'No real solutions': Trans rep-elect hits back at 'extremists' for Capitol bathroom ban

Daniel Hampton
November 18, 2024 

RAW STORY

Nancy Mace (photo by Saul Loeb for AFP)

The first trans woman elected to Congress issued a forceful response over a Republican lawmaker's reported plans to try to ban trans women from using female bathrooms at the Capitol.

Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) plans to introduce a resolution that would ban trans women from using the bathroom corresponding to their gender identity at the Capitol, Fox News reported Monday. The move comes just before Congress swears in Rep.-elect Sarah McBride (D-DE).

"The sanctity of protecting women and standing up against the Left’s systematic erasure of biological women starts here in the nation’s Capitol," Mace told Fox. The measure calls for "prohibiting Members, officers, and employees of the House from using single-sex facilities other than those corresponding to their biological sex, and for other purposes," and would task the Sergeant-at-Arms with enforcing the rule.

The specification of "Members" would at the moment apply to just one person: Rep. Sarah McBride (D-DE), who was elected this month as the first openly transgender person to serve in Congress.

McBride said Monday that Mace's resolution is a distraction.

"Every day Americans go to work with people who have life journeys different than their own and engage with them respectfully, I hope members of Congress can muster that same kindness," she wrote on X.

McBride added: "This is a blatant attempt from far right-wing extremists to distract from the fact that they have no real solutions to what Americans are facing. We should be focused on bringing down the cost of housing, health care, and child care, not manufacturing culture wars. Delawareans sent me here to make the American dream more affordable and accessible and that’s what I’m focused on."

When asked whether she planned to talk to McBride, Mace said: “No, Sarah McBride doesn’t get a say," Politico reported.






GOP Rep seeks to ban trans women from Capitol's female bathrooms after trans woman elected
Matthew Chapman
November 18, 2024 

RAW STORY



Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) -- (Photo of Mace via Shutterstock)

Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) plans to introduce a resolution that would ban transgender individuals from the bathroom corresponding to their gender identity at the Capitol, Fox News reported Monday — and it comes just before Congress swears in its first-ever transgender congresswoman.

"The sanctity of protecting women and standing up against the Left’s systematic erasure of biological women starts here in the nation’s Capitol," Mace told Fox. The measure calls for "prohibiting Members, officers, and employees of the House from using single-sex facilities other than those corresponding to their biological sex, and for other purposes," and would task the Sergeant-at-Arms with enforcing the rule.

The specification of "Members" would at the moment apply to just one person: Rep. Sarah McBride (D-DE), who was elected this month as the first openly transgender person to serve in Congress.

Republicans have used trans issues as a divisive tool to influence voters. Historically, many of these attempts have been unsuccessful, such as the North Carolina GOP's effort in 2016 to pass a statewide bathroom measure. Donald Trump's campaign bombarded the airwaves with attacks on Harris for supporting trans rights in various capacities, and his team believes these ads proved effective this year.

Mace is a Trump loyalist who was part of the cohort that threw former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) out of office. She has faced controversy after staffers came out and described her as a toxic boss focused on securing TV air time.

Following the election, she proclaimed that voters gave Trump a mandate to "protect women" even as Trump was found liable for sexual abuse by a jury in New York.

MAGA allies eye drastic Medicaid and food stamp cuts to fund tax breaks for rich: report

Matthew Chapman
November 18, 2024 

Republican presidential nominee and former U.S. President Donald Trump holds a campaign rally in Reno, Nevada, U.S. October 11, 2024. REUTERS/Fred Greaves

Donald Trump and his allies are floating the idea of major cuts to Medicaid and the food stamp program in order to offset some of the budget deficits created by their desired new round of tax cuts for the rich, reported The Washington Post on Monday.

The new tax cuts are a huge priority for Trump and his allies — in particular extending the provisions of a 2017 tax cut bill that are set to expire. The corporate tax cuts in that bill were made permanent, aside from some subsequent tweaks to corporate taxes made under the Biden administration, but the individual income tax cuts are set to run out at the end of next year.

Republicans and their strategists, according to the report, are discussing "new work requirements and spending caps for the programs, according to seven people familiar with the talks, many of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly. Those conversations have included some economic officials on Trump’s transition team, the people said."

However, these sources said the ideas are "preliminary" and Trump's allies are concerned about "the political downsides of such cuts, which would affect programs that provide support for at least 70 million low-income Americans."

The previous Trump administration allowed states to add work requirements to Medicaid coverage in a series of pilot programs. Experts widely consider these experimental programs to be a failure, as they threw tens of thousands of low-income people off of health coverage without making any noticeable change to employment figures. The Biden administration later rescinded authorization for these programs.

Despite the track record, House Republicans again tried to force a nationwide inclusion of work requirements on these programs during a budget standoff in 2023, as a condition for authorizing a debt ceiling increase and preventing a default on U.S. credit. Ultimately, Republicans backed down from this and settled for more modest reforms.

It's time for Democrats to declare class warfare

Thom Hartmann
November 18, 2024

ALTERNET

If my hypothesis from yesterday — that Democrats best way to win elections and regain political power is to engage in class warfare against the GOP and the billionaires that fund it — the immediate question is, “How?”

The last century has seen two presidents engage in class warfare in a big and direct way that not only won them multiple elections but also altered the electoral map of America: Franklin D. Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan. There are multiple lessons to learn from both.

When FDR came into power in March of 1933, the nation was in shambles because of a decade of Republican mishandling of the economy. In the early 1920s, Republican President Warren Harding dropped the top income tax rate from 91% down to 25% and loosened oversight of Wall Street.

The short-term result was an explosion of riches at the top, referred to as “The Roaring 20s,” and violent actions against attempts to form labor unions. The longer-term result was the infamous Black Tuesday of October 29, 1929 which kicked off the Republican Great Depression.

