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The Washington Post reports on some of the MAGA faithful who are losing their nest eggs on Trump’s Truth Social stock: Jerry Dean McLain first bet on former president Donald Trump’s Truth Social two years ago, buying into the Trump company’s planned merger partner, Digital World Acquisition, at $90 a share. Over time, as the price changed, he kept buying, amassing hundreds of shares for $25,000 — pretty much his “whole nest egg,” he said. That nest egg has lost about half its value in the past two weeks as Trump Media & Technology Group’s share price dropped from $66 after its public debut last month to $32 on Friday. But McLain, 71, who owns a tree-removal service outside Oklahoma City, said he’s not worried. If anything, he wants to buy more. “I know good and well it’s in Trump’s hands, and he’s got plans,” he said. “I have no doubt it’s going to explode sometime.” Even the $3.5 billion loss in value since its debut last month hasn’t deterred them. Neither has the fact that it lost $58 million last year and only had 4 millionin revenues.
Words can’t express the horrors of Israel’s genocide in Gaza. To actually feel the nightmare, you would have to be there under the bombs, fleeing with Palestinians desperately seeking a safe place that doesn’t exist; seeing building after building destroyed; treading through blood in one of the few, only partially standing hospitals; and witnessing children and other patients sprawled on hospital floors, limbs amputated without anesthesia (Israel having blocked all medical supplies). It has taken the Jewish state’s savagery to break decades of silence about its history of crimes against humanity. U.S. military historian Robert Pape has called the onslaught against Gaza “one of the most intense civilian punishment campaigns in history.” Former U.N. Assistant Secretary-General for Human Rights Andrew... Read more
Source: Dead on Arrival appeared first on TomDispatch.com.
My friend Evan Henshaw-Plath wrote recently about some concerns with ActivityPub. I want to go over his concerns one by one and give some assessment of how accurate and important I think they are. Rabble’s words in italics; my responses in just normal text. I think there are a plenty of good points in Rabble’s … Continue reading Responses to Rabble on ActivityPub
Yes, it’s finally here and it confirms what all the other polls have been showing for the last month. Acknowledging that the NY Times Sienna poll is considered the gold standard among the cognoscenti, Dan Pfeiffer does a nice analysis of what it says about this moment in time: The Democratic coalition is heading home. As the New York Times’ Shane Goldmacher wrote in his analysis of the poll: Biden had a 43-point lead with Black voters in February, now that advantage is 53 points. Among Hispanic voters, Biden trailed by six in February. He now leads by nine. The President also increased his lead with voters over the age of 65 by three points. Based on this data, we can assume that the movement is largely among older voters. These are also the voters expected to shift after an event like the State of the Union and an aggressive, well-funded television advertising campaign. Engaging older voters is simply easier in this fractured media environment. They consume more traditional news sources and still watch linear television and are therefore easier to reach with television ads.
This man is the perfect emblem of the modern GOP I have no words.
Liberal democracies remain shamefully complicit with Israel, despite its ongoing genocide against the Palestinian people. Students of world politics have long understood that when it comes to the strategic interests of leading states, international law is marginalised unless it is useful in waging a propaganda war against adversaries. Indeed, the United Nations was designed in Continue reading »
The sponsored pass system for lobbyists to access Parliament House opens the door to undue influence and potentially corrupt behaviour. Facilitating such opportunities is both unwise and inappropriate. Lobbying can be an important means of informing Ministers and other parliamentarians about issues and the perspectives of particular groups in the community. It involves political communication Continue reading »
The UN Human Rights Report of August 31, 2022 says what’s happening in Xinjiang constitutes “crimes against humanity”. In plain English, this is saying it is not genocide under the UN Genocide Convention. It confirms an earlier Amnesty International report in 2021 to the same effect. Both are clear implicit rejections of unsubstantiated genocide claims. Continue reading »
I think if I hear again, in some attempt at a supposed even-handedness an interviewer ask a representative of the Palestinian people in this terrible time, ‘do you also oppose the actions of Hamas on 7th October?’ I will puke. That is not a pleasant prospect. There it was again the other day on ‘our Continue reading »
The ACT Labor-led Government might lead the nation in many worthy ways and it might, too, you might think, especially six months out from an election, be vigilant to avoid what many might see as an embarrassing own goal. But no… This is a column I never thought I’d write. In my last stint in Continue reading »
Recent figures show that around 30% of Australian school children do not have adequate reading skills. This 30% of Australian school children need vocational knowledge and skills to find a productive place in Australian life, but some will have their reading tested by TAFE then told, without a hint of irony, “You need to go Continue reading »
The recent P&I article by Chris Douglas featuring Glencore and the Great Artesian Basin raised many genuine concerns, especially regarding the sophism of corporate social responsibility. These included Glencore’s predatory culture and rapacious deeds and the egregious conduct of many other extractive mining brigands across Australia and elsewhere around the globe. Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? Continue reading »
In 2023, an American economics firm, Brattle, provided its reparation calculations to a symposium on Transatlantic Slavery Reparations chaired by international judge Patrick Robinson. Brattle calculated that the USA and slave-trading European countries owed the Caribbean and Americas US$130 trillion for wrongs done over a 400-year period. The reparation numbers are shocking but the symposium’s Continue reading »
Figureheads like the Guardian’s George Monbiot have wrecked the left’s ability to think critically, encouraging an analysis of power politics more suited to the playground. One of the biggest problems for the left, as it confronts what seems like humanity’s ever-more precarious relationship with the planet – from the climate emergency to a potential nuclear Continue reading »
Netanyahu’s recklessness was fostered by blind U.S. support, but Israel is the one pushing its war with Iran out of the shadows.
