The Erickson Report, Page 5: We Are Not Alone

The Erickson Report, Page 5: We Are Not Alone

Now for an occasional segment called We Are Not Alone, when we remind ourselves that we are not alone on this planet and newsworthy things happen in places beyond our borders.

First we go to India, which has seen weeks of protests which have resulted in over two dozen protesters killed by police. The protesters, mostly but not exclusively Muslim, are opposing the Citizenship Amendment Act, or CAA, which was passed by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist government in December.

The CAA offers an accelerated pathway to citizenship for Hindu, Sikh, Zoroastrian, Buddhist, and Christian immigrants in India claiming religious persecution. The claim is that it is protection for people facing such persecution in neighboring countries, but the law will not bear the weight of that claim.

First, for the first time in the history of India as an independent nation and apparently contrary to its constitution, it makes religious affiliation a basis for citizenship and what's more does it in a discriminatory way: You may have noticed that Muslim immigrants claiming religious persecution in their home countries are not covered by that law.

Second, it does not require proof of claims of religious persecution on the part of those it does cover.

Third, it only applies to certain neighboring countries, specifically Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Bangladesh (marked in red). It does not apply to other neighboring countries such as China, Myanmar, and Sri Lanka (marked in blue), in all three of which there is documented evidence of persecution of religious minorities: Christians, Buddhists, and Uighur - who are Muslim - in China, the Royhingya, who are majority Muslim, in Myanmar, and Muslims in Sri Lanka.

India and neighbors

The difference in those two sets of countries is not a coincidence, which becomes even clearer when you consider that those marked in red are majority Muslim with Muslim governments - while those marked in blue are neither.

The law is part of and reflects a wave of extremist Hindu nationalism which has swept over India, where it has become commonplace for senior political figures to refer to Muslim immigrant workers as “infiltrators” or “termites" and to move to create a National Register of Citizens, requiring the production of documents to prove you are a citizen, an obstacle that of course will leave out many. But don't worry: Amit Shah, the home minister of India, has promised that the CAA will help anyone who fails that requirement to reclaim their citizenhip - except, that is, for Muslims who, again, are not covered by that law.
The law has been challenged in the courts as well as in the streets. We'll have to see what happens.

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Another place that has seen demonstrations for some months is Iraq.

For three months, protesters all across Iraq but particularly in the south have been demanding the fall of a government they consider corrupt and controlled by Iran. Between 600 and 700 protesters are believed to have been killed by security forces or militia gunmen in that time.
Despite the official violence, protests have been strong enough that Prime Minister Adil Abdul-Mahdi announced in November he would resign - but he is still in place as a caretaker because no one has been found to replace him, something I suspect Mahdi knew when he made the offer. Those who have come forward have been rejected by the protesters because of their various parties' ties to Iran and other foreign countries, which is pretty much exactly what is being protested.

Thousands of protesters have turned out every day in Baghdad, turning the central Tahrir Square into a sort of community - pitching tents and organizing meals, even having doctors and dentists providing services.

Iraq

On January 24, separately from the occupation in Tahrir Square, a huge throng turned out in Baghdad to demand the withdrawal of US forces from the country. Many came out in response to a call from powerful Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, whose political bloc controls the most seats in Parliament and who had been to that point supportive of the on-going protests.

But then al-Sadr reversed course and withdrew his support for the anti-government protests with the lame excuse of wanting to avoid “internal strife” - truly a strange sentiment coming immediately after a mass demonstration that he called for. It was not the first time in his political history that he has suddenly changed direction, but this one had immediate and violent consequences, as the very next day, January 25,  Iraqi security forces moved against the Tahrir Square protests.
They fired tear gas, they fired live ammunition, they burned tents as they stormed bridges, streets, and a highway interchange.
And not just in Baghdad: In the southern city of Nasriyah, at least three protesters were killed when security forces moved in to re-open a highway blocked by the demonstrations.

Altogether, at least 12 protesters were killed and 230 more were wounded by the assaults.
Without the support of al-Sadr, the broad-based and secular protest movement is likely to be crushed by government security forces and the Iran-backed militias ostensibly under government control.

But the protesters vowed not to give up and many said that would spend the night in Tahrir Square to try to hold it against government forces. As night fell, the Iraqi national anthem could be heard being sung there.

I'm sure more on this has happened since I recorded this. You should check it out.

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Horn of Africa

Meanwhile, east Africa has gone Biblical: A plague of locusts has spread across Ethiopia and Somalia into Kenya.

Over 100 billion of the insects, each of which consumes its own weight in food every day, are swarming through a region already reeling from a 2019 that started with drought and ended with deadly floods. The invasion is the biggest in Ethiopia and Somalia in 25 years, and the biggest in Kenya in 70 years.

Technically, the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization, the FAO, labels the current invasion an "upsurge." Only if it gets worse and cannot be contained over a year or more, does it become a "plague." But I doubt that matters to those affected as they see crops and pasture devastated in a region which is already one of the poorest and most vulnerable in the world.

And worse may be on the way. When rains arrive in March and bring new vegetation across much of the region, the numbers of the fast-breeding locusts could grow to 500 times what they are now before drier weather in June curbs their spread - which by then could include Uganda and South Sudan.

Locals have employed traditional means of fighting the onslaught: banging on cans, waving blankets, shaking trees, anything to keep the locusts moving and flying rather than eating. But the only effective means is aerial spraying of pesticides and it needs to be done before the March rains. Some is being done now, but not enough.

