecting technologies with Indigenous knowledge.

"It is meant to be an empowering class," said Danielle Paradis, program manager for INDIGital.

Previously offered in Saskatchewan and Ontario, the program held its first session at the Edmonton Public Library, starting on May 9 and ending in early June.

INDIGital offers students a chance to learn about coding, build their own websites and design digital content, all while learning about Indigenous history and teachings.

Paradis said the program helps youth understand how technologies have existed within the worldview of Indigenous communities.

"A lot of times Indigenous people are portrayed as people who've existed in the past, not people who are real and present," Paradis said.

"A lot of this program focuses on understanding that Indigenous people have always had technology."

She said they also explore where the current technological landscape is lacking when it comes to Indigenous people.

Activists and privacy watchdogs have talked about how facial recognition software and other AI disproportionately target Black and Indigenous communities.


Paradis said it's important that people from those communities learn to participate and create, to make technologies work for them.


© Danielle Paradis/Indigenous Friends Association

Serenity Jacko makes a robot move within a fixed pattern she drew during an INDIGital workshop at the Edmonton Public Library.

Serenity Jacko, a student in the program, learned about it through Facebook.

She liked the idea of learning to code — not only so technologies she already used made more sense, but to have an extra skill that would prove useful on a resumé.

Previously, she said, she felt "completely lost" when someone was bringing up coding language.

"I don't want to feel like that," she said. "It would be nice to at least have an idea."

Jacko and other students learned programming languages, how to design a website, and were introduced to beading. They also learned how to move robots within a fixed pattern using code.

Paradis said the workshop was created in part to help improve Indigenous people's relationship with technology.

"A lot of times Indigenous people, if they're growing up, say rural or remote areas, they're often taught that technology is not a good thing," she said.

Even though technology plays an important role in these communities — " Facebook groups are huge on reserves… and that's where, especially during COVID, everybody was gathering and getting information" — she said a lot of communities are apprehensive about tech.

Programs like INDIGital are important, she said, because they can teach how technology can be useful for these communities and also how to use it safely and effectively.

The INDIGital workshop has run in other parts of Canada. The Edmonton program was a first. Paradis said the hope is to run another workshop in the city next year.

"We do want to be a multi-year presence in Edmonton. I think we have a very vibrant Indigenous community," she said.

People interested in attending the workshops can do so on the Indigenous Friends Association website. Paradis said there is a waiting list but once workshops come up they will reach out to individuals to see what works.

University tragedy brings to light 'dinosaur' student issue

AFP - Yesterday 


After four people died in a Bolivian university stampede, an investigation into the role of a 52-year-old student has relaunched the debate over "dinosaur" students who never graduate.


© JORGE BERNAL

Almost a quarter of the students at the San Andres university in La Paz have been at the higher education institution for more than 11 years

On May 9, someone provoked panic in a crowded amphitheatre when they threw a tear gas grenade during a student assembly at the Tomas Frias university in the southern city of Potosi.

Four people died and 70 were injured in the ensuing stampede.

Soon after, it was revealed that student union leader Max Mendoza, 52, had played a part in organizing the assembly, sparking further controversy.

In his 33 years as a student, Mendoza has never graduated, claimed legislator Hector Arce, who brandished a notebook of the union leader's marks: since 1989 he had failed more than 200 subjects and received a grade of zero more than 100 times.


© JORGE BERNAL

Students at free public universities benefit from discounted health care and those in leadership roles also pick up a salary

The president of the Bolivian University Confederation, Mendoza is alleged to have called the student general assembly in a bid to promote the interest of fellow leaders loyal to him.


© JORGE BERNAL

San Andres university rector Oscar Heredia is worried about the trend in eternal students

The meeting turned fractious before the smoke bomb was thrown.

Mendoza was placed in pre-trial detention on May 21, accused of several offenses including abuse of office and embezzlement.

- 'Freeloaders' -

But Mendoza's case is merely the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the thousands of "dinosaurs" staying on seemingly forever at university.

The term has been used for years in universities before it caught on at a national level, says Beymar Quisberth, a sociology student at the San Francisco Xabier university in Sucre.


© JORGE BERNAL

University students can access cheap health care making it an attractive option for many working people to continue registering as students

According to local media, many student leaders drag out their studies in order to maintain their roles and keep the associated benefits.


It is free to attend public universities in Bolivia, and students receive discounted health care.

But students also take on management roles that include salaries.

Mendoza pockets a monthly salary of 21,869 bolivianos (around $3,150), similar to that of a rector, for his role as head of the executive committee that coordinates Bolivia's higher education institutions.

Another person accused of being a "dinosaur," Alvaro Quelali, 37, is a student leader at the San Andres university in La Paz and has apparently been studying for 20 years.

In Bolivia "it's a business being a university manager. Why study (and graduate) when you have so many benefits," said Arce.

Many students have jobs and professions outside of university and merely register as a student in order to maintain their benefits, with no intention of actually studying.

Even if they fail the final exams, they can repeat the trick the next year.

"They're freeloaders, it's a disgrace," said Gabriela Paz, 20, a student at the Faculty of Law and Political Sciences.

"These people stay at university to keep receiving handouts," added Mateo Siles, 21.

- 'Deep crisis' -

San Andres university rector Oscar Heredia says it is not just student leaders but also ordinary students who remain at university for many years.

Of the university's more than 81,000 students, 23 percent have been there more than 11 years and 6.7 percent more than 20 years.

One thousand have even been there more than 30 years and around 100 more than 40 years.

"It's something that worries us, but it's a broad issue," Heredia told AFP.

