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Consider Donald Trump to be in a racial bind when it comes to election 2024. After all, he needs Black voters to at least defect from Joe Biden in swing states, if not actually vote for him. Yet, more than ever, he also needs his white nationalist base to believe that a second Trump term will be even more racist than the first and he’s been openly claiming that he’ll address the ghost of anti-white racism. Not surprisingly, his evolving strategy for the Black vote has been high on empty symbolism and viral moments, but distinctly low on specific promised policy benefits for the Black community. Milkshakes and far-right policies are all the presumptive Republican presidential candidate has recently offered... Read more

Source: Black MAGA Is Still MAGA appeared first on TomDispatch.com.

Marjorie Taylor Greene and other MAGA leaders are demanding that Mike Johnson defind Jack Smith’s office. That’s ridiculous, of course but it’s good for fundraising, I guess. But Trump and his henchmen do have big plans for the DOJ and the FBI if they win in November: Trump, who has been indicted on dozens of criminal charges by the Justice Department, has vowed on the campaign trail to overhaul the agency if he wins the presidential election on Nov. 5 and pledged to use it to pursue his own opponents, including Democratic President Joe Biden. The plan is essentially twofold, according to the nine people interviewed by Reuters, some of whom requested anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. First: flood the Justice Department with stalwart conservatives unlikely to say “no” to controversial orders from the White House.

October of 2020: Granted, it was Rasmussen but still. By the way, the 2020 Black vote came in at 8% for Trump. Today Biden spoke at the Morehouse graduation. Everyone was worried there would be a massive protest or walkout. The Morehouse president had said that they were prepared to shut down the ceremony if such a thing happened (rather than call security or police) so everyone was on high alert. There were a couple of awkward moments but no huge protest. The valedictorian ended his address by calling for a ceasefire in Gaza and Biden applauded and then later endorsed in his speech.There was no mass protest but a handful of graduates turned their backs on him. His speech seemed to be well received. That doesn’t mean there isn’t a problem for Biden among young Black men. A lot of young working class men of all races and ethnicity are attracted to Trump. That’s a sad comment on our culture but it is what it is. And Gaza has animated the young beyond any other issue and many of them blame Biden for the war. But when it comes down to voting, there’s a good chance that this massive racial realignment some of the polls are suggesting is overblown.

Keeping silent, while a genocide is in full swing for all to see, is not good for social cohesion. These days any expression of grief over the genocide in Gaza is regarded as a threat to social cohesion. Any expression of moral clarity is labelled antisemitic. A large number of us are expected to keep silent and Continue reading »

The late historian Paul Schroeder offered insights into how to bring Russia into a collective security arrangement. With the death of scholar Paul Schroeder, international historians lost one of their most innovative and distinguished practitioners. Schroeder’s approach to the study of international relations was ideational: it is not power or interests alone that shapes the Continue reading »

When Labour Governments moved to protect native forest in the past – Hawke, Wran, Gallop, Kirner, Beattie, Carr – they knew that they were protecting irreplaceable natural values and resources. Even as late as the early 2000s however, the role of forests in climate change mitigation was little known. It was certainly not a matter Continue reading »

The Australia/Israel and Jewish Affairs Council (AIJAC) is a constant presence in Australia’s mainstream media. Its predominant role is to defend the state of Israel come hell or high water. Whenever someone appears in the media criticising Israel and/or supporting the Palestinian cause, AIJAC personnel pop up to set the reader straight. AIJAC complains about Continue reading »

For Australian-German author and journalist Antony Loewenstein, Gaza was rarely a place to fear as a Jew. Living and working in East Jerusalem, before the war, he was a visitor to the Palestinian enclave, enjoying its seafood, its culture, its hospitality, and its people. “I thought it was important as a Jew, to say to Continue reading »

Aged care and disability services bureaucratic elites seem increasingly to work in ways that are divorced from morality and common sense and removed from the everyday reality experienced by older people and their families. The modern Age of Reason was characterised by three pivotal events and the influential figures behind them. The Inquisition of the Continue reading »

Every element of Australia’s health system is in trouble. But you’d never know it from looking at this year’s budget. Every previous Labor government since the second world war had good reasons to boast of its performance in health policy. The Albanese government, on the evidence, does not. The 2024-25 budget leaves the nation’s crumbling Continue reading »