President Roosevelt correctly identified America’s morbidly rich, who’d seized control of the GOP after the end of the Taft presidency in 1913, as the cause of the financial disaster and proclaimed that they and their captive Republicans had declared class war against average working class Americans.

ALSO READ: Trump finds a new lawman is who even more lawless than he is

“For out of this modern civilization,” Roosevelt told America, “economic royalists carved new dynasties. New kingdoms were built upon concentration of control over material things. … It was natural and perhaps human that the privileged princes of these new economic dynasties, thirsting for power, reached out for control over Government itself.”

He used the language of class warfare; as with all wars, the first step is to identify the enemy. For FDR it was the morbidly rich of his era who weren’t content to just run their businesses and make money but also lusted for the political power they’d been given during the 1920s by Republican presidents Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover.
“These economic royalists complain that we seek to overthrow the institutions of America,” Roosevelt proclaimed. “What they really complain of is that we seek to take away their power.”
He paused for a moment, then thundered, “Our allegiance to American institutions requires the overthrow of this kind of power!”

The crowd at Madison Square Garden roared when he said that. They knew that Republican politicians had worked hand-in-glove with wealthy industrialists to suppress unions, evade taxes, and accumulate fortunes beyond anything ever seen in America. That the GOP had been running an often-violent class war against them for at least the past decade.

And they were over it. Over the greed, over the theft, and over the self-righteous proclamations that the Constitution protected their avarice. Average working people knew these “economic royalists” weren’t patriots; they were looters, vandals, and political arsonists. FDR gave voice to their anger, disillusionment, and disgust.

“In vain,” Roosevelt said, “they seek to hide behind the Flag and the Constitution. In their blindness they forget what the Flag and the Constitution stand for. Now, as always, they stand for democracy, not tyranny; for freedom, not subjection; and against a dictatorship by mob rule and the over-privileged alike.”

Republicans had declared class warfare; FDR, like he would later do with the Japanese and Germans, led the charge to fight back and defeat them.

And defeat them he did (even in the face of an assassination attempt); by the end of his presidency, American oligarchs had gone back to doing business and getting rich, largely avoiding politics and keeping their noses clean.

Until, that is, President Nixon put Lewis Powell on the Supreme Court and Powell began the process — from the bench — of turning America back into a full-blown oligarchy like Hoover had done in the 1920s.


The Powell Memo and the Court’s Bellotti decision (written by Powell) set the stage and outline the battle plan for the Reagan Revolution, an all-out declaration of class war against average Americans and the Democrats who’d historically defended them.

In the 1980s, Reagan cut the top income tax rate from 74 percent down to 27 percent (while repeatedly raising taxes on working-class people’s wages, tips, and Social Security), kicking off an explosion of billionaires. He and other Republican presidents and members of the Supreme Court followed up by:

— Ending enforcement of our anti-trust laws and gutting our environmental regulations.

— Killing off our media guardrails like the Fairness Doctrine and Equal Time Rule, along with ending ownership limits on newspapers, radio stations, and TV stations and networks.
— Fighting every effort to reduce or end student debt.
— Opposing every program proposed to broaden access to healthcare coverage.

— Attacking our right to vote.
— Privatizing Medicare with the Medicare Advantage scam (Social Security is next).
— Assailing environmental regulations that protect us and our children from cancer and other diseases.

— Going to the mat to defend hundreds of billions in annual subsidies for the fossil fuel industry and its oligarchs.
— Deregulating social media (Section 230), now taken over by rightwing billionaires.
— Packing our courts with reliable toadies for giant corporations and the wealthy.
— Stripping over $50 trillion from the working class since 1981, handing that money to the morbidly rich to stash in their offshore money bins.

— Rejecting every effort to raise the national minimum wage.
— Most recently, Trump congratulated Musk on his union-busting success.



Through this entire period, Democrats have refrained from employing FDR’s class war rhetoric to fight back. Instead, they’ve worked hard to make life better for working class people when in power and tried to limit the damage from Republican proposals and policies when they’re out of power.

This is why Vice President Harris’ claims that Democrats are here for the average person while Republicans want more tax cuts and deregulation failed to catch fire during this past election; there was no rhetoric of warfare. Instead, astonishingly, Harris campaigned with Liz Cheney and kept saying that she’d give Republicans “a seat at the table.”


As billionaire Warren Buffett famously confessed:
“There’s class warfare, all right, but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning.”

It’s far past time to take the gloves off and start punching.

Democrats have become so rusty, so wary of class warfare, that they haven’t even identified a term or metaphor to describe the rightwing billionaires for whom the GOP fronts.


From Democratic President Grover Cleveland in the 1880s saying the rich had working people under their “Iron heel” to the early 20th century when they were called Robber Barons, Democrats have had names for Republicans and the billionaires who own them.

FDR called them economic royalists. Teddy Roosevelt called them fat cats, malefactors of great wealth, parasites, and plutocrats. I’ve been calling them the morbidly rich, but there’s almost certainly a more evocative phrase out there that could be applied to greedy billionaires by this generation of progressives.

After all, elite conservatives and billionaires haven’t hesitated to use “othering” language in their war against Democrats.

Reagan and Republicans since have called us pointy-headed intellectuals, ivory tower elites, eggheads, limousine liberals, champagne socialists, latte liberals, the wine and cheese crowd, coastal elites, tax and spend liberals, bleeding hearts, do-gooders, tree huggers, environmental wackos, libtards, communists, and even feminazis.

And how do Democrats describe Republicans? “Our friends on the other side of the aisle.”

Screw that. It’s time to declare war.