Karen Apaza, an engineering student at San Andres, says she is campaigning against "these dinosaurs who live off the university for more than 20 years."

It is a familiar scene around the country.

The Gabriel Rene Moreno university in the city of Santa Cruz has 90,000 students, of whom three percent have been there more than 10 years.

Guido Zambrana, the professor of medicine at San Andres, says it is important "to recognize that we are going through a deep crisis."

He says it's time to wipe the slate clean and "dismantle the whole structure of corruption, bad management and the co-management (between students and teachers) that has been deteriorating for decades."

"University is obsolete, it's anachronistic and does not meet the current needs" of Bolivia.

jac/fj/lab/ybl/bc/mdl/des

WHEN I WENT TO THE UNIVERSITY OF LETHBRIDGE ONE OF MY ROOMATES WAS A DINOSAUR STUDENT, LIKE MANY ADULT STUDENTS, HE WORKED SPRING AND SUMMER AND WINTERED AT THE U OF L. THIS WAS THE REALITY OF CONSTRUCTION WORK IN AREA

New Orleans Starbucks store 1st in Louisiana to vote union

A Starbucks location is shown, Tuesday, April 26, 2022. Employees at a Starbucks store in New Orleans are the first of the coffee giant's locations in Louisiana to unionize, voting 11-1 in favor of joining a union on Friday and Saturday, June 3-4, 2022. 

AP Photo/Matt Rourke


Sun, June 5, 2022,

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Employees at a Starbucks store in New Orleans voted to form a union, becoming the first of the coffee giant's locations in Louisiana to unionize.

Ballots were cast Friday and Saturday 11-1 in favor of joining Workers United, which represents the unionized Starbucks stores, WWNO-FM reported. Two ballots were challenged, the station said.

The New Orleans vote is the latest in a series of wins for labor at Starbucks stores across the nation, and comes about a week after workers in Birmingham, Alabama, voted 27-to-1 to become that state’s first unionized Starbucks.

Barista Caitlyn Pierce and others wanted to unionize because of regular shifts where they were overworked and understaffed, the station reported.

“I’m feeling amazing,” Pierce said. “This is something we worked so hard for and it’s just great to finally get here.”

Starbucks has fought unionization efforts, saying its 9,000 company-owned U.S. stores function best when Starbucks works directly with employees, which the company calls “partners.”

In a statement Sunday, Starbucks said it was “listening and learning,” and added, “We respect our partner’s right to organize.” The statement didn’t say whether the company would challenge the vote.

Billie Nyx, lead organizer of the union campaign, was fired in mid-May for closing the store early without permission from higher management. Nyx is contesting the dismissal, saying it was in retaliation for union advocacy.

Nyx said they will meet with their lawyer and gather those still working at the store to solidify specific demands for the contract negotiations.

To win the changes they seek — like better pay and more reliable schedules — unionized stores must still sit down with Starbucks and negotiate a contract. It’s a painstaking process that can take years.

A Starbucks in Buffalo, New York, became the first in the United States to unionize late last year. Based in Seattle, the company has more than 34,000 stores worldwide.

Did SpaceX Really Save Taxpayers $40 Billion?

By Rich Smith - Jun 5, 2022 

The Motley Fool

KEY POINTS

John Hyten, former vice chairman of the joint chiefs general, says competition has saved the government $40 billion in space contracts.

SpaceX is a big part of the reason NASA and the government are able to get these savings.

And now they want to save even more.

If so, then SpaceX also cost somebody $40 billion in sales.

"A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you're talking real money."
-- Sen. Everett McKinley Dirksen

Now, there's some dispute about whether the late Illinois Sen. Dirksen actually said the quote above in just those words, but whether he did or he didn't, one thing's certain: Even if a billion isn't quite "real money," $40 billion certainly is.

This is why, when NASA Administrator Bill Nelson (himself a former senator) told a Senate subcommittee last month that price competition from SpaceX helped save taxpayers $40 billion on the cost of military space launches, well, as an investor that got my attention right away.

IMAGE SOURCE: SPACEX.

Quotable senators

Nelson was testifying before the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies, and talking about what funding NASA needs to accomplish all the missions it wants to accomplish. Specifically, what he told the subcommittee was this:

"General Hyten, [then] the Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, told me last year ... the fact that we have competition now on going to space -- just for the military -- has saved them $40 billion in launch costs."

Now, $40 billion is a big number, and it's not entirely clear how Hyten came up with it. Still, SpaceX has been launching government satellites at significant discounts to the prices charged by space companies such as Boeing (BA -0.89%), Lockheed Martin (LMT 0.36%), and Northrop Grumman (NOC 3.35%) for about a decade. Add in savings from SpaceX developing new products -- the Falcon Heavy rocket, for example, the Starship reusable megarocket, and even a lunar lander -- largely on its own, or with minimal support from NASA, and the $40 billion figure could be close to accurate.

And this wasn't Nelson's only revelation during his testimony.

In the context of thanking Congress for supporting a requested 9% increase in NASA's 2023 budget to $26 billion, Nelson described his plan to develop a second lunar lander, such that NASA would have two landers to choose from "somewhere in the 2027 timeframe." This second lander contract will be awarded as a fixed price contract -- and that was the point Nelson continued to hammer on throughout his testimony.
Fixed-price versus cost-plus

"The old way of doing things was always cost-plus," explained Nelson, discussing a form of government contract that reimburses a contractor for the costs it incurs -- even if those costs exceed the price it bid -- and then adds a guaranteed measure of profit on top of that (the plus). Problem is, this kind of contract doesn't require a defense contractor to work efficiently and keep costs in check.

