Thursday, May 29, 2025

Common Dreams
"Experts Warn Trump Attack on Nuclear Regulator Raises Disaster Risk. 'Simply put,' said one critic, 'the U.S. nuclear industry will fail if safety is not made a priority.'

U.S. President Donald Trump on Friday signed a series of executive orders that will overhaul the independent federal agency that regulates the nation's nuclear power plants in order to speed the construction of new fissile reactors—a move that experts warned will increase safety risks.

According to a White House statement, Trump's directives 'will usher in a nuclear energy renaissance,' in part by allowing Department of Energy laboratories to conduct nuclear reactor design testing, green-lighting reactor construction on federal lands, and lifting regulatory barriers 'by requiring the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to issue timely licensing decisions.' The Trump administration is seeking to shorten the yearslong NRC process of approving new licenses for nuclear power plants and reactors to within 18 months."
https://www.commondreams.org/news/nuclear-regulatory-commission-trump


-->One more environmental disaster after another. Yet the NYT didn't cover this important story. The paper has always been pro nuclear energy.

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Orinoco Tribune:
"Venezuelan Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello confirmed the arrest of a group of 38 mercenaries involved in a conspiracy seeking to sabotage Venezuela’s legislative and regional elections scheduled for May 25.

In a press conference held this Monday, May 19, Minister Cabello also explained that of the 38 new detainees—including explosives experts, coyotes, and mercenaries—17 are foreigners (from Colombia, Mexico, and Ukraine) and 21 are Venezuelans.

'A few days ago, we received information that I warned about. I confirm it, explosive attacks specifically targeting embassies in Venezuela. They say in their meetings that if they bomb an embassy, the whole world will find out, and there will be talk of the government’s ‘weakness.’ People who have no scruples whatsoever,' he said."
https://orinocotribune.com/venezuela-minister-cabello-confirms-arrest-of-38-mercenaries-amid-new-terrorist-plot/

-->Foreign plots to overthrow Venezuela. The plots are hatched in the US, and then covered up by the US media. All the news that's fit to print never involves plots by the CIA.

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Truthout:
"A new analysis has found that nearly $80 trillion in wealth has been redistributed from the bottom 90 percent of Americans to the richest 1 percent over the past 50 years, as neoliberal policies have come to roost and billionaires are poised to use their vast power to worsen wealth inequality in the coming years.

Five years ago, researchers for RAND found that roughly $47 trillion earned by the working class between 1975 and 2018 was instead given to the richest 1 percent, in 2018 dollars. This calculation was based on calculations of the growth of the bottom 90 percent in the decades after World War II, when income distribution held steady between groups.

In a new analysis published last month by RAND extending the analysis to 2023, RAND found that that figure is now $79 trillion in 2023 dollars, with inflation accounting for roughly $10 trillion of the growth."
https://truthout.org/articles/sanders-1-percent-has-sapped-79t-in-wealth-from-bottom-90-percent-since-1975/

-->No sign of this story in the NYT. Why wouldn't readers of the NYT be interested in how their news is being manipulated?

Wednesday, May 21, 2025

Popular Resistance:
"There are now credible reports from many sources that the levels of extermination and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in the Gaza strip is higher than officially released and in 19 months could be over 250,000 [1]. ... Over 200,000 are already out of the Gaza strip (enriching pockets of Egyptian officials who demanded $5000-10,000/person for exit) and 95% of the remaining population homeless.  Perhaps that is why Trump is now speaking about taking one million (who are left) Palestinians to Libya after Israel finished cleaning them from all areas of Gaza towards the south concentration camp of Rafah.

The bad news may lead some to despair and tell us we are entering a new dark age [5]. Yet, candles in this darkness are far too many to snuff out by the Zionist/imperial/colonial juggernaut [6]. Actually hundreds of millions of good people acting positively for sustainability, peace and justice. Look around you for these positive initiatives and support them and create more. Organize.

Afterall, every social positive movement came from such people action: there are thousands of examples from women right to vote to civil rights to Zapatista empowerment to Rohingya to Algeria and Vietnam independence. Even in the heart of the empire today, the movement is tremendous. Look at student movements at universities or even common people in Palestine and how they resist. These are the true heroes. The profiteers (oppressors) will be swept to the dustbin of history. They are the few, we the oppressed are the many and must organize better (it is an existential threat). Action based on knowledge is the best antidote for despair.
https://popular-resistance.blogspot.com/2025/05/dustbin-of-history.html

-->These numbers are not being reported in our mainstream media. Nor is there an awareness of a growing movement in the empire to end predatory wars against the world's indigenous peoples

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The Intercept:
"Before signing its lucrative and controversial Project Nimbus deal with Israel, Google knew it couldn’t control what the nation and its military would do with the powerful cloud-computing technology, a confidential internal report obtained by The Intercept reveals.