And war requires a clear delineation between our side and their side, between the good guys and the enemy. Nobody is going to rush to the ramparts against somebody we’re “happy to work with on a bipartisan basis”: as Newt Gingrich taught Republicans in the 1990s and they’ve held to with a religious fervor, there can be no quarter against the other side if you want to take and hold power.

Class war sounds ugly, but it’s exactly what Republicans and their billionaire backers have been waging against working class Americans for 43 years now. It’s damn well time to fight back by declaring a class war of our own.

In an authoritarian regime it’s important to control the news — and here we go

Thom Hartmann
November 17, 2024 

ALTERNET

Kash Patel (Photo via AFP)


— Is changing the Democratic Party the way to remake our Democracy?

Donald Trump only got about a million more votes than he did in 2020, but Kamala Harris appears to have received somewhere between 6 and 10 million fewer votes than Joe Biden did that year. For the over two decades that I’ve been writing and on the radio and TV, I’ve argued that when Bill Clinton embraced Reagan’s neoliberalism in 1992 (and Obama maintained that position) the Democratic Party had taken a fatal turn to the right. I’ve written two books that cover it, in part, as well: The Hidden History of Neoliberalism: How Reaganism Gutted America
and The Hidden History of the American Dream. It appears that millions of voters essentially said, “I’m not going to vote for that nutcase Trump, but Harris isn’t speaking to the explosion in my cost-of-living expenses so to hell with her, too.” Joe Biden campaigned with Bernie Sanders and won; Kamala Harris campaigned with Liz Cheney and repeatedly said she wanted to give Republicans “a seat at the table,” which may well have been a fatal error. She thought she could pick up moderate Republicans, but there’s apparently not such a thing anymore since Fox “News” and the massive rightwing media ecosystem has come to dominate the American news and opinion landscape.

Bernie Sanders, Robert Reich, Sherrod Brown, and many other longtime Democrats have been pointing to this pre-1992 truth: if the Democratic Party is to win, it has to go back to its FDR/LBJ roots and become the party of the bottom 90 percent, instead of embracing those with a college education, movie and rock stars, and progressive billionaires like Mark Cuban. God bless them all, but Dems really need to reinvent themselves as the blue-collar party and repudiate much of the Clinton/Obama agenda of low taxes, free trade, and private/public partnerships (like Obamacare).

Amazingly, even The New York Times’ conservative columnist David Brooks agrees, writing: “The Democratic Party has one job: to combat inequality. Here was a great chasm of inequality right before their noses and somehow many Democrats didn’t see it. Many on the left focused on racial inequality, gender inequality and L.G.B.T.Q. inequality. [This is actually an untrue GOP talking point.] … As the left veered toward identitarian performance art, Donald Trump jumped into the class war with both feet. His Queens-born resentment of the Manhattan elites dovetailed magically with the class animosity being felt by rural people across the country. His message was simple: These people have betrayed you, and they are morons to boot.” Amen. Finally, check out this troubling article from data scientist Stephen Spoonamore raising questions about manipulation of vote totals in the swing states in a way that doesn’t appear in the non-swing states. I’m agnostic on this for the moment, but it’s worth reading; he’ll be on my program Monday.


— In an authoritarian regime it’s important to cow and control the news, and here we go. Kash Patel, widely rumored to be Trump’s main pick for FBI director, has a message for reporters and opinion writers who insist on continuing to call Trump a fascist or otherwise slander/defame him and his followers: “We will go out and find the conspirators, not just in government but in the media. Yes, we’re going to come after the people in the media who lied about American citizens, who helped Joe Biden rig presidential elections – we’re going to come after you... Whether it’s criminally or civilly, we’ll figure that out. But yeah, we’re putting you all on notice.”

According to The Columbia Journalism Review, Trump has already sued The New York Times (naming reporters Peter Baker, Michael S. Schmidt, Susanne Craig, and Russ Buettner) and Penguin Random House (one of my publishers) and CBS’s 60 Minutes show for $10 billion each.

As I predicted, he appears to be following the Putin/Orbán strategy of bankrupting media outlets and reporters (rather than using cops and billy-clubs), presumably both to cow others into submission and to make the media properties available to be purchased by his allies (sort of like what just happened with The Onion buying Infowars out of bankruptcy).


Steve Bannon added his thoughts, essentially threatening or warning the journalists at MSNBC: “Weissman, you were on TV with MSNBC and all the producers, MSNBC. Preserve your documents. Ari Melber and all you hosts. Preserve your documents. All of it. You better be worried. You better lawyer up. Some of you young producers, you better call mom and dad tonight. Mom and dad, ‘You know a good lawyer?’ Lawyer up. Lawyer up.”

This is a dangerous time for anybody writing about politics. Orbán and Putin even go after random citizens who criticize them on social media; will Trump go that far? And will progressives shut up in the face of this kind of intimidation? Stay tuned…

— Speaking of authoritarianism, Texas Republicans want to outlaw websites that discuss how to get an abortion. Jessica Valenti tells the story at Abortion, Every Dayon Substack about the Republican lawmakers in Texas (and around the country) who are trying to pass legislation that would imprison people who put up websites that can be viewed in Texas (including hers) with information on abortion. They argue that abortion information is not free speech protected by the Constitution. I’d add that if the Comstock Act is enforced by the new Attorney General (as JD Vance has demanded) next year, all sorts of information about abortion will become criminalized, in addition to the devices and drugs that can be used for both abortion and birth control.


— Sarah Hurst’s Russia Report on Tulsi Gabbard will make your toes curl. I’ll let you click on it and read it yourself; it’s all about her repeated embraces of Russia and Putin. Which makes some people wonder out loud why Trump would push such objectionable candidates; surely the Senate will protect us from such people, right?