In practice, this has resulted in project delays and cost overruns that cost both NASA and taxpayers money. Nelson cited the recent example of a contract awarded to Bechtel in 2019, to build a rocket-launching platform in 44 months for $383 million. As problems cropped up, this evolved into a contract to build the same launcher in 47 months for $402 million. Sad to say, this is not an isolated example, and Nelson told the Senate that in fact, cost-plus contracts have "been a plague on us in the past."

But Nelson says NASA is "committed" to managing its costs better, and has "been moving to fixed price where we can ... really crack down on [cost-plus contracts]." Similar to how consumers shop in a store, a fixed-price contract requires contractors to bid a certain price for a certain service, and then receive that price when the service is performed -- whether it actually costs the contractor more (or less) than its bid to perform the work.

What it means for investors

Granted, this sounds like common sense. When you or I go shopping, we almost always pay a fixed price to fill our shopping carts. But this idea is kind of new for NASA. If Nelson is right and it lowers the cost of space launch, this will save NASA money, and mean taxpayers get more bang for their space bucks -- which may increase taxpayer approval of, and support for NASA.

The switch from cost-plus to fixed-price does, however, have implications for investors in space stocks.

Consider that every government contract SpaceX wins at a discounted price is a contract lost by competitors like Northrop, Boeing, and Lockheed Martin. Moreover, every contract that these publicly traded space companies must bid low on, to beat competition from SpaceX, means less revenue for them.

Going forward, Nelson says he wants more NASA contracts to be priced this way. And this implies that going forward, Northrop could see its 10.6% operating profit margin in its space segment shrink. Lockheed could earn less than its present 9.3% margin -- and Boeing, which only earns a 5.8% margin in its defense, space, and security division business, could be at even greater risk of margin shrinkage.

This is the policy NASA will pursue in the future. Investors in the space industry should start planning for smaller profits today.

Lynching preachers: How black pastors resisted Jim Crow and white pastors incited racial violence


Malcolm Brian Foley, PhD Candidate in Religion - Historical Studies, Baylor University
Sun, June 5, 2022

THE CONVERSATION


A funeral held in July 1945 for two victims of the Ku Klux Klan, George Dorsey and his sister, Dorothy Dorsey Malcolm, of Walton County, Georgia, held at the Mt. Perry Baptist Church Sunday. Bettman via Getty

White lynch mobs in America murdered at least 4,467 people between 1883 and 1941, hanging, burning, dismembering, garroting and blowtorching their victims.

Their violence was widespread but not indiscriminate: About 3,300 of the lynched were black, according to the most recent count by sociologists Charles Seguin and David Rigby. The remaining dead were white, Mexican, of Mexican descent, Native American, Chinese or Japanese.

Such numbers, based on verifiable newspaper reports, represent a minimum. The full human toll of racial lynching may remain ever beyond reach.

Religion was no barrier for these white murderers, as I’ve discovered in my research on Christianity and lynch mobs in the Reconstruction-era South. White preachers incited racial violence, joined the Ku Klux Klan and lynched black people.

Sometimes, the victim was a pastor.

Buttressing white supremacy

When considering American racial terror, the first question to answer is not how a lynch mob could kill a man of the cloth but why white lynch mobs killed at all.

The typical answer from Southern apologists was that only black men who raped white women were targeted. In this view, lynching was “popular justice” – the response of an aggrieved community to a heinous crime.

Journalists like Ida B. Wells and early sociologists like Monroe Work saw through that smokescreen, finding that only about 20% to 25% of lynching victims were alleged rapists. About 3% were women. Some were children.

Black people were lynched for murder or assault, or on suspicion that they committed those crimes. They could also be lynched for looking at a white woman or for bumping the shoulder of a white woman. Some were killed for being near or related to someone accused of the aforementioned offenses.

Identifying the dead is supremely difficult work. As sociologists Amy Kate Bailey and Stewart Tolnay argue persuasively in their 2015 book “Lynched,” very little is known about lynching victims beyond their gender and race.

But by cross-referencing news reports with census data, scholars and civil rights organizations are uncovering more details.

One might expect that mobs seeking to destabilize the black community would focus on the successful and the influential – people like preachers or prominent business owners.

Instead, lynching disproportionately targeted lower-status black people – individuals society would not protect, like the agricultural worker Sam Hose of Georgia and men like Henry Smith, a Texas handyman accused of raping and killing a three-year-old girl.

The rope and the pyre snuffed out primarily the socially marginal: the unemployed, the unmarried, the precarious – often not the prominent – who expressed any discontentment with racial caste.

That’s because lynching was a form of social control. By killing workers with few connections who could be economically replaced – and doing so in brutal, public ways that struck terror into black communities – lynching kept white supremacy on track.
Fight from the front lines

So black ministers weren’t often lynching victims, but they could be targeted if they got in the way.

I.T. Burgess, a preacher in Putnam County, Florida, was hanged in 1894 after being accused of planning to instigate a revolt, according to a May 30, 1894, story in the Atlanta Constitution newspaper. Later that year, in December, the Constitution also reported, Lucius Turner, a preacher near West Point, Georgia, was shot by two brothers for apparently writing an insulting note to their sister.

Ida B. Wells wrote in her 1895 editorial “A Red Record” about Reverend King, a minister in Paris, Texas, who was beaten with a Winchester Rifle and placed on a train out of town. His offense, he said, was being the only person in Lamar County to speak against the horrific 1893 lynching of the handyman Henry Smith.

In each of these cases, the victim’s profession was ancillary to their lynching. But preaching was not incidental to black pastors’ resistance to lynching.

My dissertation research shows black pastors across the U.S. spoke out against racial violence during its worst period, despite the clear danger that it put them in.

