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Gonzalo Lira, a prominent commentator on the Russia-Ukraine war imprisoned in Ukraine for speech critical of the country’s government, has died after weeks of medical neglect by Ukrainian authorities. Chilean-American war commentator Gonzalo Lira died shortly before noon on January 11, 2024 at a hospital in Kharkiv, where he had been imprisoned for eight months since he was accused of justifying Russian war efforts in Ukraine. Lira came to prominence in 2022 when he emerged as a critical voice in […]

The post American citizen Gonzalo Lira dies from neglect in Ukrainian prison first appeared on The Grayzone.

The post American citizen Gonzalo Lira dies from neglect in Ukrainian prison appeared first on The Grayzone.

For decades, Boeing chose shareholders and executives over workers and production quality — to the tune of $69 billion.

Via Raw Story: A Florida Republican’s bill aims to silence accusations of racism, homophobia, sexism, transphobia, or any other allegations of discrimination, making them “defamation” under the law and potentially costing the person who made them up to $35,000 in the state known for its “Don’t Say Gay” law. The sweeping legislation also appears to void journalists’ right to not reveal sources, and, chillingly removes the long-standing requirement that a public figure needs to show “actual malice” to win a defamation lawsuit. “In cases of alleged homophobia or transphobia, defendants charged with defamation are not allowed to use the plaintiff’s religious or scientific beliefs as part of their defense. If they are found liable for defamation, the defendant could be fined at least $35,000,” The New Republic reports, noting it “would silence basically any accusations of discrimination.” “The bill applies to statements made in print, on television, or on social media.

Trump keeps saying that trying to overturn a legal election and obstruct the peaceful transfer of power was part of his official duties as president. But that’s not what his lawyers said after the election as you can see by that Supreme Court filing above. Politico reports that he’s now saying that the election was “long over” and he was acting in his capacity as president: In the months after the 2020 election, Donald Trump leaned on his campaign to launch ad blitzes and legal challenges to the results, insisting to his supporters that the election was “ a long way from over.” He even told state and federal courts he was suing in his capacity as a political candidate. Now, in a bid to derail criminal charges, he’s saying the opposite. At least six times in the past two weeks, Trump has declared that the election was “ long over” by the time he began pushing state officials and then-Vice President Mike Pence to overturn his defeat.

The Pentagon has its eye on the leading AI company, which this week softened its ban on military use.

The post OpenAI Quietly Deletes Ban on Using ChatGPT for “Military and Warfare” appeared first on The Intercept.

‘There is no safe space in Gaza and the world should be ashamed.’ Blinne Ní Ghrálaigh’s closing speech at the International Court of Justice will stay with me forever. Devastating and forensic in equal measure, Ní Ghrálaigh spoke for millions of people around the world who have been utterly appalled by the horrors unfolding live […]

A new, in-depth timeline of efforts to help Samer Abu Daqqa reveals that Israel was repeatedly pressed to allow for his rescue, but kept emergency crews at bay for hours.

The post Israel Bombed an Al Jazeera Cameraman — and Blocked Evacuation Efforts as He Bled to Death appeared first on The Intercept.

This piece in Politico by Michael Kruse is a tour de force and I highly recommend reading the whole thing if you have time. This topic is something that’s been discussed a lot but I’ve never seen this put together in quite this way. Trump has been trying to blow up the American system of justice for decades. And now he has a fairly good chance of doing exactly that: What happened in Room 300 of the New York County Courthouse in lower Manhattan in November had never happened. Not in the preceding almost two and a half centuries of the history of the United States. Donald Trump was on the witness stand. It was not unprecedented in the annals of American jurisprudence just because it was a former president, although that was totally true. It was unprecedented because the power dynamic of the courtroom had been upended — the defendant was not on defense, the most vulnerable person in the room was the most dominant person in the room, and the people nominally in charge could do little about it.

