#THIS IS NOT A LEGITIMATE DEMOCRATIC PROCESS

[goat-boy-sounds]

tumblr users when you tell them facts about how the u.s. government works and the powers they hold as a voter

[hargo-news]

Monitor Campaign Period, Amran Ensures Clean, Healthy, and Compliant Process

#MonitorCampaignPeriod #HealthyCampaign Monitor Campaign Period, Amran Ensures Clean, Healthy, and Compliant Process

Hargo.co.id, GORONTALO – To ensure a clean, healthy, and compliant campaign process, Amran Hulubangga, a member of Bawaslu Pohuwato and Coordinator of HP2H Division, along with the Gorontalo Provincial Bawaslu team and the Buntulia Subdistrict Election Supervisory Committee (Panwaslu), as well as local Subdistrict Supervisors (PKD), conducted the monitoring of a participant’s campaign in Buntulia…

[david-talks-sw]

Note: The meta below wasn't written by me, it was sent to me as an Ask by an anonymous user. It was so good that sharing it without adding some images I had lying around and extra formatting (boldening/italics) to it would've been criminal, so that's my only contributions. Thank you anon, and enjoy the read folks :)

What more could the Jedi have done?

I think a lot of the discourse about the "Jedi being slavers" comes from a deliberately uncharitable and bad faith reading of them.

I agree with you that TCW raises these questions and chooses not to go through with addressing them because it is ultimately a kids show that isn't trying to tell a story about the clones' situation but about [the Clone War itself].

But whenever I see people choose to go into these deeper ethical debates, they almost always assign an unfairly disproportionate amount of blame onto the Jedi who are, for the most part, in the same boat as the clones. Even the clones themselves seem to understand the nuance of the situation and most are grateful to the Jedi for coming in and leading them.

Although, yes, the clones do have it much, much worse, the Jedi are still there, fighting, protecting and dying right alongside them.

The Jedi are blamed for being part of the Republic in spite of all its issues, far more than the Senate is for being the Republic, even though the Senate is the one with all the power.

I wonder what it is people wanted the Jedi to even do for the clones...

OPTION 1: Leave the Republic?

And let the Separatists (whose originally legitimate grievances have been hijacked by the Sith) freely commit mass atrocities and enslave other planets with their humongous droid army?

OPTION 2: Overthrow the Republic?

And then what?

Take control of the Senate and become literal dictators and the very things they sought to destroy?

And during this whole takeover process, does the Separatist army just magically pause committing its mass atrocities?

So in the middle of a galactic war, the Jedi, with their limited numbers and resources, decide to start another one against the Republic to free the clones and ignore all the other planets getting destroyed and enslaved, and then...? [Also] the Republic citizens were largely unwilling to fight their own battles and preferred to leave all the fighting to the Jedi and the clones. So, now:

Do [the Jedi] force their new "Republic" to make its own army to fight the Separatists? Do they enforce a draft on the "natborns"?

All of this ⬆️ is premised on the Jedi even being willing to throw away their democratic values, and on the clones even WANTING THEM TO DO SO. Yes the clones are in a terrible situation, but the harsh truth is that, canonically, they do share the same values as the Jedi.

People can argue that they're brainwashed into this, and I would even agree. But that doesn't make it any less true that these are still their values. Most of them want to fight for the Republic.

They should have the choice available to pursue another path if they wanted, but the show - and thus the clones and the Jedi - barely have the time to consider all these issues because they are in the middle of a war.

In the show, [the clones] are the conveniently available highly-trained army that the Republic was going to use with or without the Jedi because it was all a trap set by a Sith Lord.

The Jedi, who were supposed to be some hybrid of social workers, peace-keepers and diplomats, were drafted into a war they did not want, and did not fight [the draft] because they had made an oath to the Republic, and because the alternative was letting billions get killed.

They were between a rock and a hard place and chose to prioritize trying to end the immediate war first before fighting for the rights of the clone army (which - again - is not even their job! Padme, Mon Mothma and Bail and all the other politicians are RIGHT THERE!)

The Jedi were a minority religious order whose own situation in the Republic was precarious, as evidenced by the fact that the citizens were willing to cheerlead their genocide just a couple of years in and gleefully bought into anti-Jedi propaganda en masse.

A more charitable reading of the Jedi would take all this ⬆️ context into account before declaring them slavers/slavery-enablers and surmise that... no, they did not agree with how the Republic was treating the clone army.

They were most likely hoping the Senate would enact a democratic solution to this after the war, so they tried to end the war as quickly as they could.

And no, they didn't "selfishly decide to overthrow/kill Palps just because they found out the Chancellor was their religious enemy when they were unwilling to do so for the clones."

It was because they realised that - all this time - they had all been under the control of a Sith Lord who had orchestrated a sham war to destroy them and take power for himself.