Many, like the Washington, D.C., Presbyterian pastor Francis Grimke, preached to their congregations about racial violence. Grimke argued for comprehensive anti-racist education as a way to undermine the narratives that led to lynching.

Other pastors wrote furiously about anti-black violence.

Charles Price Jones, the founder of the Church of God (Holiness) in Mississippi, for example, wrote poetry affirming the African heritage of black Americans. Sutton Griggs, a black Baptist pastor from Texas, wrote novels that were, in reality, thinly veiled political treatises. Pastors wrote articles against lynching in their own denominational newspapers.
By any means necessary

Some white pastors decried racial terror, too. But others used the pulpit to instigate violence.

On June 21, 1903, the white pastor of Olivet Presbyterian church in Delaware used his religious leadership to incite a lynching.

Preaching to a crowd of 3,000 gathered in downtown Wilmington, Reverend Robert A. Elwood urged the jury in the trial of George White – a black farm laborer accused of raping and killing a 17-year-old white girl, Helen Bishop – to pronounce White guilty speedily.

Otherwise, Elwood continued, according to a June 23, 1903 New York Times article, White should be lynched. He cited the Biblical text 1 Corinthians 5:13, which orders Christians to “expel the wicked person from among you.”

“The responsibility for lynching would be yours for delaying the execution of the law,” Elwood thundered, exhorting the jury.

George White was dragged out of jail the next day, bound and burned alive in front of 2,000 people.

The following Sunday, a black pastor named Montrose W. Thornton discussed the week’s barbarities with his own congregation in Wilmington. He urged self-defense.

“There is but one part left for the persecuted negro when charged with crime and when innocent. Be a law unto yourself,” he told his parishioners. “Die in your tracks, perhaps drinking the blood of your pursuer.”

Newspapers around the country denounced both sermons. An editorial in the Washington Star said both pastors had “contributed to the worst passions of the mob.”

By inciting lynching and advocating for self defense, the editors judged, Elwood and Thornton had “brought the pulpit into disrepute.”


This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. It was written by: Malcolm Brian Foley, Baylor University.

Read more:


Lynching memorial shows women were victims, too


Maryland has created a truth commission on lynchings – can it deliver?


An editor and his newspaper helped build white supremacy in Georgia

Industry steps up lobbying ahead of bumper EU climate votes

Sun, June 5, 2022
By Kate Abnett

BRUSSELS, June 6 (Reuters) - European Union lawmakers have been inundated by lobbyists ahead of votes this week on more ambitious EU climate change policies, with some industries urging them to scale back the proposals.

The European Parliament is set to confirm its position on a raft of proposals to cut planet-warming emissions faster this decade, ahead of negotiations with EU countries on final laws.

Among the measures are an upgrade of Europe's carbon market, a planned tariff to impose CO2 costs on imported goods, and an effective ban on new combustion engine car sales in the bloc from 2035.

Emails to EU lawmakers, seen by Reuters, show a last-minute lobbying push from industries unhappy with positions approved by parliament's environment committee and up for a vote by the full assembly this week.

"We are overwhelmed by requests and solicitations from the lobbies," Green EU lawmaker Marie Toussaint said.

A flashpoint is the committee's plan to speed up the phase-out of the free CO2 permits the EU gives industries to help them compete with foreign rivals that do not pay for carbon emissions and discourage industries from moving to regions with weaker climate policies. It proposes to replace them by 2030 with a carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM) - a new levy on imports of carbon-heavy goods like cement, steel and fertilisers.

The European Commission, which drafts EU policies, had proposed a 2036 phase-out and steel industry association EUROFER last week sent lawmakers a statement warning against bringing the date forward.

Signed by 50 CEOs and published online, it urged them to avoid further scaling back of the current system "until the CBAM has proven its effectiveness and a solution for exports is in place."

The EU says free permits must go when its new carbon border charge kicks in to avoid breaching World Trade Organization rules by giving European companies "double" protection.

Higher CO2 costs are a key tool in the EU's plans to fight climate change, by giving businesses a financial incentive to cut emissions. While already-soaring EU carbon prices have hiked costs for polluters in recent years, they have also raised billions of euros for national governments' budgets.

Many industries want to keep their free permits for longer, however. Another statement sent to lawmakers by energy-intensive industries including EUROFER, Cefic and Cembureau also warned against cutting them faster. EUROFER will co-host a "dinner debate" for lawmakers on Monday to present its position ahead of the assembly votes.

A EUROFER spokesperson said Europe's steel firms support EU climate goals and have 60 low-carbon projects underway, but accelerating free permits' phase-out would boost their carbon costs, leaving them with less to invest in decarbonisation.

Farming industry group Copa-Cogeca also wrote to lawmakers, warning that the environment committee's plan was "too ambitious" and would put an "additional burden" on agriculture.

Copa-Cogeca said a faster introduction of the border carbon levy would further hike prices of imported fertilisers, which have soared in recent months amid surging gas and raw materials costs.

Other emails showed auto lobby groups urging lawmakers to oppose plans to end polluting car sales in 2035, while airport groups warned against proposals to hike CO2 costs for flights.

Jytte Guteland, who was parliament's negotiator on the EU's 2030 emissions-cutting target, urged colleagues to keep in mind voters calling for faster action on climate change.

"Society would prefer that we do more for climate," she said.

With some lawmakers still undecided, EU officials said the vote results were uncertain.