The report makes explicit the extent to which the tech giant understood the risk of providing state-of-the-art cloud and machine learning tools to a nation long accused of systemic human rights violations and wartime atrocities. Not only would Google be unable to fully monitor or prevent Israel from using its software to harm Palestinians, but the report also notes that the contract could obligate Google to stonewall criminal investigations by other nations into Israel’s use of its technology. And it would require close collaboration with the Israeli security establishment — including joint drills and intelligence sharing — that was unprecedented in Google’s deals with other nations.
A third-party consultant Google hired to vet the deal recommended that the company withhold machine learning and artificial intelligence tools from Israel because of these risk factors.

Three international law experts who spoke with The Intercept said that Google’s awareness of the risks and foreknowledge that it could not conduct standard due diligence may pose legal liability for the company. The rarely discussed question of legal culpability has grown in significance as Israel enters the third year of what has widely been acknowledged as a genocide in Gaza — with shareholders pressing the company to conduct due diligence on whether its technology contributes to human rights abuses."
https://theintercept.com/2025/05/12/google-nimbus-israel-military-ai-human-rights/

-->The NYT did a story about Google and Israeli contracts. But the paper didn't print this confirmation that Google is, in fact, involved in committing war crimes.

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Palestine Chronicle:
"The Norwegian Confederation of Trade Unions (LO), the country’s largest labor federation, has voted in favor of a comprehensive boycott of Israel, including a ban on trade and investment with Israeli companies. The decision was passed with an overwhelming 88 percent majority during LO’s national congress, held in the Norwegian capital, Oslo, from May 8 to 9, the official Palestinian news agency WAFA reported.

The Palestine Committee of Norway also announced the move on its Instagram page, saying the LO 'will introduce an economic boycott of Israel, with 240 votes for economic boycott, and 69 votes against.'

It said the resolution 'means that LO now requires that the State Pension Fund abroad, Norwegian companies and financial institutions withdraw from companies that contribute to the Israeli occupation. ... The resolution shows strong support among LO’s one million members to introduce boycott, divestment and sanctions,' it added."
https://www.palestinechronicle.com/overwhelming-majority-norways-largest-trade-union-votes-for-boycott-of-israel/

-->BDS? you won't read about it in our corporate controlled media.

Wednesday, May 14, 2025

Common Dreams:
"Warnings Grow Over US and Israel-Backed Plan for Gaza Aid. The plan 'contravenes basic humanitarian principles,' said a spokesperson for the United Nation's children's agency.

United Nations aid officials have rejected a U.S. and Israel-backed plan for aid delivery in Gaza that reportedly involves the use of a private foundation and U.S. military security contractors to deliver far less humanitarian assistance than the besieged enclave needs.

Jens Laerke, a spokesperson for the U.N.'s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), warned Friday that the agency 'will not participate.'
'There is no reason to put in place a system that is at odds with the DNA of any principled humanitarian organization,' Laerke told the BBC.

Since early March, Israel has blocked aid from entering Gaza, compounding widespread misery and hunger in the besieged enclave as Israel continues to mount a deadly military campaign there. U.N. officials have decried the fact that aid is close at hand but is not being allowed in."
https://www.commondreams.org/news/un-aid-gaza-humanitarian-foundation

-->Food is gone for millions of Palestinians. But so is the news coverage by the genocide's newspaper, The NYT. It didn't cover this story.

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Common Dreams:
"Democrats' Bill Would Extend Social Security and Medicare Solvency 'As Far as the Eye Can See.' 'Working-class seniors pay into Social Security and Medicare their whole careers so they can enjoy a dignified retirement, but they end up paying a much larger share of their income in taxes than billionaires because the tax code is rigged in favor of the rich."

Social Security and Medicare protect tens of millions of American senior citizens from poverty and medical bankruptcy each year, but economic justice advocates have long said the programs would be strengthened and remain fully solvent for as long as possible if the richest Americans contributed more to them—and on Thursday two Democratic lawmakers introduced legislation to ensure they do.
The bicameral bill, the Medicare and Social Security Fair Share Act, was reintroduced by Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) and Rep. Brendan Boyle (D-Pa.), with the aim of requiring people with yearly incomes of more than $400,000 to contribute a fairer share of their wealth to the two programs."
https://www.commondreams.org/news/social-security-medicare-2671925476

-->I don't see this dramatic defense of Social Security in the NYT. The truth is, our newspaper of record has always favored Wall Street's plans to privatize Social Security.

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The Guardian UK:
"Netherlands urges review of EU-Israel trade deal over ‘catastrophic’ Gaza aid block
Foreign minister Caspar Veldkamp tells top EU diplomat Kaja Kallas he believes Israel is in breach of rights obligations linked to trade agreement.