The post Israel and Israel Alone Kicked Off This Escalation — In a Bid to Drag U.S. Into War With Iran appeared first on The Intercept.
Week-end Wrap – Political Economy – April 14, 2024
by Tony Wikrent
Strategic Political Economy
Heather Cox Richardson Politics Chat: April 9, 2024
[Youtube, April 9, 2024]
Trump and the Republicans are flogging violent crime as their biggest issue after immigration. And they’ve actually conflated the two with a nonsensical new slogan called “Biden Migrant Crime.” Not that it matters to the cult because they live in an alternate universe, but reality should be biting for anyone who isn’t indoctrinated in Trump fantasy. The Wall St. Journal reports: Homicides in American cities are falling at the fastest pace in decades, bringing them close to levels they were at before a pandemic-era jump. Nationwide, homicides dropped around 20% in 133 cities from the beginning of the year through the end of March compared with the same period in 2023, according to crime-data analyst Jeff Asher, who tabulated statistics from police departments across the country. Philadelphia saw a 35% drop in killings as of April 12 compared with the same period last year, police data show. In New York City, homicides fell 15% through April 7. Homicides in Columbus, Ohio, plunged 58% through April 7.
Iran’s retaliatory strikes on Israel highlight an America-led regional war spanning Iraq, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and others.
The post Israel Conflict Spreads to 16 Nations as Biden Admin Says There’s No War appeared first on The Intercept.
Fifth Doctor Peter Davison has some questions about Doctor Who Showrunner Russell T. Davies's "bi-generation" and what it actually means.
Apparently, he doesn’t know the difference between the American system and a parliamentary system and just wants to be able to call elections whenever he feels like it — which, in his case, will be never. He’s an imbecile. The Philly Inquirer’s Will Bunch went that rally yesterday. He says he goes to them from time to time for a specific reason: I go largely because I think the media still fails to understand America’s most important story of the last 10 years. U.S. democracy is staring out into the abyss not so much because of the narcissistic bluster of one alleged billionaire ex-president, but because of the people with fleece hoodies over their MAGA hats who spent hours in an April windstorm to see him. You’re not supposed to say that, of course. His followers are all Real Americans who are good people who are hypnotized by Donald Trump and we can’t hold them responsible. It’s tiresome particularly since they have no compunction about slamming their political opponents with the grossest insults imaginable.
Iran throws a flurry of missiles and drones at Israel Iran retaliated for Israel’s April 1 “bombing of its consular building in Syria that killed two of Tehran’s top commanders.” Buckle up (CNN this morning): In decades of antagonism between Israel and Iran, there has never been an attack by Iran inside Israel. This crosses a threshold. What happens next rests on whether Israel will listen to the United States and not escalate the cycle of retaliation. Iran’s massive drone and missile wave was 99% intercepted, and Israel said damage was limited. Triggered by Israel’s April 1 strike on the Iranian consulate in Syria, the barrage brings the region to a boil. We still don’t know exactly why Israel carried out the strike in Syria, but analysts say Iran was forced to respond for its own internal consumption and to demonstrate strength in the region. For its part, it says the matter is now concluded. President Joe Biden said the US will not join any Israeli offensive against Iran. The very real question is whether Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will listen to the warnings of his biggest backer.
From private equity groups hollowing out nursing homes to Pfizer’s bold tax-free year, here’s all the news from The Lever this week.