 (Reporting by Kate Abnett, additional reporting by Victoria Waldersee; Editing by John Chalmers and Tomasz Janowski)

A rural county in heart of red California votes more like San Francisco. Here's why


Mark Z. Barabak
Sun, June 5, 2022

Markleeville, population 275 or so, is the seat of Alpine County in the Sierra Nevada. Despite its rural nature, the county routinely votes along the lines of Democratic bastions like Los Angeles and San Francisco. (Max Whittaker / For The Times)

Alpine County, perched like an emerald on the crest of the Sierra Nevada, is as rural as rural California gets.

Vast distance separates its sparse settlements, tucked among forests and crystalline streams. The views, unobstructed by city clutter, go on forever.

There is no hospital, no supermarket, fast-food restaurant or shopping mall anywhere in its 743 square miles. The only stoplight is temporary, put in place for a bridge repair.

And yet if all goes as expected in Tuesday’s primary election, Alpine County will vote along the same lines as Los Angeles, Sacramento, San Francisco and other urbanized blue bastions.

Rural usually means Republican. But Alpine County, set in the far eastern reaches of the state, is a notable exception — a Democratic speck bobbing alone in a sea of red.

Richard Harvey is one of those who gives the place its distinctive hue. Like many, he came from someplace else, moving here from Oakland as part of the 1970s back-to-nature movement.

“I was raised believing that helping people who have less is sort of an obligation for being a good citizen in this country,” the retired emergency room doctor said over the rush of Markleeville Creek, as it ran though this tiny county seat (population 275, give or take).

“The Democratic Party seemed to be the party that helped out people with less, more than the other options," said Harvey, 78. "So I’ve been a Democrat since.”

Alpine County is small, population-wise, but its political leaning poses a big mystery.

Is it liberals from the Bay Area choosing to cast their ballot from a second home? Is it the Democratic-leaning Native American community, which makes up a significant part of the population? Is it Democrats moving in and Republicans moving out as people seek to live among like-minded partisans?

All seem like plausible explanations.

Markleeville General Store in Alpine County. (Max Whittaker / For The Times)

Alpine County has just 1,200 or so residents, which works out to about two people per square mile, the fewest of any county in California. There are 918 registered voters. (Los Angeles, by contrast, has thousands of voters per precinct.)

The sample size is small, but the pattern is clear.

Going back to 2000, when Republican George W. Bush narrowly beat Democrat Al Gore in the race for president, Alpine has consistently voted Democratic — and not by a little. Its voters rejected the recall of Gov. Gavin Newsom 61% to 39%, and in 2020 backed Joe Biden over Donald Trump 64% to 33%.

At the same time, Alpine’s rural neighbors Amador, Calaveras, El Dorado and Tuolumne counties voted just as consistently Republican, often by landslide margins.

(The exception was in 2006, when Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger romped to reelection, carrying 52 of California’s 58 counties, including Alpine. Even then, Schwarzenegger won just 54% of the vote in Alpine, compared with 70% or more in those neighboring counties.)

So what explains it?

People smiled at the suggestion it’s something in the water, or pure mountain air.

But maybe that’s a part of it.

::

The East Fork of the Carson River winds its way through Alpine County near Markleeville. (Max Whittaker / For The Times)

Natural beauty is Alpine County's great gift and its main source of livelihood.

Pristine rivers flow between soaring granite walls and through endless carpets of green meadow. Juniper, aspen and ponderosa pine cover the hillsides, and snow-peaked mountains paint the vistas.

There is a feeling of time slowed down, a throwback to a less-frenzied era, which seems fitting for a place that boomed and busted well over a century ago. Little has changed since.

What's the appeal of life with no bank, no chain store, no movie theater? Where it's a 20-minute drive, or more, to get a haircut or Frappuccino?

"That's the appeal," said Dianna Mitzner, 70, a longtime Democratic activist who moved to Alpine County 20 years ago because it seemed like a better place to raise a child than the Hollywood Hills. "It's the authenticity."

Dianna Mitzner, former chair of the Alpine County Democratic Central Committee, outside her home in Markleeville. (Max Whittaker / For The Times)

The Washoe people were the county's original inhabitants. (About 400 members of the Hung-A-Lel-Ti community of the Washoe Tribe remain.) A silver strike in the 1860s brought a rush of white settlers, who saw the peaks and named the place after the Swiss Alps. In less than a decade, though, the mines were played out and the population quickly dwindled to a just few hundred.

There it stood for decades, until the 1960s, when the development of ski resorts at Kirkwood and Bear Valley brought an influx of residents and boosted tourism, which is pretty much the county's only industry.

More than 95% of the land is national forest, which makes it a natural playground for fly fishers, backpackers, mountain bikers and rock climbers. It also keeps virtually all of the county off-limits to development.

Polaroids of proud anglers adorn the walls of Markleeville General Store. (Max Whittaker / For The Times)

There is a bit of cattle ranching. There was once some logging. But that dried up long ago, just like the silver mines. So there was never the raging battle over natural resources that took place in other rural California counties, turning many residents against the Democratic Party and others foes derided as tree-huggers.

Maybe that's another reason the party thrives. People come here because they cherish the unspoiled outdoors and want to keep it that way, and believe voting Democratic is the best way to do so.

Some of them may have stayed at Mitzner's bed-and-breakfast in Woodfords (population 150) or at John Brissenden's place just down the road.

Brissenden lived in Santa Cruz and worked for a time as a field representative for Democratic Rep. Leon Panetta. His wife, Patty, worked for Democratic Assemblyman Sam Farr. They passed through Alpine County in 1980 on their honeymoon and fell in love. The couple bought a collection of ramshackle cabins and turned it into a rustic resort.