So what will it take to step up the spraying? According to the FAO, about $70 million in aid. Not billion, million. That's a little more than 1/3 of what Mike Bloomberg and Tom Steyer have spent on TV ads. That's about 50 minutes worth of our military spending.

And the hungry of the world still need to beg.

By the way, does this have anything to do with climate change? Yes.

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Epicenter of earthquake in Turkey

More bad news: A major earthquake hit eastern Turkey on January 24, leaving at least 38 dead and more than 1,600 injured.
At least 76 buildings were destroyed and hundreds more were heavily damaged.

The epicenter of the magnitude 6.7 quake was near the town of Sivrice, in eastern Elazig province about 565 kilometers (350 miles) east of the Turkish capital of Ankara.

Hundreds of aftershocks, one with a magnitude of 5.4, complicated relief efforts, which nonetheless saw dozens of people pulled from the rubble as 3500 rescue experts worked around the clock in sub-freezing temperatures.

This is neither the first nor the worst quake to hit Turkey; in fact, there was one in the same area ten years ago that killed 51 people and in 1999 two strong earthquakes struck northwest Turkey, killing around 18,000. But I don't imagine that is any comfort to the families of those killed this time.

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I'm going to end this segment with this and I have a particular reason for putting it here.

US Women's March

The fourth annual Women's March was on January 18. Thousands turned out in Washington DC, Los Angeles, Chicago, and a number of other places in what NPR called as "a smaller but passionate crowd" which AP described as "focused on issues such as climate change, pay equity, reproductive rights, and immigration."

Okay, so why is this under "We Are Not Alone?" To make the point that this is not a US issue, this is not a US campaign, this is not a US effort. This is a world issue, a world campaign, a world effort.

On January 18 there were over 200 marches covering 24 countries across six continents. This is a worldwide campaign for women's freedom - by which I mean women's rights, women's dignity, women's autonomy. The issues women face vary from place to place and I daresay in intensity from place to place. But it still comes under one banner, one umbrella, one headline, one non-negotiable, bottom-line principle: women as full and equal human beings.

The Erickson Report, Page 5: Two Weeks of Stupid: Clowns and Outrages [the Clowns]

The Erickson Report, Page 5: Two Weeks of Stupid: Clowns and Outrages [the Clowns]

Now for our regular feature, Two Weeks of Stupid: Clowns and Outrages.

Turning first to the Clowns as we usually do, we start with a repeat winner: Sen. Lindsey Grahamcracker, who so frightened himself by coming perilously close to breaking with Tweetie-pie over the latter's abandonment of the Kurds in Syria, that within a couple of days he was in awe at The Great Orange One's leadership and wisdom.

Grahamcracker said Tweetie-pie plans to use US air power over a demilitarized zone occupied by international forces - after, that is, Turkey had completed its ethnic cleansing in northern Syria, creating a Turkish "safe zone," because we must "protect Turkey from elements of the Kurds that they consider to be terrorists," said the man who a couple of days earlier was calling for sanctions against Turkey.

What's more - oh yes, there's more -

You've heard how we are "protecting" the Syrian oil fields in the eastern part of the country, because of course we get to decide what happens to and with them. Grahamcracker says "we are on the verge of a joint venture between us and the Syrian democratic forces" - the very people we just betrayed - "to modernize the oil fields" and give the revenue from them to the Kurds.

"I'm increasingly optimistic," he said to laughter from the circus crowd. "This can turn out very well."

Meanwhile journalist and author Chris Hedges notes that "The withdrawal of Iraq from the northern Kurdish areas following the 1991 Gulf War created a de facto Kurdish state, the third this century. But Turkey remains determined to destroy it. If history is any guide, the autonomous Kurdish region in northern Iraq will be as short-lived as the other autonomous enclaves briefly carved out by the Kurds over the last century."

Oh and as a footnote: The Pentagon is planning to send tanks and armored vehicles into eastern Syria as part of "protecting" those oil fields, which will require troops to operate and maintain the vehicles, as well as more troops to protect the bases from which they operate. At least we have our priorities straight.

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Next up and standing as a symbol of many others, we have James Bagnell of Edmonton, Alberta.

A painted portrait of Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg appeared on a section of a downtown "free wall" in the city, an area where people are encouraged to do art or make comments.

Bagnell's "comment" was to deface the portrait by spray painting the message "Stop the Lies. This is Oil Country!!!" over the teen's face.

He was seen by a CBC reporter, who asked him why. "We don't need foreigners coming in and telling us" what to do, was the answer.

Showing that he's up to date with his rightwing memes, Bagnell said climate activists are "intolerant" because they are calling for change and Thunberg is a child who is just "doing what she's told," and doesn't know better but who at the same time "should go back to her country and try to make her country better," where apparently she is a fully mature, informed, and independent agent.

Bagnell, who insisted that of course he's concerned about the environment - I bet some of his best friends are environmentalists - said Thunberg should "Just shut up until you have solutions."

Of course, we do have solutions, primary among which is stopping the use of fossil fuels. It's just that clowns like Bagnell don't want to hear about them.

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Speaking of clowns, here's a collection of them: the Christian Right. That's an oxymoron if ever there was one and with the death of Elijah Cummings, some of them proved that the emphasis clearly should be on moron.

"Christian" fundamentalist Stacey Shiftlett insisted that Trump was sent by God himself to govern the US and that Cummings helped lead a “demonic attempt” to remove Trump from office. "I believe that God had had enough," Shiftlett said, "and God moved.”

Yeah, just like with Ananias and Sapphira.

