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Many Americans are being gaslighted
How to explain the pro-Trump supporters and the anti-Biden Democrats? The answer came to me the other day: they have been gaslighted. Continue reading
Just in time for holidays, Dems may embrace GOP plan to boot millions off Medicaid
One expert noted the pending deal has "huge stakes... for children and families."
With congressional leadership expected to imminently release the text of omnibus government funding legislation, Politico revealed Monday that Democrats are preparing to join with Republicans who have demanded an end to Medicaid policies enacted because of the Covid-19 pandemic. Continue reading
No, ‘independent state legislatures’ can’t shred constitutional rights
Far-right state lawmakers say the Constitution gives them the right to stiff voters. Legal experts say that’s bogus.
Are state lawmakers free to ignore the results of a presidential election? Continue reading
The crypto-populist pyramid scam
Here’s how to connect Donald Trump and Nayib Bukele to Sam Bankman-Fried and Bored Ape Yacht Club.
It should be obvious to pretty much everyone at this point that anything crypto is an old-fashioned grift, a scam, a Ponzi scheme. Those who got in on the ground floor of crypto-currencies and NFTs and the like—and then left when the going was good—have made out like bandits. The rest of us are left holding the bill. Continue reading
A job behind bars
A prison mental health specialist talks about the myths and realities of providing psychological care to detainees
At least two million people in the United States are incarcerated in 122 United States prisons. Little is known about the prisoners themselves. Did their background condemn them to bad behavior or did they just make grievous mistakes? Do they suffer from mental illness sometimes masquerading as criminal behavior? Can they change their life path? A mental health specialist with 25 years of direct experience provided counseling services to pre-trial detainees in Chicago’s notorious Cook County prison system, agreed to this interview. Continue reading
‘You don’t get to lead a government you tried to destroy’: House Dems move to block Trump 2024 run
"The 14th Amendment makes clear that based on his past behavior, Donald Trump is disqualified from ever holding federal office again," said Rep. David Cicilline, the lead sponsor of a new bill raising a constitutional challenge against Trump's bid.
More than 40 House Democrats introduced legislation Thursday aiming to bar former President Donald Trump from the 2024 ballot, citing the 14th Amendment clause prohibiting insurrectionists from holding federal office. Continue reading
The economic realities we face at the end of 2022
Economies around the world were shocked and damaged over the course of 2022. Global capitalism had been brewing conflicts among the major powers (the United States, China, and the EU) for some time as their relative strengths and vulnerabilities shifted. U.S. capitalism and its empire are widely perceived as waning. Europe’s role as a U.S. ally and indeed its economic future became correspondingly riskier as a result. China’s economic growth encountered problems but continued to be remarkably positive and often crucially supportive of world economic conditions in ways that were once more closely associated with the role of the United States. China’s deepening alliance with Russia as well as its burgeoning global economic reach frightened many in the United States. Years of increasingly aggressive competition, tariff and trade wars, and bans and subsidies, mostly initiated by the United States, culminated this past year in global economic warfare. Continue reading
New MAGA coup evidence revealed in GOP texts: Be scared!
Host of Republican lawmakers pushed for the Jan. 6 coup and are about to become leaders of the government they wanted to overthrow.
It is a well-accepted maxim that elections have consequences. Voters may not have fully realized, however, that by putting Republicans in control of the House, even by the slimmest of margins, they were granting enormous power to people who openly plotted to overthrow the government. Continue reading
‘Chilling’: Republican state AG’s Office sought list of trans Texans
"This is an alarming attack on the privacy, safety, and dignity of transgender Texans," said the ACLU.
“Despicable.” “Disgusting.” “Egregious.” “Terrifying.” Continue reading
You’d better watch out: The surveillance state is making a list, and you’re on it
You’d better watch out—you’d better not pout—you’d better not cry—‘cos I’m telling you why: this Christmas, it’s the Surveillance State that’s making a list and checking it twice, and it won’t matter whether you’ve been bad or good. Continue reading
The Nakba Day triumph: How the UN is correcting a historical wrong
The next Nakba Day will be officially commemorated by the United Nations General Assembly on May 15, 2023. The decision by the world’s largest democratic institution is significant, if not a game changer. Continue reading
The right to die a dignified death and escape suffering
People commit suicide when they want to stop the pain more than exist another minute in their world of shit. It is, therefore, a very sensible thing to do. After all, when our pets are in pain, we sometimes “put them to sleep” to save them from a long suffering. Humans are often not granted the same right for ourselves. Continue reading
Brittney Griner and the U.S. State
Brittney Griner's ordeal in Russia is over. But she has been secreted away for "reintegration" and the U.S. continues its own brand of international hostage taking.