Highway 89 passes through mountainous terrain near Woodsford in Alpine County. (Max Whittaker / For The Times)

Now and then the hosts talked politics with their guests. Some liked what they heard — enough to move here once they retired. (More than a quarter of the county's residents are 65 or older, compared with fewer than 15% statewide, which may account for its extraordinarily high voter turnout. The county is also whiter and more affluent than the state on average.)

With so few people, it didn't take much beyond word of mouth to help turn Alpine from red to blue.

"There was a heartbeat of more liberal thought," said Brissenden, 73, who sold the resort in 2019 but is still active in environmental politics. "And that attracted like-minded people who want to continue that legacy of preserving and protecting."

::

Andy Lovell has a theory, which he shared over a plate of fried cheese curds at Cutthroat Brewing Co. (That's cutthroat as in trout.)

The upscale saloon is one of fewer than a dozen businesses that make up downtown Markleeville, a two-minute stroll end-to-end along Highway 89. During the day, when traffic is heaviest, 20 minutes or more can pass between cars.

Lovell, 60, who works winters at Kirkwood and does a lot of volunteering year-round, believes Alpine County leans Democratic because people of a certain mindset — conservationist, socially liberal, OK with the federal government owning most of their surroundings — have come and stayed put.

Those who don’t agree need travel not terribly far down the road to make their home in Douglas County, Nev., one of the most conservative in that state.

“They can still come here and enjoy everything we have to offer — all the different recreational possibilities,” said Lovell, who settled in Markleeville 26 years ago when South Lake Tahoe grew too crowded and expensive.

“Why," Lovell asked, "come to this small community that isn’t necessarily conservative in its values when right there they have people they feel more comfortable with?”

It isn't easy getting people in Alpine County to talk about politics, especially in these antagonistic times. Just about everyone knows everyone else. You're sure to bump into familiar faces at the general store, the gas station, or a meeting of the school board or volunteer fire department. So it’s important to keep on good terms.

An ambulance can take 45 minutes to show up, said Bill Scherbak, “so your neighbor is going to be the first one to come to your aid. We depend on each other.”

Scherbak, 54, is a general contractor. His wife, Aimee Nitzberg, 51, is a yoga instructor who also works at the public library. They set up camp chairs in their big backyard and invited Harvey, the retired physician and a neighbor, to sit by Markleeville Creek and discuss why they're Democrats.

They referred to the party's stand on social issues, on cultural matters and helping those with less. Inevitably, the conversation came around to the stunning beauty, the clear water and pure mountain air around them.

"The environment is very important to me," Scherbak said. "Protecting what we have and even trying to enhance it, to make it better."

Bill Scherbak and Aimee Nitzberg outside their home in Markleeville. (Max Whittaker / For The Times)

The Tamarack Fire nearly destroyed Markleeville last summer — residents were evacuated for two weeks — and much of the town is surrounded by sooty hillsides and trees turned to black matchsticks.

None of that was visible, however, beneath a canopy of green that sifted the day's fading sunlight. Cici, the couple's pudelpointer, sniffed around for a treat. The talk turned to wildflowers, hiking and great outdoor adventure. The creek rumbled steadily past.

Soon darkness fell and the stars put on their nightly show.

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.

Former Afghan model lives in Iowa after fleeing Taliban's persecution over her profession


Rekha Basu, Des Moines Register
Sun, June 5, 2022

When Afghanistan’s government fell to the Taliban on Aug. 15, 2021, Laila Naseri knew her life was going to be upended. Most Afghans' lives were in different ways, but the threats to her were immediate.

As a single woman in her early 20s, she'd be compelled to submit to the strictures of the brutally misogynistic Taliban regime, which is bent on enforcing a radical form of Islamic fundamentalism on women. Suddenly, the now 23-year-old was relegated to home and hijab, the head covering mandated for women by the ruling party. In recent months that has morphed into mandatory head-to-foot coverings in public, including over the face.

Anywhere she goes, a woman must now be accompanied by a male relative. There are no exceptions — even if she's fleeing domestic violence. Only old women and young girls are exempted from wearing the burqa in public. Violations can result in prison for the father or closest male relative, who can also be fired from government jobs.

This clothing decree was depicted by Afghanistan's supreme leader and Taliban chief, Hibatullah Akhundzada, as "traditional and respectful." Its purpose, he said, was "in order to avoid provocation when meeting men who are not mahram [adult close male relatives]." In other words, if men can’t control themselves in a woman’s presence, the onus is on women for dressing provocatively.

Laila Naseri

So imagine how the Taliban feels about female fashion models, strutting down runways, sometimes in Western clothing, sometimes striking sultry poses for television commercials, or even flirting.

That had been Laila Naseri's profession for three years when the Taliban took over.

“If the Taliban knows about the modeling girls, they will kill them,” the 23-year-old told me through an interpreter in Des Moines. “I couldn’t leave the house.”

Within days she heard women in media jobs were getting evacuated from Afghanistan, so she and a friend went to the Kabul airport to try to tell officials about their situations. She was clutching her modeling documents to show she was legitimately at risk. The security guards they spoke with outside the airport told them to wait while they went inside to confer with superiors.

From there it was a whirlwind. When they returned, the men let the women into the airport where, the next day, they were flown to Dubai for four days for processing. Naseri, not expecting such fast action, had no luggage, nothing but the clothes she wore. Her passport had gone to Germany with someone else. They entered the U.S. through Washington, D.C., on Aug. 29 and ultimately arrived in Des Moines via Wisconsin.