Meanwhile, "Christian" fundamentalist Dave Daubenmire denounced Cummings as an “enemy of the cross” and went on to say, “I’m glad he’s gone. I bet he’s not pro-choice now. I bet he’s not pro-homo now.”

Radio host Jesse Lee Peterson declared “if you notice, John McCain, he dead. Charles Krauthammer, he dead. And Elijah Cummings, now he dead. They all didn’t like The Great White Hope" - which is how he refers to Tweetie-pie, no joke - "they went against him, they talked about him. Now, they all dead. That’s amazing.”

“Don’t mess with The Great White Hope," Peterson intoned. "You see what happens. Don’t mess with God’s children.”

I swear these people are genuinely sick. Clowns, but sick.

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Mike Pence

I should be outraged by this but the image of it is just too comical.

On October 21, Vice President Mike Not-Worth-a-Farthing addressed the opening ceremony of the 70th International Astronautical Congress in Washington, DC.

He made no announcements about national space policy or international cooperation in his remarks, but he did say this:

Under President Donald Trump’s leadership, America is leading in space once again. He believes, as I do, that’s it’s America’s destiny to be the leader amongst nations in our adventure into the great unknown.

Graciously, as befits someone speaking from such a high perch, Not-worth-a-farthing added that our Glorious Leader of Great and Unmatched Wisdom would condescend to allow other "freedom-loving" nations to assist us - "freedom-loving" being defined as sufficiently pro-corporate.

He was reported to have gotten "a lukewarm reaction" from the diverse international audience.

258.5 - Why Turkey sent tanks into Syria

Why Turkey sent tanks into Syria

Let's get to this quickly. No way am I going to try to do an in-depth commentary on what's going on in Syria; that would take an entire book and I expect in the future it will be the subject of several.

But I did want to make a quick comment on news which I expect you heard and came as I was preparing this show: On August 24, Turkey sent tanks and troops into northern Syria. The purpose, or at least the claimed purpose, which was surely a good part of the purpose but just as surely not all of it, was to support a Syrian rebel force in pushing Daesh - that is, ISIS - out of the town of Jarablus, which was the last stronghold ISIS had on the Syrian-Turkish border.

The push was also supported by the US-led coalition - which means by the US - which conducted eight airstrikes as part of the operation, signaling US support for the Turkish incursion.

Within hours, the so-called Free Syrian Army, one of the many Syrian rebel groups and one backed by Turkey, had captured the town.

But why did Turkey act now? Writing at Foreign Policy magazine, Faysal Itani of the Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East at the Atlantic Council noted that Turkey's war on ISIS has been "inconsistent" and suggests that something more than striking a blow against ISIS is involved.

That "something more" is why I wanted to raise this now, even before the dust has settled.

A senior US official told CNN that the US's assessment is that Turkey's cross-border action is not so much about stopping ISIS as it is about stopping the Kurds. The Kurdish Democratic Union Party, known as the PYD, which is backed by the US, played a major role in driving ISIS out of the northern Syrian town of Manbij in mid-August. From there, the YPG, the military arm of the Democratic Union Party, looked to move on Jarablus, about 40km, or 25 miles, north.

And that, the US official said, is when Turkey got interested. "The Turks never cared about Jarablus until the Kurds wanted to get there," the official said.

The thing is, the PYD and the Turks share a common enemy in ISIS - but Turkey regards the PYD as a terrorist group and says it is linked to Turkey's own Kurdish insurgents, the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, against which Turkey is now pursuing a scorched-earth policy in southeastern Turkey. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said Turkey will never allow a Kurdish-held area along its border.

So sum up: The US, Turkey, and the Kurdish Democratic Union Party, or PYD, are all fighting ISIS in Syria. The US supports the PYD, which some have called the single most effective force against ISIS in the conflict. However, Turkey, which is also a US ally, regards the PYD as a terrorist group linked to an internal group in Turkey which Ankara also labels as terrorist.

Looking at those sorts of conflicting alignments, Patrick Cockburn, writing in The Independent, calls the Turkish incursion "a gamble in a dangerous game."

Turkey can act against ISIS, he wrote, "but if this is a mask for an assault on Syrian Kurds then it will be opposed by both the US and Russia," because not only does the US support the PYD, Russia has been appreciative of the Kurds' cooperation with the Russian air campaign in Syria. So an assault on Syrian Kurds could well have unknowable effects on the region.

And indeed, even while Turkey fired artillery at ISIS in Jarablus in preparation for the ground attack, it also shelled Kurdish fighters north of Manbij to hinder or block their movement toward Jarablus.

The Turkish foreign minister says his country wants the PYD to return to the east side of Syria's Euphrates River, which would mean not only forgetting about Jarablus, which lies on the west bank of the river, but leaving Manbij. "Otherwise," he said, "we will do what is necessary."

It is indeed a gamble in a place where, as Cockburn says, things are so complex that participants have great difficulty in telling who their friends are or even where their own best interests lie.

And that is always a dangerous place to be.

Sources cited in links:
http://www.cnn.com/2016/08/24/middleeast/turkish-troops-isis-syria-operation/
http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/08/24/why-turkey-finally-went-to-war-in-syria-jarablus-invasion-kurds/
http://www.cnn.com/2016/08/13/middleeast/syria-isis-manbij/
http://www.cnn.com/2016/06/29/europe/understanding-turkey-enemies/
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/turkey-syria-isis-tanks-gamble-in-a-very-dangerous-game-a7207881.html

254.5 - The world in numbers

The world in numbers

Finally for this week, we'll take a quick tour around the world using numbers.