WNBA player Brittney Griner was arrested in Moscow on February 17, 2022, exactly one week before the Russian government began what it called its Special Military Operation in Ukraine. Griner was returning home from playing in Russia during the off-season and was carrying CBD oil in her luggage. While legal in much of the United States, any marijuana formulation is illegal in the Russian Federation. She was finally released on December 8, 2022 in a prisoner swap for Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout. Continue reading
New York Times strike: From reporters to rabble-rousers
Workers at the “newspaper of record” stopped working to demand better pay and labor rights—but only for a day. What would happen if they actually flexed their power.
Strike activity in the United States appears to have reached an all-time high as the unionized staff of the New York Times recently joined the ranks of iconic brands like Starbucks and Amazon in agitating for their rights. More than 1,100 staffers, represented by the NewsGuild of New York, staged a one-day walkout on December 8, saying their hand was forced “due to the company’s failure to bargain in good faith, reach a fair contract agreement with the workers, and meet their demands.” It was the first time in 40 years that the paper boasting of publishing “All the News That’s Fit to Print” experienced such a labor action. Continue reading
Is America blind to Trump’s genocide?
April 7, 2020, was the day everything changed in America. And hardly anybody realizes it. Continue reading
Musk and Thiel are highly deportable
Two of the world’s wealthiest men—Peter Thiel and his friend and business colleague Elon Musk—became U.S. citizens through the naturalization process. Both are aiding and abetting neo-Nazi and other far-right causes in the United States and fit the bill of “undesirable aliens.” Thiel, through bankrolling the political campaigns of dangerous Nazi sympathizers like Blake Masters in Arizona, and Musk, in re-platforming hundreds of neo-Nazis on Twitter, pose a threat to the constitutional governance of the United States. Thiel and Musk are as deportable from the United States as were dozens of Nazis who were discovered to have carried out war crimes during World War II. In any event, Thiel does not seem to care very much about his acquired U.S. citizenship since he also carries a New Zealand passport and is attempting to obtain one from Malta. Continue reading
How the corporate takeover of American politics began
The corporate takeover of American politics started with a man and a memo you’ve probably never heard of. Continue reading
SPACE JUNK: The corporate media’s fawning coverage of billionaires’ space tourism is one of the best examples of junk food news of the past year, written by Jen Lyons, Marcelle Swinburne, Sierra Kaul, Gavin Kelley, and Mickey Huff
Adapted from Project Censored’s “State of the Free Press 2023”
Remember the Cold War Space Race between the former Soviet Union and the United States in the 1950s and 1960s? During the past year, Jeff Bezos, Richard Branson, and Elon Musk went ahead and turned that into a modern-day dick-measuring contest, for lack of a better phrase, to see who could get there first for the longest. Their space outfits, extensively reported on by CNN Science, received more attention than the pollution caused by this narcissistic billionaire power competition, in which one rocket launch produced an estimated 300 tons of carbon dioxide in the upper atmosphere, where it can remain for years. Continue reading
Some 65 million Social Security recipients breathe easier this year
Social Security was on the ballot in Georgia’s December 6 run-off election. Continue reading
Twilight of the Gods
Europeans have embraced American manacles more readily than any other subjugated people have in history.
Not only has America slain all Europe’s gods but our moral cowardice ensures there can be no room for either our gods or us in Valhalla. We are a sorry, doomed lot. We Europeans have embraced our American manacles more readily than any other subjugated people have in history. The best protest we can manage is that of the German football team who were laughed out of Qatar all the way back to their obese nation. Continue reading
JCPA: A good idea, promoting a stupid behavior, rolled into an unrelated bill
It’s never really news that the annual “National Defense Authorization Act” is bloated. The 2023 version comes to $858 billion which, probably ten times what’s required to fund an actual “national defense” (as opposed to trying to maintain a sprawling global empire in terminal decline). Continue reading
Hunting the Twitter Files: Legacy media censor details about censorship
Over two years after Big Tech Big-Tech made the historic decision to limit access to the New York Post’s story about President Joe Biden’s son Hunter, users are getting a glimpse into how Twitter came to that decision. However, delusional legacy and social media outlets are doing everything they can to misrepresent and bury the consequential details of the process. Continue reading
What does the Fed’s Jerome Powell have up his sleeve?