Naseri was one of some 700 Afghans to be relocated here. Since leaving Afghanistan, she received word that two of the women she had modeled with had been shot to death while leaving Kabul by car. The founder of Modelstan, the first of Afghanistan's modeling agencies, fled to Germany after being warned he would be killed. Hamed Valy had studied in India, and said he returned to Afghanistan hoping to make fashion and glamor more accepted in his home country.

Now they bring death threats.

Laila Naseri shows how she used to make her living back in Afghanistan.

In Des Moines, life for Naseri is assuming some semblance of normalcy, and she feels safe and free here. But it was a rocky start, as the Register documented previously, and the future isn't guaranteed. Resettlement of many Afghans was fraught with problems. Many lacked adequate food and services, were living in temporary substandard housing and couldn’t get caseworkers from the resettlement agencies to respond to their calls for help.

Laila Naseri felt threatened in her homeland of Afghanistan, but feels safe in Iowa.

Naseri said it was particularly rough being one of few single women in the group. “I’m very sad. I’m broken. I’m suffocating in this room,” she told the Register in April. Things have improved since she moved into better housing and has a job. But far from the glamorous, highly competitive one she had posing for the camera, she’s doing an overnight shift packaging car parts. During the day she sleeps, and three days a week at 5:30 p.m. she takes English lessons at DMACC through Lutheran Services in Iowa’s program for refugees.

She doesn’t speak English, so this interview was done with a friend interpreting.

With neither a driver’s license nor a car, Naseri depends on others to go anywhere she can't walk to. The Register's Lee Rood has taken her under her wing since witnessing her struggles, and Naseri has many friends. She just wishes her parents and siblings were with her.

The Taliban first took over Afghanistan in 1996 after both the U.S. and the former Soviet Union pulled forces out. It remained in control until 2001, when the U.S. invaded in search of Osama bin Laden, following the attacks of Sept. 11.

After that, some women's rights were restored so Naseri hadn't personally experienced such repression before. A new constitution was passed, strengthening women's rights, and an Elimination of Violence Against Women law was passed in 2009. But the former Ministry of Women’s Affairs has now been replaced by the Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, which gives you a sense of the priorities.

In 2009 we at the Register had a visit from a different 23-year-old Afghan woman who had suffered under Taliban extremism when both her parents were killed. She had gone on to write the 2003 book “Zoya’s Story,” using only her first name because of threats on her life. Though she had moved to Pakistan with her grandmother, she wrote and spoke of joining the Revolutionary Association of Women of Afghanistan and returning to Afghanistan to help organize underground schools for girls, among other things.

But with the Taliban back in power, girls above sixth grade are now barred from attending school. "Is it a sin to be girl, is it sin to seek education?" asked a tearful one captured on a news video.

Zoya's trip to America at the time was to encourage the government to pull U.S. troops out. Many Afghans felt the U.S. had turned its back on Afghanistan after the fall of the former Soviet Union, leaving a void into which the Taliban stepped; they didn't want to see history repeat itself.

Sadly, it has.

Some of the newest refugees believe last year's outcome could have been avoided had the U.S. done more, earlier, to help create a more stable Afghan government and better equip it to resist the Taliban. When NATO troops withdrew last August, the Taliban vowed not to reimpose the same strict rules on women as during its previous tenure. But it has proceeded to do exactly that, prompting the U.S. and other countries to cut development aid there and impose sanctions on the banking system.

The newest Afghan emigres are here on two-year “humanitarian parole" status. That's granted by the Secretary of Homeland Security to people deemed ineligible for refugee status. But it's given only for emergency, humanitarian and public interest reasons. Everyone must apply within the first year for political asylum to stay on. That requires proof that they'd be targets if they returned. But many lack access to lawyers.

Laila Nesari is shown at work with her team in Afghanistan.

Naseri has been lucky enough to get one, and given her past as a model, she should have a strong case.

When she’s seriously homesick, Naseri says she prays. In Afghanistan under Taliban rule, women aren’t even allowed to go to mosques. Demanding extreme piety of women without even letting them into places of worship is just another cruel hoax of a government that should never have made a comeback. Yet for all the bloodshed, upheavals, years of foreign intervention and vows to do right by women, and for all the courageous resistance, this brutal, extremist regime is free to victimize women again.

Russia, when it was the Soviet Union, helped establish education and jobs for women when it controlled Afghanistan. Now it's busy invading Ukraine. And in America, which went into Afghanistan 21 years ago talking about women's rights, women are bracing for the loss of the most fundamental right over our own bodies.

It may be too late to reverse some of the damage done in our wake, but our government can and should grant long-term status to Afghans here who fled. They shouldn't be required to prove they were specifically threatened when we know that Afghan women as a whole are threatened. And so are the men who helped the U.S. military there. There is still time to do the right thing by those forced to flee, and our government should.

Rekha Basu is an opinion columnist for The Des Moines Register. Contact: rbasu@dmreg.com. Follow her on Twitter @RekhaBasu and at Facebook.com/rekha.basu1106. Her book, "Finding Her Voice: A collection of Des Moines Register columns about women's struggles and triumphs in the Midwest," is available at ShopDMRegister.com/FindingHerVoice.

Workers want raises. Shippers want robots. 

The supply chain hinges on reaching a deal


Sam Dean
Sun, June 5, 2022

The Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach handle more than 30% of containerized imports entering the U.S. The expiration of a deal between dockworkers and shippers could snarl that pipeline. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

The immediate future of the global supply chain rests on a bargaining table in San Francisco, where the union representing all West Coast dockworkers is hashing out a new contract with the assembled bosses of maritime shipping.

The current contract, which covers the International Longshore and Warehouse Union's more than 22,000 workers at the 29 ports dotting the Pacific coast of the U.S., is set to expire July 1.