The first number is 50,000. That is the number of people who have been fired or suspended from their jobs in Turkey in wake of last week's failed coup in what now has every sign of being a combination purge and witch-hunt intended to suppress any dissent to the government of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. More than 9400 people have been arrested. Amnesty International has called it "a crackdown of exceptional proportions."

Turkey had stood as the proof that a nation could be both Muslim and democratic, but in recent times there had been concern that Erdogan and his allies in the national legislature had been pushing the nation in an Islamist - by which I mean here a theocratic - direction. In the wake of the failed coup, Erdogan has taken steps to further centralize his power, intensifying that concern.

The next number is 30. That is the number of years for which the British parliament voted to renew the country's Trident program, Trident being a submarine-launched nuclear missile. Trident program is, that is, Britain's nuclear weapons program.

According to new prime minister Theresa May, apparently out to prove she is as Margaret Thatcher as can be, abandoning weapons of mass destruction would be "an act of gross irresponsibility" while she accused critics of the program of being "the first to defend the country's enemies."

The approval for extending the program came despite the fact that the government's own "National Security Strategy and Strategic Defence and Security Review" found, quoting, "no direct threat to the UK or its vital interests from states developing weapons of mass destruction" - which means, put another way, there is no basis for the claim that Trident is needed to "defend" Great Britain.

The renewal passed handily, 472-117, but beyond absolutely dreaming of a time when 20% of the US Congress would vote to shut down our nuclear weapons programs, I do wonder how many of the "ayes" were based on the attitude expressed by UK Defense Secretary Michael Fallon, who said he hoped the vote would somehow prove in the wake of the Brexit vote that the UK is still a player.

Because, it still seems, being able to commit mass murder is how you show you count as a nation.

Next up is the number "less than 9." According to Oxfam, that is the percentage of the world's refugees being hosted by the world's six richest nations combined - and of those six, one hosts a third of their combined total. Those six - the US, China, Japan, Germany, the UK, and France - together account for nearly 57% of the world's GDP.

By contrast, the six nations - Jordan, Turkey, the Palestinian Territory, Pakistan, Lebanon, and South Africa - that host more than half of the world's 24.5 million refugees and asylum seekers account for less than 2% of the world's GDP.

Those with the most are doing the least; those with the least are struggling to do what they can. Sadly, not an unusual situation.

As a quick footnote, these figures do not include people who have been driven from their homes by violence, war, and human rights violations but who have not left their country and so are not counted as refugees but as "internally displaced persons." Include those people and the number of displaced persons rises from 24.5 million to over 65 million, the highest total that the UN High Commissioner for Refugees has ever recorded.

The next number is 8. That is how many of the nine primary uses for which medical marijuana is recommended for which prescriptions for corporate-produced drugs have declined in states with medical marijuana laws.

This is based on a detailed study of drug prescriptions over the period 2010-2013 which examined the difference between the annual number of prescriptions per doctor in each category of use in states with and without medical marijuana laws. Thus, for example, they found that a typical doctor in a state with medical marijuana issued nearly 1900 fewer prescriptions for pain killers each year than did doctors in states without medical marijuana.

And so on down the line: Fewer prescriptions per year for anxiety, nausea, psychosis, seizures, sleep disorders, depression, and spasticity, which is uncontrolled muscle stiffness or spasms and is often associated with conditions such as cerebral palsy and multiple sclerosis. The only exception was glaucoma, for which prescriptions per doctor rose in states with medical marijuana.

To check their results, the researchers looked at prescriptions for other conditions, ones for which medical marijuana is not recommended, specifically, blood thinners, anti-viral drugs, and antibiotics. They found no difference between medical marijuana states and others, confirming that it was the medical marijuana laws, not something else, that made the difference.

Want to know why Big Pharma is fighting against medical marijuana? The answer is in the numbers: Medical marijuana is cutting into their profits.

Next comes 63. According to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll, that is the percentage of Americans who hold that race relations in the US are generally bad, with a majority of respondents saying they are getting worse.

The good news, if you can call it that, hidden in the bad is that the increase from 48 percent found in a Pew Research survey this spring was largely driven by white Republicans and white independents who had resisted seeing racial discrimination as a problem but now have been forced to acknowledge it.

Finally, 0.0067, or if you prefer 1/150, or 2/3 of 1 percent. According to Bloomberg New Energy Finance, a company that invests in renewable energy, that is how much solar power per unit of output cost in 2015 as compared to what it cost in 1975. Meanwhile, the number of solar installations is now 115,000 times what it was then.

The company predicts that even as coal and natural gas prices stay low, within 15 years wind and solar will be cheaper in many countries and cheaper in most of the world not long after. In some places where solar energy is most easily available, it is already clearly cheaper: Dubai has received a bid to supply 800 megawatts of solar power at a rate equivalent to "US 2.99 cents per kilowatt hour." By comparison, the average residential price for electricity in the United States is 12 cents per kilowatt-hour.

It's not just the Middle East, either: Austin, Texas, and Palo Alto, California, have signed contracts for solar-generated power at under 4 cents/kwh. Even if you take out the federal investment tax credit, it still comes out at 7 cents/kwh, still well below that national average of 12 cents/kwh.

Unfortunately, this still means that we are truly up against it when it comes to global warming because the timelines involved reach out to 2040, by which time we may already be irrevocably committed to blasting through the 2 degrees Celsius target if in fact we have not already done so - but at least it offers some hope and a promise that the very worst can be headed off.