But if Trump really wants to pull a Hitler and seize absolute control of the nation within a matter of a few months, his first move would be to either negotiate or force a recess of the Senate and simply “recess appoint” all of his cabinet nominees. No hearings, no tough questions, no FBI or other background checks, no Democratic politicians’ input. He has this authority under Article II, Section 3 of the Constitution: if there’s a disagreement between John Thune and Mike Johnson about when to adjourn, “...and in Case of Disagreement between them, with Respect to the Time of Adjournment, he [the president] may adjourn them to such Time as he shall think proper.”

They could agree to disagree; that way they could both evade responsibility. On the other hand, if Thune simply gives in to Trump’s recent demand for recess appointments (as he told reporters yesterday he was considering), Thune can simply adjourn the Senate, something that hasn’t happened in decades; Trump can then simply do his own recess appointments (it could be done in a single hour) under the Constitution’s provision: “The President shall have Power to fill up all Vacancies that may happen during the Recess of the Senate, by granting Commissions which shall expire at the End of their next Session.” or he could just appoint them as “acting“ officials.


He did that during the last year of his presidency, and went way beyond the legal time limit for several; he flagrantly broke the law last time with over 15 cabinet members and Republicans were unwilling to call him on it, although he never started that way. This will be our first clue that the nation is no longer a constitutional republic with anything resembling checks and balances, but has become an oligarchic dictatorship like Hungary.

— Blueprint of destruction: Is Trump following Orbán’s and Putin’s road to power? M. Gessen, an expert on authoritarianism, writes in The New York Times: “When Orban was re-elected, he carried out what Magyar calls an ‘autocratic breakthrough,’ changing laws and practices so that he could not be dislodged again. It helped that he had a supermajority in parliament. Trump, similarly, spent four years attacking the Biden administration, and the vote that brought it to the White House, as fraudulent, and positioning himself as the only true voice of the people. He is also returning with a power trifecta — the presidency and both houses of Congress. He too can quickly reshape American government in his image. … Kamala Harris’s campaign, of course, tried to warn Americans about this and a lot more, labeling Trump a fascist. … It’s not just what the autocrats do to stage their breakthrough, it’s how they do it: passing legislation (or signing executive orders) fast, without any discussion, sometimes late at night, in batches, all the while denigrating and delegitimizing any opposition.”

The article is definitely worth a read, chilling as it is. Gessen even gets into the role of Project 2025 in facilitating the transformation of our American form of government into one with a single strongman president at its pinnacle. This does not bode well for America.


— Former Trump administration officials who turned on him are preparing to flee the country. The Washington Post is reporting: “A retired U.S. Army officer who clashed with senior officials in Donald Trump’s first White House looked into acquiring Italian citizenship in the run-up to this month’s election but wasn’t eligible and instead packeda ‘go bag’ with cash and a list of emergency numbers in case he needs to flee. A member of Trump’s first administration who publicly denounced him is applying for foreign citizenship and weighing whether to watch and wait or leave the country before the Jan. 20 inauguration. And a former U.S. official who signed a notorious October 2020 letter suggesting that emails purportedly taken from a laptop belonging to Hunter Biden could be part of a ‘Russian information operation’is seeking a passport from a European country, uncertain about whether the getaway will prove necessary but concluding, ‘You don’t want to have to scramble.’”

Reports (like this one from the Post) suggest that Trump has an “enemies list” of at least 600 people, much like Nixon’s, and he intends to go after everybody on the list on day one. Will he, like Nixon, just harass people with IRS audits? It seems more likely based on his own words that he’ll launch criminal and civil actions to jail or bankrupt his perceived enemies and those who have written or said things that have offended him.

Along those same lines, Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene wants “justice” against health officials: “Dr. [Anthony] Fauci lied to the American people, abusing his power and position and role, a very powerful role paid for by the American tax people. He lied, and many, many people died. … People that perpetuated and continue to perpetuate these crimes need to be prosecuted, and that needs to be starting in the next administration, and I’m pretty sure our next attorney general will do that, and I look forward to seeing that happen.”

Washington, DC is very, very much on edge right now; I got a call Friday morning at 5:30 in the morning from the CEO of a major DC-based progressive media outlet who’d just gotten off the phone with a Clinton colleague; both are considering leaving the country. This is getting real very, very fast.


— Are Republicans coming for healthcare for both retired and working people?Millions of people signed up for Affordable Care Act insurance policies over the past three years because of hefty subsidies contained in Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act.

Those subsidies expire at the end of this year, and Republicans are signaling that they won’t be renewed, meaning that premiums could go from $200 a month to as much as $2400 a month. Meanwhile, Project 2025 has called for private corporate Medicare Advantage plans to become the default option for people turning 65 and signing up for Medicare. Once a critical threshold is hit (currently more than half of seniors are on the Advantage plans) it’ll be fairly easy for a Republican congress and president to end legacy Medicare; once that happens, Advantage plans, no longer having competition from real Medicare, will almost certainly become more expensive and offer less coverage.

Meanwhile, Raw Story is reporting: “Rep. Jodey Arrington (R-Texas), chairman of the House Budget Committee, told reporters earlier this week that the GOP is looking to use the filibuster-evading reconciliation process to pursue cuts to ‘mandatory programs’—a category that includes Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security.” Republicans have been talking about this since the ReaganRevolution, but never actually tried (other than Reagan raising the retirement age from 65 to 67). Get ready.

— State-level authoritarians fall in line with Trump. Oklahoma’s Channel 4 (KFOR) TV News reports: “Oklahoma State Superintendent Ryan Walters emailed leaders in Oklahoma school districts on Thursday telling them they would be required to play their students and parents a video showing Walters blaming the ‘radical left’ and ‘woke teachers unions’ for ‘attacking’ religious liberty, then inviting students to join him as he prays for President-elect Donald Trump.” Walters also reportedly purchased five hundred Trump Bibles for Oklahoma schools. Welcome to the Brave New World. Compounding a religious grift with a financial one; breathtaking.