[unsolicited-opinions]

Once again, let's have a reality check and some nuance.

1️⃣ The Biden administration's Department of Education should have sued Columbia for doing fuck-all to protect the rights and safety of Jewish students and faculty.

This would have been the most correct and appropriate remedy for Columbia's failure to protect the civil rights of Jewish faculty and students.

The Biden administration's failure to do this was infuriating, wrong, and set us all up for where we are now.

It helped cost the Democrats the 2024 election, as huge swaths of US moderates again felt that the Democrats were simply ignoring yet another problem they didn't want to address.

2️⃣ It is clearly legal for the State Department and Homeland Security to revoke Khalil's green card and deport him.

3️⃣ A competent administration would have managed both the impeccably above-board process for doing this and would have managed public messaging about it, rather than the "Shalom Mahmoud" carnival barking of Trump, which hurts US Jews.

The Trump administration has fucked this up in a handful ways which have served Khalil and his movement.

Saying so, acknowleding this obvious truth, is not simping for leftists, is not betraying other Jews, and is not an attempt to be a more acceptable Jew to gentiles.

Due process protects the classical liberalism which liberated and enfranchised US Jews and protects us all from government overreach. There shouldn't be any shortcuts around due process, and people who think otherwise should study history, political science, and law...or sit down.

4️⃣ The Trump administration is without question a villain in this story as it:

- Fails to make any meaningful progress protecting Americans from campus antisemitism

- Energizes the leftist antisemites through its incompetence

and

- Helps target Jews for the blowback instead of acting like a responsible government and using the justice system and law enforcement to solve a justice problem and a law enforcement problem.

5️⃣ But the Trump administration is far from the only villain in our story.

Khalil is a supporter of terrorism. He absolutely should be deported.

The Democrats, who reflexively go all-in against anything Trump does, are lionizing Khalil instead of sensibly demanding due process. Their failure to acknowledge and protect the civil rights of Jews helped bring us here.

I get that many of you feel legitimate frustration, fear, and/or anger, and I'm there with you.

But if you rage at other Jews because they want to have a government which professionally, legally, actively opposes antisemitism without damaging civil liberties, skirting the law, aiding the antisemites, and further endangering Jews?

Take a breath, sit down, and consider the wisdom in some silent prayer before another idiotic word of that bullshit escapes your head.

[tanadrin]

It turns out that "nationalism is a not-even-once drug" is antisemitic because it leads a person to not support the state of Israel (but really I appreciate your firm and clear position on nationalism).

There was *maybe* a time when nationalism was conditionally a useful liberatory ideology in the 19th century, when it was a force that helped carve democratic states out of reactionary empires; but even in that context it feels like it was mostly dumb luck, and the alternative scenario where multiethnic empires could have become multiethnic democracies strikes me as more desirable in many ways—not least because it might have helped avoid the process of national calcification and brutal ethnic cleansing and population transfers that occurred after both world wars.

But even the most ardent nationalist will admit not every people can have its own nation—just as German nationalism required suppressing Sorbian and Czech and Polish nationalism, or Russian nationalism required running roughshod over Ukrainian nationalism, or French over Breton, etc, etc—it is ultimately an ideology which requires some nations to be more valid than others, and minority nations to be subsumed, forcibly assimilated, or expelled. And even within the nation, the national elites, the “true” carriers of the national spirit, will necessarily be privileged over those who are considered “lesser” or more contingent members. Nationalism does not actually entail democracy—it’s an ideology that legitimates state power, regardless of who is running the state.

And it sucks! And making a carve out for special kinds of nationalism under the label “indigeneity” doesn’t seem like a great solution to me either. We can end and try to correct the historic wrongs done to oppressed people without recourse to an ideology that fundamentally validates oppression, you know? We sort of have to. And on the flip side it should surprise no one that linking territoriality and statehood to a national identity leads to projects of bloody conquest and oppression. That’s kind of what nationalism is for!

[contemplatingoutlander]

If he loses the 2024 presidential election, former President Donald Trump will likely lobby House Republicans to refuse to certify the results. This was not as much of a problem in 2020 when Democrats held the majority of seats, but with Republicans now holding a narrow majority, it could become a legitimate issue. However, Politico reports that a bipartisan group of House lawmakers have banded together to jointly pledge to certify the results of the 2024 presidential election, and the group so far includes six House Republicans. This means that, should these six Republicans keep their pledge to certify a win for Vice President Kamala Harris, Trump's allies would be unable to block the certification of the election given the current numbers in the House of Representatives. The bipartisan group, which was organized by centrist Reps. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) and Don Bacon (R-NE), also includes Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA), Mike Lawler (R-NY), Lori Chavez-DeRemer (R-OR), Nick LaLota (R-NY) and Anthony D’Esposito (R-NY). Bacon said that the group's pledge was a reflection of traditional American values. “In America we respect election results especially once the courts and appeals work through the process,” he said. “We fight hard to win during campaigns and then respect the results when the votes are counted.”