The Dutch government, seen as one of Israel’s most loyal allies in the European Union, is calling for an urgent review of the EU Israel association agreement, the basis for the EU-Israeli free trade agreement, the Dutch foreign minister Caspar Veldkamp told the Guardian.

Veldkamp described the Israeli ban on the supply of aid into Gaza as 'catastrophic, truly dismal' and in clear breach of international humanitarian law. He has written to the head of the European Union foreign service Kaja Kallas requesting an urgent review, saying he believes Israel is now in breach of the association agreement."
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/may/07/netherlands-urges-review-of-eu-israel-trade-deal-over-catastrophic-gaza-aid-block

-->Israel is now in breach of international humanitarian law. But readers of the NYT will never have to ponder Israel's role in starving tens of thousands of children to death. the NYT didn't print this story.

Thursday, May 08, 2025

The Intercept:
"New York University School of Law barred 31 pro-Palestine law school students from campus facilities and demanded that they sign away their right to protest in exchange for being allowed to return. If the students — deemed 'personae non grata,' or PNG — don’t renounce their right to protest on campus, they will be unable to sit for final exams.

'You may not participate in any protest activity or disruptive activity on Law School property,' says the so-called 'Use of Space Agreement' sent to the students, which explicitly lays out conditions for being allowed to return to key campus buildings during the school’s 'exam period.'

The law students, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to avoid further repercussions from the school, are accused of participating in sit-ins, a time-honored form of nonviolent demonstration that is allowed according to NYU policy. The sit-ins on March 4 and April 29 took place, respectively, at the school’s Bobst Library and outside the office of the law school dean. ... Barring the students from campus and demanding they refrain from protesting represents a dramatic escalation against NYU students involved in demonstrations against Israel’s war on Gaza — breaking with school policy and upending precedents for disciplinary procedures, said seven of the PNG students who spoke with The Intercept, as well as other NYU students and faculty.
https://theintercept.com/2025/05/03/nyu-law-students-protests-gaza-palestine-israel/

-->The NYT hasn't covered this story yet. Chances are it will come out buried somewhere where people won't complain about it. This fascist assault on the rights of students makes NYU a willing participant in the end of free speech in the US.

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Consortium News:
"I [Chris Hedges] am sitting in the auditorium at The New York Times. It is the first time I have been back in nearly two decades. It will be the last. The newspaper is a pale reflection of what it was when I worked there, beset by numerous journalistic fiascos, rudderless leadership and myopic cheerleading of the military debacles in the Middle East, Ukraine and the genocide in Gaza, where one of the Times contributions to the mass slaughter of Palestinians was an editorial refusing to back an unconditional ceasefire. Many seated in the auditorium are culpable.

I am here, however, not for them but for the former executive editor they are honoring, Joe Lelyveld, who died earlier this year. He hired me. His departure from the Times marked the paper’s steep descent. ... On the front page of the program of the memorial, the year of his death is incorrect — emblematic of the sloppiness of a newspaper that is riddled with typos and errors. ...

Lelyveld came back for a brief interim. But the senior editors who followed were of little improvement. They were full-throated propagandists – Tony Judt called them 'Bush’s useful idiots' – for the war in Iraq. They were true believers in the weapons of mass destruction."
https://consortiumnews.com/2024/04/17/chris-hedges-requiem-for-the-nyt/

-->The NYT hasn't had a story about Gaza for several days now. Plenty on Ukraine. of course. Young boy killed by an Islamophobic right winger, and the boat to Gaza attacked. But nothing beyond that. So maybe Hedges is correct. The genocide won't be televised.

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UltimasNoticias:
"On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the 'Liberation of Saigon,' when communist troops from the North entered the presidential palace of South Vietnam in 1975 and ended the war, the President of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro Moros, expressed his admiration for the people of Vietnam, for being a beacon of inspiration for countries around the world.

In this context, the President described Vietnam's victory as a catastrophic defeat for the American empire, as their courage demonstrated that 'when a people want to be free, they achieve it, and Vietnam defeated the greatest military machine on planet Earth.'

He also said that Ho Chi Minh's heroic war was an example of the struggles against colonialism and imperialism and against all forms of foreign domination.
In a document issued this Wednesday by the Venezuelan Foreign Ministry, it was recalled that this historic date marked the end of the war and the definitive victory over colonialism and imperialism, which allowed for national reunification under the luminous legacy of Comrade Ho Chi Minh."
https://en.ultimasnoticias.com.ve/politica/presidente-saludo-al-pueblo-de-vietnam-a-50-anos-de-la-derrota-del-imperialismo-estadounidense/

-->If we had a free press, it would have carried this story. Won't we ever get sick of this warmongering propaganda?