FASCISM COMES TO AMERIKA
Trump confirms plan to use military for mass deportation

VIOLATION OF POSSE COMMITATUS LAW

By AFP

November 18, 2024

Part of the border wall built under Donald Trump's administration is seen at the US-Medican border east of Douglas, Arizona - Copyright AFP/File Olivier Touron

President-elect Donald Trump confirmed Monday that he plans to declare a national emergency on border security and use the US military to carry out a mass deportation of undocumented migrants.

Immigration was a top issue in the election campaign, and Trump has promised to deport millions and stabilize the border with Mexico after record numbers of migrants crossed illegally during President Joe Biden’s administration.

On his social media platform Truth Social, Trump amplified a recent post by a conservative activist that said the president-elect was “prepared to declare a national emergency and will use military assets to reverse the Biden invasion through a mass deportation program.”

Alongside the repost, Trump commented, “True!”

Trump sealed a remarkable comeback to the presidency in his November 5 defeat of Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris.

He has been announcing a cabinet featuring immigration hardliners, naming former Immigration and Customs Enforcement acting chief Tom Homan as his “border czar.”


US President-elect Donald Trump has been announcing a cabinet featuring immigration hardliners – Copyright AFP Laurent THOMET

Homan appeared at the Republican National Convention in July, telling supporters: “I got a message to the millions of illegal immigrants that Joe Biden’s released in our country: You better start packing now.”

Authorities estimate that some 11 million people are living in the United States illegally. Trump’s deportation plan is expected directly to impact around 20 million families.

While the US government has struggled for years to manage its southern border with Mexico, Trump has super-charged concerns by claiming an “invasion” is underway by migrants he says will rape and murder Americans.

During his campaign, Trump repeatedly railed against undocumented immigrants, employing incendiary rhetoric about foreigners who “poison the blood” of the United States and misleading his audiences about immigration statistics and policy.

Trump has not elaborated on his immigration crackdown in any detail but during his election campaign repeatedly vowed to invoke the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to speed up deportations.

Critics say the law is outdated and point to its most recent use during World War II to hold Japanese-Americans in internment camps without due process.

The number of US border patrol encounters with migrants crossing from Mexico illegally is now about the same as in 2020, the last year of Trump’s first term, after peaking at a record 250,000 for the month of December 2023.

'True!' Trump says he'll declare national emergency and use military for mass deportations

David Badash, 

The New Civil Rights Movement
November 18, 2024 

Donald Trump kicked off the week by taking the focus off his highly criticized Cabinet nominees and moving it to his highly controversial deportation plan. The President-elect acknowledged early Monday he is prepared to declare a national emergency and use "military assets" in his mass deportation program.

Trump campaign spokesperson Karoline Leavitt, who was named last week White House Press Secretary for Trump's second term, had announced the day after the election that Trump would deport "millions" starting on day one.

“The American people delivered a resounding victory for President Trump, and it gives him a mandate to govern as he campaigned, to deliver on the promises that he made,” Leavitt had said. “Which include, on Day 1, launching the largest mass deportation operation of illegal immigrants that Kamala Harris has allowed into this country.”

Leavitt also said that the “mass deportation operation” would include “millions of undocumented immigrants.”

Trump has called immigrants “animals,” “monsters,” and “murderers,” and said they are “poisoning the blood of our country.” He falsely claimed they are responsible for a “surge in crime,” because “it’s in their genes,” and claimed they’re “eating the pets.”

Back in 2018, Trump "complained about 'having all these people from shithole countries come here' — and singled out Haiti, El Salvador and Africa as examples — he also added that, 'we should have more people from Norway'," NPR reported at the time.

Just past 4 AM ET on Monday, Trump on his Truth Social website reposted a statement from right-wing anti-immigrant activist Tom Fitton, the president of Judicial Watch and a senior member of the secretive organization the Council for National Policy. (CNP has been called the "scariest Christian nationalist group you've never heard of," and "probably the most dangerous," by Americans United.)

Fitton had written on November 8: "GOOD NEWS: Reports are the incoming @RealDonaldTrump administration prepared to declare a national emergency and will use military assets to reverse the Biden invasion through a mass deportation program."


Trump responded: "TRUE!!!"

Attorney and immigration expert Aaron Reichlin-Melnick urged "caution" on Monday:

"I want to again emphasize caution here. Fitton mashed together two different things (the border and mass deportations). There is no National Emergency Act authority to use the military for deportations, while we know Trump used the [NEA] in the past for border wall construction."

READ MORE: Backlash as Trump Skips FBI Background Checks — One Nominee Called ‘Likely Russian Asset’


Leavitt's claim that Trump had been given a mandate has been deemed false by political experts, with one pundit calling it a "lie."

According to the Cook Political Report, while winning the popular vote, Trump did not win a majority. He beat Vice President Harris by just over 1.6 million votes, or just 1.7%, with nearly 800,000 more votes in California alone still to be counted.

CNN's Harry Enten on Monday confirmed Trump's margin over Haris ranks just 44th out of 51, and called it "weak, weak, weak."

Watch the videos above or at this link.

RELATED: ‘There Were Witnesses’: Attorney for Minor Urges Release of Gaetz Ethics Report

Parts of Great Barrier Reef suffer highest coral mortality on record

By AFP
November 18, 2024


This underwater photo taken on April 5, 2024, shows bleached and dead coral around Lizard Island on the Great Barrier Reef, 270 kilometres (170 miles) north of the city of Cairns - Copyright AFP/File DAVID GRAY

Parts of the Great Barrer Reef have suffered the highest coral mortality on record, Australian research showed Tuesday, with scientists fearing the rest of it has suffered a similar fate.