Sources cited in links:
http://www.cnn.com/2016/07/20/europe/turkey-failed-coup-attempt/index.html
http://www.foxnews.com/world/2016/07/18/erdogans-appeal-to-islamists-in-wake-failed-coup-spurs-fears-for-turkeys-future.html
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/british-parliament-set-to-renew-nuclear-weapons-program-for-three-more-decades/2016/07/18/5892583e-4c5e-11e6-bf27-405106836f96_story.html
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-36820416
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/trident-vote-nuclear-weapons-theresa-may-a7142726.html
http://www.cnn.com/2016/07/18/world/oxfam-richest-countries-refugees/
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jul/18/refugees-us-china-japan-germany-france-uk-host-9-per-cent
http://www.unhcr.org/statistics/unhcrstats/576408cd7/unhcr-global-trends-2015.html
http://www.unhcr.org/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/07/13/one-striking-chart-shows-why-pharma-companies-are-fighting-legal-marijuana/?wpisrc=nl_p1wemost-partner-1&wpmm=1
http://content.healthaffairs.org/content/35/7/1230
http://www.webmd.com/pain-management/pain-management-spasticity
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/more-than-6-in-10-adults-say-us-race-relations-are-generally-bad-poll-indicates/2016/07/16/66548936-4aa8-11e6-90a8-fb84201e0645_story.html?wpisrc=nl_headlines&wpmm=1
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2016/07/18/3797907/solar-energy-miracle-charts/
http://www.bloomberg.com/company/new-energy-outlook/#findings

Left Side of the Aisle #254

Left Side of the Aisle
for the weeks of July 21 - August 3, 2015

This week:

Good News: win for voting rights in Wisconsin
http://www.jsonline.com/news/statepolitics/judge-issues-injunction-allows-voters-without-ids-to-cast-ballots-b99764677z1-387501461.html
http://www.politicspa.com/turzai-voter-id-law-means-romney-can-win-pa/37153/
https://www.thenation.com/
https://www.thenation.com/article/a-big-victory-for-voting-rights-in-wisconsin/
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/muckraker/todd-allbaugh-voter-id-wisconsin-gop
http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2015/04/1985-voter-suppression-is-right-wing.html

Outrage of the Week: Supreme Court legitimizes corruption
http://www.politico.com/story/2016/06/supreme-court-overturns-bob-mcdonnells-corruption-convictions-224833
http://www.npr.org/2016/06/27/483749525/supreme-court-overturns-former-virginia-gov-bob-mcdonnells-conviction
https://www.yahoo.com/news/jersey-sen-bob-menendez-indicted-corruption-charges-195317722--politics.html?ref=gs
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2016/07/18/latest-ex-utah-official-gratified-by-charges-decision.html
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Anatole_France
http://www.citizensforethics.org/
http://www.cnn.com/2016/06/27/politics/bob-mcdonnell-supreme-court/index.html

Protesters plan "Fart-In" during Democratic convention
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/sanders-fans-plan-dnc-fart-protest-clinton-nomination-n611596
http://www.aol.com/article/2016/07/24/democratic-party-head-resigns-amid-email-furor-on-eve-of-convent/21438028/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/wikileaks-dnc-bernie-sanders_us_579381fbe4b02d5d5ed1d157
http://economichumanrights.org/
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/8/13/766336/-

Clown Award: Rep. Steve King
http://www.dailykos.com/stories/2016/7/18/1549495/-Iowa-Congressman-asks-what-sub-groups-have-contributed-more-to-civilization-than-white-people
http://www.aol.com/article/2016/07/18/gop-congressman-says-non-white-sub-groups-have-contributed-les/21434394/?icid=maing-grid7|main5|dl22|sec1_lnk2&pLid=1686787329_htmlws-main-bb
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2016/07/19/rep-king-takes-heat-for-questioning-contribution-non-whites-in-society.html
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/what-steve-king-considers-racist-and-divisive
http://www.girlsaskguys.com/other/q1421386-why-is-it-that-the-majority-of-inventions-are-by-whites-caucasians

The world in numbers
 http://www.cnn.com/2016/07/20/europe/turkey-failed-coup-attempt/index.html
http://www.foxnews.com/world/2016/07/18/erdogans-appeal-to-islamists-in-wake-failed-coup-spurs-fears-for-turkeys-future.html
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/british-parliament-set-to-renew-nuclear-weapons-program-for-three-more-decades/2016/07/18/5892583e-4c5e-11e6-bf27-405106836f96_story.html
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-36820416
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/trident-vote-nuclear-weapons-theresa-may-a7142726.html
http://www.cnn.com/2016/07/18/world/oxfam-richest-countries-refugees/
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jul/18/refugees-us-china-japan-germany-france-uk-host-9-per-cent
http://www.unhcr.org/statistics/unhcrstats/576408cd7/unhcr-global-trends-2015.html
http://www.unhcr.org/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/07/13/one-striking-chart-shows-why-pharma-companies-are-fighting-legal-marijuana/?wpisrc=nl_p1wemost-partner-1&wpmm=1
http://content.healthaffairs.org/content/35/7/1230
http://www.webmd.com/pain-management/pain-management-spasticity
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/more-than-6-in-10-adults-say-us-race-relations-are-generally-bad-poll-indicates/2016/07/16/66548936-4aa8-11e6-90a8-fb84201e0645_story.html?wpisrc=nl_headlines&wpmm=1
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2016/07/18/3797907/solar-energy-miracle-charts/
http://www.bloomberg.com/company/new-energy-outlook/#findings

226.4 - Boots on the ground in Syria

Boots on the ground in Syria

I said it last week. I said that, quoting myself,

The Obama administration, the Amazing Mr. O, our Nobel-Peace-Prize winning Prez, is considering a direct combat role, boots on the ground, for US forces in Iraq and Syria.