It is curious that though the Russia-Ukraine conflict is now in its third year, Australian audiences have been only given one side of the picture: that of Ukraine and its Western backers. The commercial outlets, no doubt, have their reasons for acting like Pravda would in Russia and toeing the line of the Australian government Continue reading »

How did the Vietnamese prevail at that world-historical moment? The answers shed light on the world we see outside our windows now. I had the most salutary email the other day, a reviving lift amid these, humanity’s darkest days, surely, in the memory of anyone living. It was from George Burchett, an Australian painter who Continue reading »

Week-end Wrap – Political Economy – May 19 2024

by Tony Wikrent

Strategic Political Economy

You Can’t Run Industrial Policy OR A War Economy Under Neoliberalism 

Ian Welsh, May 13, 2024

Oh never mind I shouldn’t be shocked by this but I am: Republican officials have completely lost any sense of decency. So much so that even Fox News MAGA adherents like Bartiromo are pushing back. By the way, Murphy is a surgeon. Honestly, this sort of thing greatly worries me. MAGA seems to infect a lot of doctors and it makes me think it’s probably wise to determine whether yours has Fox News Brain Rot before you go under the knife.

Q: Viktor Orbán seized control of universities and put them in foundations that were run by his allies. He rewrote the Constitution, he neutered the courts, and he has tried to control the media. Is that what you’re advocating for in the US? Trump VP contender Vance: I think he’s made smart decisions that we could learn from in the United States There you have it. As Michael Tomasky writes in the intro to The New Republic’s issue on American fascism: [A]nyone transported back to 1932 Germany could very, very easily have explained away Herr Hitler’s excesses and been persuaded that his critics were going overboard. After all, he spent 1932 campaigning, negotiating, doing interviews—being a mostly normal politician. But he and his people vowed all along that they would use the tools of democracy to destroy it, and it was only after he was given power that Germany saw his movement’s full face. Today, we at The New Republic think we can spend this election year in one of two ways. We can spend it debating whether Trump meets the nine or 17 points that define fascism.

Does the Israeli government know or care what it’s doing? And what if it does? (via The Guardian): Virtually all we know we get from reports like these. U.S. medics trapped in Gaza share emotional testimonies Perhaps one of the American doctors from the group tells NPR: Dr. Adam Hamawy, a U.S. doctor and former U.S. Army combat surgeon who is currently in Gaza, says he has “never in my career witnessed the level of atrocities and targeting of my medical colleagues as I have in Gaza.” Hospitals in Gaza are reported on the verge of collapse. “The weight of it all” Dr. Tanya Haj-Hassan shares with Mehdi Hasan’s Zeteo her experience working two weeks in Gaza. It’s not pretty (40 min video): “What I saw [in Gaza]… was utter and complete carnage,” Dr. Tanya Haj-Hassan tells author and Zeteo contributor Fatima Bhutto in the latest episode of ‘The Exchange.’ Haj-Hassan, a pediatric intensive care doctor, recently spent two weeks in Gaza working at the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in the central part of the enclave.

Corporate landlords are buying up homes and terrorizing tenants with junk fees and negligent maintenance, and other news from The Lever this week.

The INTERNET is UNdefeated Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D) of Texas inspired beats and tunes last week. I may add the Motown-inspired song below to one of my playlists. ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● For The Win, 5th Edition is ready for download. Request a copy of my free countywide GOTV planning guide at ForTheWin.us.

In today's BCTV Daily Dispatch: SNL, King of the Hill, Doctor Who, Booster Gold, Spider-Man, The Acolyte, X-Men '97, Bosch: Legacy & more!

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A WAR veteran and a CrossFit coach have banded together to launch ‘Sawtell Men’, a free support group for men involving regular exercise on the beach then coffee and a chat. The purpose of the group is to better each other’s lives by encouraging great conversations and meeting up on a regular basis for a...

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OZFISH Unlimited, Australia’s fishing conservation charity, in collaboration with NSW DPI Fisheries, is spearheading a cleanup campaign for Bonville Creek on Saturday May 18, 2024. Recreational anglers are invited to join hands in this worthy cause to keep the local waterways clean and free of rubbish. Advertise with News of The Area today. It’s worth...

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AT TIMES when a community is grieving it can be difficult to know what to say and to whom to say it. In light of recent tragic deaths within the Coffs Coast community, News Of The Area spoke with local ‘death doula’ Rani Foreman about navigating grief and loss. Advertise with News of The Area...

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