The Australian Institute of Marine Science said surveys of 12 reefs found up to 72 percent coral mortality, thanks to a summer of mass bleaching, two cyclones, and flooding.

In one northern section of the reef, about a third of hard coral had died, the “largest annual decline” in 39 years of government monitoring, the agency said.

Often dubbed the world’s largest living structure, the Great Barrier Reef is a 2,300 kilometre (1,400-mile) expanse of tropical corals that house a stunning array of biodiversity.

But repeated mass bleaching events have threatened to rob the tourist drawcard of its wonder, turning banks of once-vibrant corals into a sickly shade of white.

Bleaching occurs when water temperatures rise and the coral expels microscopic algae, known as zooxanthellae, to survive.

If high temperatures persist, the coral can eventually turn white and die.

This year had already been confirmed as the fifth mass bleaching on the reef in the past eight years.

But this latest survey also found a rapid growing type of coral — known as acropora — had suffered the highest rate of death.

This coral is quick to grow, but one of the first to bleach.


– ‘Worst fears’ –


Lead researcher Mike Emslie told public broadcaster ABC the past summer was “one of the most severe events” across the Great Barrier Reef, with heat stress levels surpassing previous events.

“These are serious impacts. These are serious losses,” he said.

WWF-Australia’s head of oceans Richard Leck said the initial surveys confirmed his “worst fears”.

“The Great Barrier Reef can bounce back but there are limits to its resilience,” he said.

“It can’t get repeatedly hammered like this. We are fast approaching a tipping point.”

Leck added the area surveyed was “relatively small” and feared that when the full report was released next year “similar levels of mortality” would be observed.

He said that it reinforced Australia’s need to commit to stronger emission reduction targets of at least 90 percent below 2005 levels by 2035 and move away from fossil fuels.

The country is one of the world’s largest gas and coal exporters and has only recently set targets to become carbon neutral.

Mass of contradictions: Creating new foods from fungal mycelia

By Dr. Tim Sandle
November 18, 2024
DIGITAL JOURNAL

Fungi growing on a tree in a wood in England. Image by © Tim Sandle.

Scientists from Technical University of Denmark have teamed up with Copenhagen Michelin-starred chefs to unveil an innovative fermentation product (a new product made by growing fungi). The aim was to combine science with high-end gastronomy to demonstrate the simplicity of fermentation-made products. The researchers deployed the process biomass fermentation – similar to beer or yoghurt production – to show what caused mycelium to grow rapidly on sustainable materials.

The research focus was on the rapidly growing root structure – or mycelium – of the oyster mushroom and how this could be used to develop new alternative meat and seafood products.

While ‘fruiting bodies’ of fungi are among the most widely eaten in the world, the culinary qualities of its root structure has rarely been explored. The scientists found mycelial mass to have good nutritional qualities as well as, in the case of oyster mushrooms, low levels of toxins and allergens.

Lead researcher Dr Loes van Dam of the university’s Novo Nordisk Center for Biosustainability states: “Food extends far beyond academic research, so it was vital that – as well as establishing that this new product is safe and nutritious – we were able to work with chefs to demonstrate that it could be part of an enjoyable dining experience.”

Loes van Dam continues: “Fungi offer huge unexplored potential to feed our growing population, providing nutritious and sustainable sources of protein with a fraction of the emissions and land needed to farm animals, and because they grow rapidly on food and agricultural byproducts, they can play a major role in contributing to a circular economy.”

Loes van Dam also notes the growing number of possibilities: “There are millions of fungi species waiting to be investigated for gastronomic use, but varieties producing widely eaten mushrooms are a great place to start. As we found, the mycelium of the oyster mushroom is safe, nutritious and above all delicious.”

These findings come as a new report reveals Denmark and other Nordic countries are taking a leading position in alternative protein research. The new product made from oyster mushrooms’ rapidly growing root structure is said to be tasty, sustainable and nutritious.

The resulting product was rich in protein and contained important micronutrients such as vitamin B5 and provitamin D2.

The findings come as the first-ever analysis of European research into alternative proteins such as plant-based foods, cultivated meat, and fermentation-made foods reveals that Denmark is at the forefront of this field.

The research was part of a project funded by nonprofit and think tank the Good Food Institute. The research appears in the journal Food Science. The research is titled “GastronOmics: Edibility and safety of mycelium of the oyster mushroom Pleurotus ostreatus.”

Germany, Finland warn of ‘hybrid warfare’ after sea cable cut


By AFP
November 18, 2024

C-Lion1, a 1,172-kilometre (730-mile) fibre-optic cable, has carried communications between Helsinki and Germany's Rostock since 2016 - Copyright Lehtikuva/AFP Heikki Saukkomaa

Germany and Finland launched a probe Monday after an undersea cable linking the countries was severed, warning of the threat of “hybrid warfare” amid heightened tensions with Russia.

The countries’ foreign ministers said in a joint statement they were “deeply concerned” by the cutting of the communications link through the Baltic Sea, where tensions have increased since Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine.

“The fact that such an incident immediately raises suspicions of intentional damage speaks volumes about the volatility of our times,” they said.

“Our European security is not only under threat from Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, but also from hybrid warfare by malicious actors.”

“Safeguarding our shared critical infrastructure is vital to our security,” they added.

Finnish network operator Cinia said earlier that the cable between Finland and Germany, both members of the NATO military alliance, had been cut for unknown reasons.

The fault was detected in the undersea cable C-Lion1, Cinia said in a statement, adding that all services provided by the cable were down.

A Cinia spokesman quoted by Finnish media added that “all the fibre connections in it are cut”.