I reported that, quoting again, his

most senior national security advisers have recommended measures that would move US troops closer to the front lines in Iraq and Syria, including positioning some number of Special Operations forces on the ground in Syria.

Well, just two days after I did that show, last Friday, it came true: The US, lead by our peacenik in residence, is going to deploy Special Operations forces into Kurdish-controlled areas in northern Syria. Supposedly to "coordinate" but perhaps also to protect the Kurds from more attacks by our supposed ally Turkey, which has pledged to take a more active role in battling ISIS but has spent most of that time bombing the Kurds because it's afraid that if the Kurds get a foothold in northern Syria it may lead to increased demands for autonomy or even independence among Kurds in Turkey.

But the point I wanted to focus on here is the obvious one: These special forces are going into Syria. Boots on the ground. In Syria. Where they were never going to be.

This is so blatant a move that even the New York Times was obliged to call it "a huge shift" in policy.

The White House continued with its bold faced lying about what is going on, insisting it's just a small number of troops while at the same time insisting they will be "an important force multiplier" that will have "a real impact" but without having "a combat mission." And if you can follow the logic of that, you can be a White House representative. Actually you don't have to follow it, you just have to be able to say it with a straight face.

Again, even the New York Times was moved to pointedly note that

the definition of combat has changed several times since the United States began airstrikes against the Islamic State in August 2014.

In fact, the paper notes, "Special Operations forces have conducted several secret missions on the ground" including raids into Syria.

That is, Obama and his minions have been lying to us about fighting on the ground, they are lying to us about fighting on the ground, and they will continue to lie to us about fighting on the ground for as long as they can get away with it, which is likely to be until some sufficiently large numbers of Americans are killed that they can't be brushed away as accidents or isolated tragedies or the results of individual acts of heroism.

Even so, the lies are fraying because they are becoming so obvious. Recently, White House press secretary Josh Earnest, saying something only a presidential press secretary could say with any facade of dignity because they actually have none, asserted that sending Special Forces into Syria  does not represent any change in strategy and, swallowing whatever self-respect he had left, said that troops in Syria don't have a combat mission, but they could be in combat situations. Which strikes me like a burglar saying "I don't have a breaking-and-entering mission, but I could find myself in a breaking-and-entering situation."

But in one sense, the strategy does remain the same. Not the military strategy, but the domestic political strategy of heading off any opposition that can't be brushed off as the product of right-wing rejection of anything Obama does, heading off opposition by making the US role in the carnage as invisible, as seemingly sanitary, as, most importantly, painless for us as possible. The pain suffered by others? Well, they, after all, are "others."

There was some bitter humor to be found in all this. A "senior defense official" quoted by CNN said that Obama has approved a current cap of less than 50 troops in Syria - but more could be sent. So there is a cap. Unless there isn't. Which shouldn't be a surprise, considering this president has blown through his own declared limits on US forces in Iraq, the time frame for withdrawal from Afghanistan, and now the promise of no "boots on the ground" in Syria. It seems the only "cap" around here is the one on Donald Trumps' pointed head.

Sources cited in links:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/31/world/obama-will-send-forces-to-syria-to-help-fight-the-islamic-state.html?_r=0
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/01/world/middleeast/isis-is-target-of-turkish-bombing-raids.html?_r=0
http://www.cnn.com/2015/10/30/politics/syria-troops-special-operations-forces/index.html?eref=rss_politics
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-government/white-house/article39271314.html

And the award for the most unsurprising news of the week goes to...

...the Turkel Commission! (Applause, presenting of the bouquet, tearful walk down the runway, etc.)

The Turkel Commission, in case you don't recognize the name, is the panel set up by the Israeli government to "investigate" last May's assault by the Israeli military on the Mavi Marmara, one of a flotilla of six ships then attempting to challenge the illegal Israeli blockade of the Gaza Strip. Nine passengers - eight Turks and one Turkish-American - were killed and several more wounded.

After carefully considering all the Israeli evidence offered by Israeli government officials and Israeli military officials, this Israeli-government-established panel found that the Israeli soldiers (and therefore the Israeli government and the Israeli military) acted entirely lawfully. What's more,

[t]he Israeli investigation also found that Israel's three-year blockade of Gaza, which the ship was trying to broach, does not violate international law.

Put more simply, once again the accused have investigated themselves and declared themselves not guilty.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu praised the inquiry.

"I hope all those who rushed to judgment against Israel and its soldiers will read this report and learn the truth about what happened," Netanyahu said. "The truth is that our soldiers were defending our country — and defending their very lives."

Indeed, the panel asserted that the soldiers' lives had been in danger - even though, somehow, pure coincidence (or God's will) no doubt, it was only passengers who were killed. Moreover, the commission claimed to have looked at 133 individual cases in which soldiers used force, including 16 involving shooting to kill, and found that in every single case the soldiers had "acted professionally in the face of extensive and unanticipated violence." Geez, you'd think they were cops.

The Turkish government, which had earlier released its own findings, rejected the report, as did Israeli Arab Knesset member Haneen Zoabi, who noted that the report is based entirely on the statements of the same people who ordered and carried out the attack.