The real goal of Fed policy: Breaking inflation, the middle class or the bubble economy?
“There is no sense that inflation is coming down,” said Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell at a November 2 press conference, — this despite eight months of aggressive interest rate hikes and “quantitative tightening.” On November 30, the stock market rallied when he said smaller interest rate increases are likely ahead and could start in December. But rates will still be increased, not cut. “By any standard, inflation remains much too high,” Powell said. “We will stay the course until the job is done.” Continue reading
How a federal agency’s funding crisis imperils workers’ rights
Some workers began delaying doctor’s appointments and others started delving deeply into their pockets for care when Tecnocap illegally slashed health benefits at its Glen Dale, West Virginia, manufacturing plant last year. Continue reading
Xi’s visit and the future of the Middle East: What does China want from the Arabs
The problem with most Western media’s political analyses is that they generally tend to be short-sighted and focused mostly on variables that are of direct interest to Western governments. Continue reading
“Intermittency” and “density” arguments favor household renewables over fossil fuel and grid dependence
Avid supporters of coal, oil, and gas (and opponents of wind and solar energy, but I repeat myself) seem convinced that they’ve got the ultimate gotcha arguments in “intermittency” and “energy density.” They’re right, but not in quite the way they seem to think. Continue reading
The Constitution has already been terminated
If there is one point on which there should be no political parsing, no legal jockeying, and no disagreement, it is this: for anyone to advocate terminating or suspending the Constitution is tantamount to a declaration of war against the founding principles of our representative government and the rule of law. Continue reading
Why workers are up in arms over the rail strike intervention
The rail industry can thank Congress and the president for helping it secure $321 million in annual profits at the expense of workers.
The United States Senate acted in a show of rare unity recently in voting 80 to 15 to pass a bill forcing rail workers to accept their employers’ contract offer without a strike. There was no such unity to pass an amendment introduced by Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) that would have given rail workers seven paid sick leave days. That bill did not pass even though 52 senators voted for it, as it failed the requisite 60-vote threshold. Continue reading
Biden playing the long game by moving South Carolina up to first primary state
Joe Biden may be 80 years old but only Republicans and a few wobbly Democrats who think the president is out grazing in a pasture are underestimating someone who is, first and foremost, a politician of the old school. Biden’s decision to have the Democratic Party hold its first primary in 2024 in South Carolina, thus edging out traditional first primary state New Hampshire, as well as the first nominating process—caucus—state Iowa, is a political master stroke of genius. As it now stands, South Carolina will lead the Democratic primary calendar on Saturday, February 3. Having the primary election on a Saturday will likely increase voter participation among two Democratic strongholds, African-Americans and college students. Continue reading
Journalism defenders press for passage of ‘game-changing’ PRESS Act
"The PRESS Act is the most important free press legislation in modern times because it would finally stop the government from spying on journalists and threatening them with arrest for doing their jobs," explained one advocate.
Free press advocates this week urged people to contact Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s office and ask the New York Democrat to pass legislation protecting journalists from government abuses during the closing days of the current Congress. Continue reading
Hakeem Jeffries and the railroad workers
A new Black "first" came along at the same moment that the Democratic Party showed itself to be a servant of the ruling classes. Hakeem Jeffries is a very willing tool of powerful people. There is no reason to celebrate his ascension to the House Minority Leader position.
The Black Agenda Report team is proud to have coined the phrases “Black misleadership class” and “Black political class.” These words cannot be uttered and written too often because they name and shame the people who work alongside the neoliberal and imperialist order in the United States while also pretending to act on behalf of Black people, whose needs are antithetical to those of the oligarchy. Continue reading
A Christmas story from Hell
Posted on December 23, 2022 by Jack Balkwill
The traditional Christmas story is about an unmarried, pregnant, Jewish teen named Mary who, on a freezing night in Bethlehem, seeks a warm place to rest and give birth. Nobody would allow the girl a bed. Today, it is unlikely that such a person would not be shunned as much as the Biblical Mary, as we allow people to die in the Land of the Free when they fall to the bottom of the capitalist ranks where there is a dearth of mercy. Continue reading →