In the morning, my son and daughter wander downstairs whenever they want. I don’t bother waking them at a reasonable hour, since my highest priority as a parent is for my kids to see me as their best friend, rather than an authority figure.

I believe that any attempt to regulate my kids’ eating will give them eating disorders, so I let them choose their own breakfast. They always choose granola.

My kids get dressed, but when I see my daughter’s clothes, I inform her they’re not revealing enough. I retrieve a pair of scissors from my unnecessarily open kitchen and cut her shirt in half horizontally to reveal her midriff. I convince both kids to put on more makeup.

Next, I drop the kids off at school because they’re too soft to walk the six miles uphill. I’m always careful to pack their water bottles, even though I never brought a water bottle to school, and I didn’t die of dehydration.

Israel has just defended the indefensible in the International Court of Justice, in its quest to have the case brought by South Africa against it thrown out. At the historic ICJ hearing on Thursday, South Africa – itself a past victim of murderous colonialism and apartheid for almost half a century – made an impassioned Continue reading »

The US and UK have reportedly struck over a dozen sites in Yemen using Tomahawk missiles and fighter jets, backed by logistical support from Australia, Canada, Bahrain and the Netherlands. A statement from President Biden asserts that the strikes against “targets in Yemen used by Houthi rebels” are a “direct response to unprecedented Houthi attacks Continue reading »

“… but they can be sure that they won’t be recorded for their crimes in history — because there won’t be any history” (Noam Chomsky, 2023) The macabre criminality of world so-called ”leaders”, coupled with the ignorant compliance of a majority of victims of global heating and nuclear annihilation, belong to the inconceivable. It is Continue reading »

John Howard took Australia into the devastating war of aggression in Iraq in March 2003 but has still not been held accountable. Recently released archives show the then prime minister did not even bother to prepare a written cabinet submission setting out the case for the invasion. Yet there was no plausible evidence available to Continue reading »

The term terrorism has become a fighting word in the arsenal of a declining world empire known as the United States of America. Its leaders’ endless talk of terrorism is in reality a desperate swansong, an indicator of the downfall of the United States as a global empire, its slow but irreversible disappearance from the Continue reading »

Israel is relying on world sympathy fatigue and amnesia. They are biding their time for the world to look away so that they can finish the job they started back in 1948. That is, the elimination of the Palestinian people. With luck, they hope, the world will stop their bleeding-heart moaning about Gaza and the Continue reading »

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As South Africa presents its case against Israel to the International Court of Justice, even Genocide Joe might hesitate to defy a “binding” order of the world’s highest judicial authority by continuing to support, militarily, financially and diplomatically, Israel’s genocidal assault against the people of Gaza. The three hours of oral arguments by the six Continue reading »

“Whatever the outcome, we are witnessing an amazing moment of rule of international law history,” said Amnesty International secretary general Agnès Callamard. Human rights defenders and legal experts on Thursday lauded what many called South Africa’s “compelling” opening presentation at the International Court of Justice in The Hague in a case accusing Israel of genocide Continue reading »

The hearing at the ICJ is not only a determination of the genocidal nature of Israel’s assault on Gaza, it is also an adjudication on the morality of the West. This week, South Africa will open its case against Israel at the International Court of Justice in The Hague. The indictment is based on the Continue reading »

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Here we go again. The House Republicans are running around in circles, unable to agree among themselves about what they were sent to Washington to do and we are once again on the cusp of a government shutdown. No matter who’s in charge or what the circumstances are, they just can’t get anything done. And for some reason they believe this is a winning election year strategy. The week started out on a hopeful note. I was pleasantly surprised to see that Speaker Mike Johnson and House Majority Leader Chuck Schumer had come to an agreement on a top-line budget number. This seemed to signal that Johnson and his team were serious negotiators who might actually be able to avoid a government shut down. Of course, the framework was already in place from the deal struck last spring between then Speaker Kevin McCarthy and President Biden to raise the debt ceiling, but it still spoke well of his successor that he could be practical enough to recognize that he was going to have to negotiate.