The global coronavirus outbreak which also threatens the United States—and the widely criticized effort by the Trump administration to address it—is offering advocates of both paid sick leave and Medicare for All an opportunity to make the case that such universal social programs are not only morally right but would also serve a key public health function. Continue reading
While U.S. advocates and local politicians struggle to get their first public banks chartered, Mexico’s new president has begun construction on 2,700 branches of a government-owned bank to be completed in 2021, when it will be the largest bank in the country. At a press conference on Jan. 6, he said the neoliberal model had failed; private banks were not serving the poor and people outside the cities, so the government had to step in. Continue reading
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released some welcome news late last month: Americans are living a tiny bit longer. In 2018, the federal health agency reported, U.S. life expectancy at birth inched up about a month, from 78.6 to 78.7 years. Continue reading
What was your main take-away from this year’s State of the Union speech? That the leader of the (theoretically) most enlightened and democratic country in the world is a liar, a bigot, a blasphemer and a war criminal? Or that Rep. Pelosi might have cajones after all? Well, sure, that too. Continue reading
A funny thing happened three Sundays ago (Feb. 9). . . Okay, not funny ha-ha. My cat’s overexuberant love bite had infected, doubling the size of my left hand. So it was off to an urgent care facility, where the doc took one look at my hand and said, “TO THE ER. NOW!” That if I didn’t go, I would be in a coma by morning and hauled off in an ambulance and sepsis could kill me. Who’s to argue about that? Continue reading
What can we do to protect America’s young people from sexual predators? Continue reading
After several postponements, US President, Donald Trump, has finally revealed the details of his Middle East plan, dubbed ‘Deal of the Century’, in a press conference in Washington on January 28. Continue reading
The die is cast. History will record that Republican senators in the U.S. Senate used their majority to sabotage the impeachment trial of Donald Trump and, in so doing, de facto exonerated him of abuse of power and of obstruction of Congress. Continue reading
As Dear Leader wound up his State of the Union, and Nancy Pelosi tore its pages in quarters as she stood behind him, I had the same reaction that many colleagues out in the Twitter universe had. We all instantly recalled George W. Bush’s words at the end of Donald Trump’s inaugural address in 2017: “Well, that was some weird shit.” Continue reading
Our society has coined expressions like “philanthropist” to encourage and hail people’s charitable spirit. Continue reading
The chaos in Iowa’s Democratic primary is nothing new. Continue reading
President Donald Trump is reportedly compiling a Nixonian “enemies list” that includes former national security adviser John Bolton and top House Democrats as he seeks to retaliate for the congressional impeachment process, which is expected to come to a close as early as Wednesday with a Senate vote to acquit. Continue reading
Thanks to animal welfare groups, most people are now aware of “factory farms.” Concentrated animal feeding operations or CAFOs abuse workers, animals, the environment, human consumers and even our tax dollars. (How? Price supports and government bailouts when diseases occur.) Thanks to greedy CAFOs crowding, diseases killed one-tenth of all US pigs and millions of chickens and turkeys a few years ago. Continue reading
Ten of the first twelve presidents of the United States were slave holders. This is just one of many historical facts that this columnist discovered while researching and writing Prejudential: Black America and the Presidents . The newly published book is an exploration of black American history viewed through the prism of the presidency. Continue reading
I wasn’t going to comment on Trump’s lie-filled State of the Union message but the whoppers were so big—especially on the economy—that I feel compelled. Continue reading
As cleanup of the 2011 Fukushima disaster continues, the Japanese government made its case to embassy officials from 23 countries Monday that dumping contaminated water from the nuclear power plant into the ocean is the best course of action. Continue reading
While journalists pick through the ashes of the Iowa caucuses meltdown, thousands of progressive activists are moving forward to make election history in New Hampshire. In sharp contrast to the prattle of mainstream punditry, the movements behind Bernie Sanders are propelled by people who engage with politics as a collective struggle because the future of humanity and the planet is at stake. As a result, the Granite State’s primary election on Feb. 11 could be a political earthquake. Continue reading
Amid all the finger-pointing and anger that followed the nightmarish Iowa Democratic presidential caucuses Monday night, many journalists and progressive observers honed in on the smartphone app the state Democratic Party used—with disastrous consequences—to record and report the results of the highly anticipated contest. Continue reading
Hardly a day passes but some new and usually disturbing light is cast on President Donald Trump, and a recent illuminating glimpse came from publication of a recording that showed yet more of his expansive bluster. The video/sound evidence of his performance showed him at a dinner table “in a private suite in his Washington hotel with a group of donors, including two men at the centre of the impeachment inquiry, talking about golf, trade, politics, and removing the United States ambassador to Ukraine.” Continue reading