"The Commission was not granted the power to investigate the detailed circumstances in which nine were killed, which was the primary motivation behind the Turkish and international demand for the establishment of a commission of inquiry."

She said the commission report "lacks any value."

Israeli human rights group Gisha also criticized the Turkel Commission's conclusions.

"No commission of inquiry can authorize the collective punishment of a civilian population by restricting its movement and access, as Israel did in its closure of Gaza," Executive Director Sari Bashi told AOL News. "A primary goal of the restrictions, as declared by Israel, was to paralyze the economy in Gaza and prevent its residents from leading normal lives."

In September, a UN Human Rights Council inquiry charged that the Israeli attack was “clearly unlawful” and "demonstrated levels of totally unnecessary and incredible violence." Now, as I said shortly thereafter,

[a]dmittedly, the Human Rights Council has a somewhat spotted reputation and in some cases, especially as it relates to its member states, a rather tenuous relationship with hard truth.

Even so, the US was the only member of the Council to vote against accepting the report - and, significantly, in doing so, offered no criticism of its contents.

The Human Rights Council report is separate from the four-member investigating committee set up by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, which has yet to issue its own findings.

Footnote: The Gisha site has an interesting little game called "Safe Passage" which points out the legal and bureaucratic means Israel uses to restrict movement between Gaza and the West Bank in pursuit of a policy of "separation," using quotes from Israeli laws, regulations, and court filings. It's an interesting experience.

Footnote to the preceding, maybe it is that simple after all

According to Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Economy.com, about 12 million US homeowners - nearly one in six - are "under water." That is, they owe more on their mortgages than their house is worth.

That compares to a figure of about 6.6 million at the end of 2007 and 3 million at the end of 2006.

"At the root it's 'the' problem," said Zandi. "If you're going to put your finger on the one thing that's gotten us into this fiasco, it's the fact that millions of homeowners are under water on their homes." ...

In a slowing economy, it doesn't take much to push an underwater mortgage into default.

"When you're under water and you have some kind of hit to your income or some kind of unintended expense, that's when you default. And so now we've got this noxious mix of millions of people under water and quickly rising unemployment," Zandi said. ...

While the U.S. government has focused its rescue on banks, it has done little to help individuals who are struggling to pay their mortgages, apart from the HOPE NOW program, which has facilitated a few hundred thousand mortgage restructurings.

This is despite the fact that nearly a third of homes purchased over the last six years - and nearly half of those purchased over the last three years - now have negative equity.

Steve Berg, a managing director at research firm LPS Applied Analytics, said mortgages originated in 2008 were on par or trending worse than those originated last year or in 2006.

In other words, it's getting worse. And instead of addressing "'the' problem," the government is shoveling money at the banks. Which thus remains a pretty fair indication of what and who is regarded as important.

Not everything is in the toilet

In 2004, when it looked like there was a good chance to reach a deal that would reunite the two halves of Cyprus and put an end to the 30-year Turkish military occupation of the northern part of the island, I did a whole series of posts - 14 in all - on the negotiations, the referendum, and their ultimate failure. I said in my last post that it was interesting re-reading the previous ones: "I can see how my initial hope gradually turned to cynicism."

But, for better or for worse, I find it impossible to remain a cynic permanently. So here is something for me, from CNN for Friday:

Cyprus' rival community leaders have agreed to accelerate the peace process by holding weekly negotiations on a deal to reunify the war-divided island.

President Dimitris Christofias, a Greek Cypriot, and Turkish Cypriot leader Mehmet Ali Talat met for the fourth time since relaunching talks last month to end a four-year stalemate. Both say they are committed to end the island's decades-old division. ...

U.N. envoy Alexander Downer, who moderated the talks, said Friday Christofias and Talat agreed to meet once a week "to keep the momentum of the process going."

I'm not sure exactly what kind of "momentum" there can be in a "four-year stalemate" but I'll take what I can get.

Once more into the breach

(Cross-posted to the Out of Irag Bloggers Caucus.)

Remember what I said just over a week ago, how Kirkuk remains a potential "flashpoint for ethnic conflict?" Juan Cole brings the goods: First, he cites Reuters for Friday, which reports that Kurdish councilors

called for the city [of Kirkuk] to become part of the largely autonomous region of Kurdistan. ...

Thursday's decision by Kurdish councilors at a provincial council meeting was symbolic because other factions boycotted the session. The council's head, himself a Kurd, also noted the call was unconstitutional.

But tensions have been rising over the city's fate, with demonstrators taking to the streets several times this week.

One of those rallies, last Monday, was attacked by a suicide bomber. Some 23 people were killed.

The central Iraqi government rejected the councilors' call while urging calm:

"The Iraqi government calls upon all parties and groups in Kirkuk province to refrain from carrying out any [actions] that might harm the national unity," government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said in a statement. "The Iraqi government is stressing its [opposition to] any unilateral measure to change the status of Kirkuk."

Kurds regard Kirkuk as their historical capital and demand that it become part of the largely-autonomous Kurdish region. The central government's opposition is likely based not only on questions of "national unity" but concern over the prospect losing direct control over the oil-rich region of which Kirkuk is part. Another significant player, Turkey, is also watching warily: For its own internal reasons, Turkey fears any strengthening of Kurdish interests and expressed "anxiety" over the proposal.

But the real source of potential conflict comes from a third source: The non-Kurd residents of Kirkuk, particularly the Turkmen (also Turkomen), who also regard Kirkuk as home and fear ethnic oppression if the city becomes part of Kurdistan. This is something I first brought up over four years ago. Over a year ago, I noted that the leader of a Turkmen group in Kirkuk said "all the Turkmens will become suicide bombers to defend the Turkmen identity" of the city.