“At the moment there isn’t a possibility to assess the reason for the cable break but these kinds of breaks don’t happen in these waters without an outside impact,” the spokesperson said.

– Sea tensions –

But internet traffic had not suffered any disruptions, said Samuli Bergstrom, head of the Cybersecurity Centre at the Finnish Transport and Communications Agency (Traficom).

“Fortunately, there are several data cable routes between Finland and abroad, so a single cable failure will not affect internet traffic,” Bergstrom was quoted as saying by the broadcaster Yle.

The 1,172-kilometre (730-mile) fibre-optic cable has carried communications between Helsinki and Germany’s Rostock since 2016.

Last month NATO opened a new naval base in Rostock to coordinate the forces of the military alliance’s members in the Baltic Sea.

Russia summoned the German ambassador to Moscow the day after the inauguration to protest the new naval command centre.

Moscow called the centre a “blatant breach” of the treaty on the reunification of Germany in 1990 that said no foreign armed forces would be deployed in the area, a claim Berlin denied.

Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, there have been repeated cases pointing to the heightened tensions in the Baltic.

Most notably, in September 2022 a series of underwater blasts ruptured the Nord Stream pipelines that carried Russian gas to Europe under the waters.

GUNRUNNER 

Russia vetoes Sudan ceasefire resolution at UN

ABOLISH BIG POWERS UN VETO


By AFP
November 18, 2024

A Sudanese army soldier mans a machine gun on top of a military pickup truck outside a hospital in Omdurman - Copyright AFP Omar AL-QATTAA

Russia vetoed a UN Security Council resolution on Monday calling for an immediate end to hostilities in Sudan where a war between two rival generals has been raging since April 2023.

A draft of the resolution prepared by Britain and Sierra Leone, which was seen by AFP, had called on both sides to “immediately cease hostilities” and begin talks on “a national ceasefire.”

“One country stood in the way of the council speaking with one voice. One country is the blocker,” British Foreign Secretary David Lammy said after the vote, which showed 14 countries in favor and only Russia against.

“One country is the enemy of peace. This Russian veto is a disgrace, and it shows to the world yet again Russia’s true colors,” Lammy added.

Sudan has been ravaged by fighting between the regular army of General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, who seized power in a 2021 coup, and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) led by his one-time deputy, General Mohamed Hamdan Daglo.

Before Monday’s vote, a diplomat told AFP on condition of anonymity that Russia had appeared to become “visibly more aligned” with General Burhan’s camp during negotiations over the draft.

During previous votes on Sudan in the Security Council, Russia had abstained.

Sudan’s army under Burhan has accused the United Arab Emirates of providing arms to the RSF, a charge rejected by Abu Dhabi.

– Civilian toll –

The draft had called on member states to avoid any “external interference which foments conflict and instability” and urged all sides to respect an embargo against arms transfers to Darfur.

The conflict has claimed tens of thousands of lives and displaced more than 11 million people, including 3.1 million who have fled the country, according to UN figures.

Recent weeks have seen violence flare up again, with each camp seemingly “convinced they can prevail on the battlefield,” Rosemary DiCarlo, UN under-secretary-general for political affairs, said recently.

The fighting has taken a high toll among civilians, with some 26 million people facing severe food shortages and both sides exchanging accusations of sexual violence.

Against that backdrop, the draft resolution called on both parties to “fully implement” commitments made in 2023 to protect civilians, to “halt and prevent conflict-related sexual violence,” and to allow “rapid, safe, unhindered” humanitarian access into and throughout Sudan.

The UN has been largely paralyzed in its ability to deal with conflicts from Ukraine to Gaza because of splits between permanent Security Council members, notably Russia and the United States.

Even if it had been adopted, it was unclear what effect the Sudan resolution would have produced.

A resolution in March calling for an “immediate” ceasefire during the month of Ramadan had little impact.

And a council demand in July for the RSF to end its “siege” of the city of El-Fasher, where thousands of civilians were trapped, was similarly ignored.

Defiant Lebanese harvest olives in the shadow of war


By AFP
November 18, 2024

The olive groves of Kfeir are just 9 kilometres from the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights - Copyright KCNA VIA KNS/AFP STR

Laure Al Khoury

On a mountain slope in south Lebanon, agricultural worker Assaad al-Taqi is busy picking olives, undeterred by the roar of Israeli warplanes overhead.

This year, he is collecting the harvest against the backdrop of the raging Israel-Hezbollah war.

He works in the village of Kfeir, just a few kilometres (miles) from where Israeli bombardment has devastated much of south Lebanon since Israel escalated its campaign against Iran-backed Hezbollah in September.

“But I’m not afraid of the shelling,” Taqi said, as he and other workers hit the tree branches with sticks, sending showers of olives tumbling down into jute bags.

“Our presence here is an act of defiance,” the 51-year-old said, but also noting that the olive “is the tree of peace”.

Kfeir is nine kilometres (six miles) from the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, in the mixed Christian and Druze district of Hasbaya, which has largely been spared the violence that has wracked nearby Hezbollah strongholds.

But even Hasbaya’s relative tranquillity was shattered last month when three journalists were killed in an Israeli strike on a complex where they were sleeping.

Israel and Hezbollah had previously exchanged cross-border fire for almost a year over the Gaza conflict.



– $58 mln in losses –



The workers in Kfeir rest in the shade of the olive trees, some 900 metres (3,000 feet) above sea level on the slopes of Mount Hermon, which overlooks an area where Lebanese, Syrian and Israeli-held territory meet.

They have been toiling in relative peace since dawn, interrupted only by sonic booms from Israeli jets breaking the sound barrier and the sight of smoke rising on the horizon from strikes on a south Lebanon border village.

Hassna Hammad, 48, who was among those picking olives, said the agricultural work was her livelihood.