On January 12, Deutsche Welle (Germany’s public broadcaster like BBC, PBS, NPR, and RT) headlined “Mayor’s resignation highlights threat to German leaders: Arnd Focke, the Social Democratic mayor of a town in Lower Saxony, was regularly threatened by nationalists. Now he has resigned. Regional officials have repeatedly faced threats across Germany.” He quit for his safety, because carrying out Germany’s compassionate policies toward the flood of mainly Middle-Eastern refugees has produced a backlash that is becoming increasingly organized and dangerous to Germany’s democracy. Continue reading
On Friday, I was in Washington, DC. No, not to witness the final throes of the Senate’s impeachment trial of Donald Trump, but to be at the memorial service for a former colleague, newsman Jim Lehrer. Continue reading
Since Harry Truman in May 1948 was first among world leaders to recognize the new Jewish state on stolen Palestinian land, the US, other Western nations, and their establishment media one-sidedly supported its ruling regimes—ignoring their high crimes of war, against humanity, and persecution of long-suffering Palestinians. Continue reading
It is remarkable how the Democratic presidential candidates allow themselves to be pigeon-holed by the media as “moderate,” “centrist,” “extreme,” “left-wing,” and other abstract fact-deprived nomenclature. Continue reading
“Boxed warnings” or “black boxes” are the strictest FDA label warnings. They appear on cigarettes, fluoroquinolones (for tendon rupture), Lamictal (for SJS and TEN), Accutane (birth defects), and other products with well-known risks. Continue reading
I write a lot about government secrecy and the importance of whistleblowers, leakers and leak publishers, and for good reason: governments which can hide their wicked deeds from public accountability will do so whenever possible. It’s impossible for the public to use democracy for ensuring their government behaves in the way they desire if they aren’t allowed to be informed about what that behavior even is. Continue reading
Dr. Robert Epstein, a Hillary Clinton supporter who happens also to be an honest expert, told Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) last Tuesday that Google and social media can manipulate votes by using tools that they have at their disposal exclusively. In the absence of regulation, no one can counteract Google and social media or even know that they have reversed an election outcome. Continue reading
The Palestinian Authority, which governs the occupied West Bank, announced on Saturday that it would act immediately to cut ties with the U.S. after President Donald Trump unveiled a so-called peace plan that effectively allows Israel carte blanche to continue the occupation and theft of Palestinian land. Continue reading
Is Israel US property? In many ways, yes. Despite its willful ways, Israel is always pushing the envelope with the US. It has been getting away with murder since it was founded, abetted and funded by the US. But the US has failed, and Jared Kushner is the perfect envoy for this latest ultimatum, crafted by Netanyahu for his buddy Donald and his Orthodox Jewish son-in-law. Continue reading
Having just recently celebrated the annual reductive canonization of Martin Luther King by deservedly extolling his work for human solidarity but with hardly anyone quoting his criticisms of capitalism, his fellow revolutionary Malcolm’s words are still timely as well in going far beyond current identity group divisions and addressing humanity as a whole. At the time, Malcolm was played as the divisive force by racists and protectors of the system he was most critical of, and in unity with MLK about. That system they were working against—and why they were murdered—has not changed in essence since Marx analyzed it in the 19th century, but the 21st has brought it, and us, closer to disaster than at any previous point. While billions of the colonized, enslaved and class diminished have suffered over the ages, now all are threatened as never before. Continue reading
There’s so much going on in US politics right now that it’s hard to know what to write about. With all the shouting about the election, impeachment, Trump’s bogus Palestine “deal” and so many other important political issues competing for airtime with Kobe Bryant’s death and coronavirus fear porn, it feels like we’re already at white noise information saturation. Things are going to get a whole lot noisier this month when the Democratic presidential primaries (and all the establishment manipulations that will necessarily accompany them) get underway, and Julian Assange’s extradition trial begins. Continue reading
There can only be one winner emerging from this year’s Super Bowl LIV showdown between the San Francisco 49ers and the Kansas City Chiefs, but the biggest losers will be the hundreds of young girls and boys—some as young as 9 years old—who will be bought and sold for sex during the course of the big game. Continue reading
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The vengeful, lawless, corporate toady Trump explodes
‘The egomaniacal Trump is inebriated with his disgraceful acquittal, convinced of his own innocence, despite the clear evidence of his guilt.’
Posted on February 28, 2020 by Ralph Nader
The day after his acquittal by the Republican Party in a trial that banned witnesses, the unhinged Donald Trump gloated for over an hour on all the television networks. Trump flattered his courtiers, one by one, and fulminated against his congressional adversaries, Hillary Clinton and ex-FBI chief James Comey. Continue reading →