At stake is the continuing flow of goods into the country, after two years of disruptions to the supply chain from pandemic lockdowns, material shortages, soaring fuel prices and the occasional giant ship getting stuck in the Suez Canal. Forty percent of all U.S. maritime imports pass through the West Coast ports, with more than 30% of all containerized imports arriving at the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, which together make up the nation's largest port complex.

Past contract talks have run beyond the expiration date and led to major disruptions to port operations, as workers and shipping companies, represented at the table and the West Coast docks by the Pacific Maritime Assn. industry group, agitated for a better deal.

In 2002, negotiations deteriorated to the point where the PMA, which represents 70 ocean carriers and terminal operators, locked out its workforce for 10 days until the George W. Bush administration intervened. In 2014 and 2015, the Obama administration also got involved to help end a yearlong contract fight peppered with slowdowns and stoppages.

The backdrop of the negotiations is starkly distinct from earlier rounds. In 2002 and 2015, the shipping companies were facing either low profits or outright losses, as a glut of new megasize ships kept freight rates and shipping revenue low.

But the last two years have brought financial bonanzas for ocean shipping companies, with the industry as a whole posting more than $150 billion in profits in 2021. One of the industry leaders, A.P. Moller-Maersk, had the most profitable year of any company in Danish history, with $18.7 billion in profits — a trend that the shipper has continued into 2022, with a $6.8 billion reported profit in the first quarter alone.

All the while, total imports from Asia to the U.S. West Coast have increased over the years, giving the workers of the ILWU more power over their crucial point in the global flow of goods. A surge in import demand led to a historic backup at the L.A. port complex over the last year, with more than 100 gargantuan container ships idling offshore waiting to berth at certain times during the holiday season. That number has since declined to 30 ships waiting to be unloaded, but as the labor negotiations unfold this summer, supply chain experts are bracing for a new round of shipping whiplash.

Port congestion "has improved," said Christopher S. Tang, a distinguished professor at the UCLA Anderson School of Management who studies supply chains, but "this will be short-lived because the tsunami is coming." The peak ocean liner shipping season typically picks up in August for the back-to-school and holiday seasons, and retailers burned by delays in previous years are getting a head start in anticipation. Combined with a backlog of ships idling at port in Shanghai, which has been subject to strict COVID-19 lockdowns, Tang believes another crunch will arrive soon.

With the supply chain and its link to inflation in the national spotlight for the first time in decades, both sides of the table opened talks with guardedly positive rhetoric in statements made before bargaining, and a mutually agreed-upon media blackout, began.

The president of the ILWU, Willie Adams, wrote that "the men and women of the ILWU are looking forward to the opportunity to meet with the employers and seek a contract that honors, respects, and protects good American jobs and U.S. importers and exporters" in an open letter published in early May. James McKenna, chief executive of the PMA, said in a video statement that the organization is committed to negotiating a new contract without disruptions.

Politicians have already weighed in, urging both parties to reach an agreement. Adams was called to a meeting at the White House last October to talk supply chain with President Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg, among others, and was joined on a tour of the port complex in November by California Gov. Gavin Newsom and the Biden administration's port envoy, John Porcari. In May, as the talks began, Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California published a letter to Adams and McKenna asking them to come to terms quickly, noting that any slowdowns or stoppages would "exacerbate global supply chain disruptions."




If negotiations grow more heated, the Biden administration has also indicated that it will step in. “We don’t need to get involved in this negotiation unless we have to,” Secretary of Labor Marty Walsh said in a May interview with Bloomberg.

The potential for conflict is clear. PMA CEO McKenna highlighted the fact that ILWU workers receive "world-class wages" that approach $195,000 per year on average for full-time workers, plus benefits, and stated that the PMA was committed to advancing automation at the ports.

ILWU President Adams countered both points in his open letter. "We make no apologies for achieving wages that allow workers to provide for their families, have retirement, and the healthcare these difficult and dangerous jobs require," Adams wrote, noting that "decades of previous negotiations have made longshore jobs good blue-collar jobs."

On the automation question, Adams was more forceful, writing that "automation not only kills good jobs but does not move more cargo" and poses a national security risk as infrastructure hacking becomes more widespread.

After two years of working through the pandemic, with shippers booking record profits, the historically well-organized and powerful ILWU is likely looking for raises to beat inflation, according to Jake Wilson, professor of sociology at Cal State Long Beach who has written multiple books on the ILWU and global logistics labor.

"When you look at the value added and the importance of the work the dockworkers do, it’s a small percentage of an overall highly profitable system for these massive corporations," Wilson said.

West Coast dockworkers are the highest paid logistics workers in the United States, but Wilson noted that "these jobs are still increasingly being squeezed — workers at the docks haven’t had a raise in years, there’s ongoing pressure to work more hours and work through the night and other demands that would require hiring more dockworkers who are union."

The numbers bear out Wilson's argument. The PMA paid out $2.26 billion in wages in 2021, and another $1.55 billion in benefits, according to its annual report. The shipping industry made $150 billion in profits.

A 10% raise across the board for the West Coast longshoremen would raise labor costs on the West Coast from $3.8 billion to roughly $4.2 billion. That $400-million increase represents just over a quarter of 1% of the industry's profits last year. The estimated cost of the 10-day work stoppage in 2002 ran into the billions for the U.S. economy. Ten days of profits lost out of the $150-billion year would add up to more than $4 billion for the shipping companies alone.

"What’s really unique about dockworkers around the world is their strategic location in the world’s choke points. Working in the ports provides a lot of leverage," Wilson said. "The money is there, the shippers are accumulating massive amounts of profit, while most people aren’t."

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.