“We aren’t afraid, we’re used to it,” she said of the war.

But “we are afraid for our brothers impacted by the conflict”, she added, referring to the hundreds of thousands of Lebanese displaced by the fighting.

Elsewhere in south Lebanon, olive trees are bulging with fruit that nobody will pick, after villagers fled Israeli bombardment and the subsequent ground operation that began on September 30.

A World Bank report this month said that “the disruption of the olive harvest caused by bombing and displacement is expected to lead to $58 million in losses” in Lebanon.

It said 12 percent of olive groves in the conflict-affected areas it assessed had been destroyed.

Normally, the olive-picking season is highly anticipated in Lebanon, and some people return each year to their native villages and fields just for the harvest.

“Not everyone has the courage to come” this time, said Salim Kassab, who owns a traditional press where villagers bring their olives to extract the oil.

“Many people are absent… They sent workers to replace them,” said Kassab, 50.


– ‘Love the olive month’ –


“There is fear of the war of course,” he said, adding that he had come alone this year, without his wife and children.

Kassab said that before the conflict, he used to travel to the southern cities of Nabatiyeh and Sidon if he needed to fix his machines, but such trips are near impossible now because of the danger.

The World Bank report estimated that 12 months of agriculture sector losses have cost Lebanon $1.1 billion, in a country already going through a gruelling five-year economic crisis before the fighting erupted.

Areas near the southern border have sustained “the most significant damage and losses”, the report said.

It cited “the burning and abandonment of large areas of agricultural land” in both south and east Lebanon, “along with lost harvests due to the displacement of farmers”.

Elsewhere in Kfeir, Inaam Abu Rizk, 77, and her husband were busy washing olives they plan to either press for oil or jar to be served throughout the winter.

Abu Rizk has taken part in the olive harvest for decades, part of a tradition handed down the generations, and said that despite the war, this year was no different.

“Of course we’re afraid… there is the sound of planes and bombing,” she said.

But “we love the olive month — we are farmers and the land is our work”.

Woman-owned cafe in Indonesia’s Sharia stronghold shakes stigma


By AFP
November 17, 2024

Morning Mama owner Qurrata Ayuni (R) says her Banda Aceh cafe is the only one run by a woman in the capital of Indonesia's most conservative province 

- Copyright AFP Zikri Maulana

Jack MOORE

In what claims to be the only woman-run cafe in the capital of Indonesia’s most conservative province, owner Qurrata Ayuni says she and her baristas provide an alternative to rowdy, smoke-filled male haunts.

The 28-year-old opened Morning Mama last year to create a space that caters to women in Banda Aceh, known as the city of 1,001 coffee shops.

“I thought why not open a place that is comfortable for women?” she said.

While the province has long been known as the site of the world’s deadliest tsunami and a decades-long separatist insurgency, Aceh’s draw for visitors is often the coffee.

The traditional “sanger” latte, mixed with condensed milk, is a popular staple.

Aceh’s strong connection to coffee started hundreds of years ago with Dutch colonial rulers. Now, its farmers cultivate world-renowned beans in lush highlands.

Aceh still catches attention for its ultraconservative values, including by-laws that require Muslim women to wear hijabs.

While women are not banned from working in the only region in Muslim-majority Indonesia to impose Islamic law, running a coffee shop is seen as a man’s job.

“It’s extremely difficult for women in Aceh to pursue education or a career, facing not only legal restrictions but also social bullying,” said Andreas Harsono of Human Rights Watch.

Despite widespread criticism, public whipping remains a common punishment for a range of offences in the province, including gambling, alcohol consumption and relations outside marriage.

Independent career paths are mostly viewed as out of reach for Aceh’s young women, but Qurrata was undeterred.



– ‘Time for change’ –



Qurrata, who owns her cafe without a business partner, saw a demand for a space for women to work or meet friends.

She and her team of baristas pour fresh coffee to mostly hijab-wearing customers, with children’s books and menstruation pads on sale nearby.

“There’s no cigarette smoke, it’s not noisy, it’s really cosy,” she said, adding that some men also have coffees at her shop.

“It’s a statement that women can own businesses, make decisions and lead,” she said.

“Now is the time for change.”

The entrepreneur says women are stepping up, pointing to at least 1,000 applying for a barista job.

“I want to offer them the chance to change the course of their lives,” she said.

Caca, a 23-year-old barista, said it was a “really cool job” rare in Aceh.

The cafe’s regulars hail Morning Mama as a spot where women can be themselves.

“I feel more connection if I ask something with a woman barista,” said 21-year-old student Meulu Alina. “I don’t feel any nervousness. It’s more like talking with your sister.”



– Helping others –



Before starting her business, Qurrata overcame the loss of her parents at the age of eight in the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, which killed more than 200,000 people.

Her village near Banda Aceh was completely destroyed, but she survived and was raised by her aunt and uncle.

Qurrata said she wants to channel her grief into helping other women.

“It’s a platform to help others find their own resilience, much like I did,” she said.

Photography jobs allowed her to build savings and confidence, taking a leap into business after her uncle encouraged her and helped financially.

Other women were still “afraid to start”, she said, for fear men will say bad things.

“People here tend to believe that women should stay at home,” she said.

But “the older generation understands that times have changed.”

Owner of Aceh’s popular Solong coffee shop, Haji Nawawi, said he would not employ women but locals had accepted them making coffee elsewhere, calling it “normal” as values “from outside” Aceh had entered the province.

Qurrata employs five women alongside two men.

Revenue fluctuates, but Qurrata says her ultimate aim is to inspire other women.

“Women are capable of so much more than we’re often given credit for. We can be leaders, creators, and innovators,” she said.

“So don’t just sit back. Don’t be afraid.”