The intensity of that feeling remains, as evidenced by an interview with Narmin Al-Mufti, an official of the Turkoman Front, published in the Kurdish newspaper Chawder. Juan Cole posted the translation done by the US federal government's Open Source Center.

In the interview, Mufti called the Kurdistan Regional Government "not a lawful region but an internal administration." That is, the Front accepts the Kurdish area as an administrative region but does not accept autonomy, charging it is contrary to the Iraqi constitution. In fact, he said they do not recognize the constitution itself

because it has been forced upon us without our agreement. We prefer and recognize the older constitution, which contained 39 articles and did not contain Article 140,

which relates to the future of Kirkuk.

He also said the Turkoman Front does "not believe the Kurdish leadership," who "are only concerned about, and work for, their own interests" and that

[t]he Turkoman Front does not agree with elections, because balloting would be in the interest of the Kurdish political parties and they are always carrying out vote fraud.

Fraud such as, he charged, moving hundreds of thousands of "non-residents" to Kirkuk to affect potential elections. Kick those "non-residents" out, he said, and the Front could accept elections, because then "the Turkomans would have the majority vote in Kirkuk."

"I want to tell the Kurdish leadership," he concluded, "that we would rather be part of China than Kurdistan." The Kurds, every bit as determined on the matter, would probably be willing to grant that wish.

The chance of any short-term breakthrough on this impasse seems unlikely, especially considering that

Iraqi parliamentarians failed on Sunday to pass a law on provincial elections, putting the date of important polls in doubt and leaving unresolved a political standoff that has stoked ethnic tensions[, Reuters reports].

After struggling for hours to reach a quorum, lawmakers indefinitely postponed a special session they had called to pass the law, which has come unstuck over plans for the disputed northern city of Kirkuk and angered minority Kurds.

Still, hope springs eternal and all that.

Lawmakers did not say when they would reschedule the debate, but political leaders continued meetings to seek a compromise. ...

Mahmoud Othman, a Kurdish lawmaker, said a compromise was close at hand and parliament would hold another vote when faction leaders signal they have reached a deal.

"We are waiting for the white smoke to rise," he said.

The trouble is, when we see the smoke rising, will it mean what Othman wants it to mean? Or will it signify a heat that is starting to do more than just smolder? Or even an impending explosion?

Footnote to the preceding, Lest We Forget Div.

(Cross-posted to the Out of Iraq Bloggers Caucus.)

Turkish officials stated that their warplanes bombed 13 "rebel targets" in northern Iraq on Wednesday, AP reported.

Turkey has conducted frequent air raids on suspected positions of the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, in northern Iraq. Earlier this year, it also launched a weeklong ground offensive there. ...

The PKK has been fighting for self-rule in southeast Turkey since 1984. The violence has killed tens of thousands of people since then.

The rebels use bases in Iraq as a staging ground for cross-border attacks on Turkish targets.

The military said it was determined to press ahead with anti-rebel operations both inside Turkey and across the border in Iraq "according to military needs."

It needs to be mentioned here that Turkey's battle with the PKK is largely of its own making, having viciously repressed the Kurds, who make up nearly 20% of Turkey's population, in the wake of the 1980 military coup - even for eight years banning the use of the Kurdish language in an effort to deny their cultural identity, an effort which continues today.

The result, almost a predictable one, has been to create a new, more radicalized generation, "the children of serhildan," (intifada, uprising) in the words of anthropologist Hisyar Ozsoy. It's a generation raised in poverty and schooled on

endless tales of family and friends burnt out of their villages in the hills and decanted into the slums of [the eastern city of] Diyarbakir

as part of a deliberate scorched earth policy undertaken by the Turkish military during an intense period of fighting in the early 1990s. A generation more prepared for more violence than their elders. A generation created by war whose existence promises more of it.

This is by no means to say the PKK is innocent; it has in years past been willing to kill those it regarded as "traitors" and has attacked civilians. Still, beyond a few examples such as a suspected PKK bombing in Ankara in May 2007, actual cases of attacks on civilians as opposed to military targets and armed police have proved hard to come by, and most of the sources for those were Turkish, which necessarily raises issues of possible bias.

But again, this is not to say the PKK is innocent. It is, however, to say that if Turkey really wants to solve its "Kurdish problem" rather than, as it has in the past, temporarily suppress it, it will need to learn, as governments over history have learned, that dropping bombs in not the way to do it because "what goes around, comes around." A. J. Muste was much closer to the mark:

"There is no way to peace - peace is the way."

Footnote to the Footnote: The US, among others, regards the PKK as a terrorist organization. According to Seymour Hersh, however, that has not kept the US and Israel from

working together in support of a Kurdish resistance group known as the Party for Free Life in Kurdistan. The group has been conducting clandestine cross-border forays into Iran, I was told by a government consultant with close ties to the Pentagon civilian leadership, as “part of an effort to explore alternative means of applying pressure on Iran.”

The Party for Free Life in Kurdistan, or PEJAK,

emerged this decade as an Iranian offshoot of the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK....

Former members say PEJAK was meant to circumvent Western restrictions on contacts with the PKK, which has been labeled a terrorist organization by the U.S. State Department and the European Union.

Both the US and Israel deny any support for PEJAK, but given the choice between the US government, the Israeli government, and Seymour Hersh, I damn well know which one I trust.