Thank goodness for a handful of Republicans in the House who actually take their oath to support the Constitution seriously.

[reality-detective]

Kamala Harris’s Campaign Implodes in $20 Million Debt: Begging for Donations After Her Crushing Loss, Exposed Links to Hollywood, Dark Money, and Dirty Political Sabotage!

Kamala Harris’s campaign isn’t just in debt—it’s a smoking wreckage of corruption, deceit, and manipulative power plays that expose the Democrats’ true agenda. Her humiliating defeat to Donald Trump wasn’t just about a flawed candidate; it was about America rejecting the dark forces trying to hijack democracy.

A week after her crushing loss, Harris’s campaign is groveling for donations, but this isn’t about covering debt—it’s about funding underground operations that reek of political sabotage, media collusion, and elite control.

The Harris Fight Fund: A Smoke Screen for Political Subversion

Emails from Harris’s team show their frantic attempts to rally funds under the so-called “Harris Fight Fund”. It’s not about recounts; it’s about deploying legal warfare to destabilize Trump’s victory and undermine democracy itself. The language used is a psychological weapon designed to manipulate her base into funding a losing cause.

Dark Money, Celebrity Puppets, and the Globalist Agenda

Where did Harris’s billion-dollar campaign fund go? The truth is shocking. Behind concerts and celebrity endorsements, lies a web of financial chaos. Oprah Winfrey received $1 million for a single endorsement. Why? To legitimize Harris in the eyes of the global elite, solidifying her as their puppet.

The $20 million spent on swing-state concerts wasn’t just a spectacle—it was a propaganda machine funded by dark money from Silicon Valley and Hollywood elites. This wasn’t about rallying votes; it was a distraction to cover up Harris’s incompetence and the sinister plans brewing behind the scenes.

The Real Purpose Behind the Debt

The $20 million debt is no accident—it’s a strategic calculation. By ending the campaign in debt, Harris’s team creates a pretext to siphon more money from donors. This money is being funneled into black budget initiatives aimed at destabilizing not just Trump’s administration but the entire American electoral system.

The Pennsylvania Power Grab

Bob Casey’s refusal to concede his Senate seat is part of a broader strategy to keep swing states under Democratic control. Whispers suggest that Casey’s fight is being bankrolled by foreign interests seeking to dismantle national sovereignty.

Trump’s Calculated Counterpunch

In a masterstroke of political strategy, Trump has offered to pay off Harris’s debt using his surplus funds. This move not only exposes Democratic incompetence but underscores the contrast between his success and their failure.

The Bigger Agenda

Harris’s campaign wasn’t just about losing an election—it was a testing ground for a much darker agenda. The spending, the manipulation, the covert operations—it’s all part of a coordinated effort to erode trust in the electoral process and prepare for even more insidious moves in the future.

Harris may have lost, but the fight for America’s soul is far from over.

Stay vigilant. 🤔

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Every internet fight is a speech fight

THIS WEEKEND (November 8-10), I'll be in TUCSON, AZ: I'm the GUEST OF HONOR at the TUSCON SCIENCE FICTION CONVENTION.

My latest Locus Magazine column is "Hard (Sovereignty) Cases Make Bad (Internet) Law," an attempt to cut through the knots we tie ourselves in when speech and national sovereignty collide online:

https://locusmag.com/2024/11/cory-doctorow-hard-sovereignty-cases-make-bad-internet-law/

This happens all the time. Indeed, the precipitating incident for my writing this column was someone commenting on the short-lived Brazilian court order blocking Twitter, opining that this was purely a matter of national sovereignty, with no speech dimension.

This is just profoundly wrong. Of course any rules about blocking a communications medium will have a free-speech dimension – how could it not? And of course any dispute relating to globe-spanning medium will have a national sovereignty dimension.

How could it not?

So if every internet fight is a speech fight and a sovereignty fight, which side should we root for? Here's my proposal: we should root for human rights.

In 2013, Edward Snowden revealed that the US government was illegally wiretapping the whole world. They were able to do this because the world is dominated by US-based tech giants and they shipped all their data stateside for processing. These tech giants secretly colluded with the NSA to help them effect this illegal surveillance (the "Prism" program) – and then the NSA stabbed them in the back by running another program ("Upstream") where they spied on the tech giants without their knowledge.

After the Snowden revelations, countries around the world enacted "data localization" rules that required any company doing business within their borders to keep their residents' data on domestic servers. Obviously, this has a human rights dimension: keeping your people's data out of the hands of US spy agencies is an important way to defend their privacy rights. which are crucial to their speech rights (you can't speak freely if you're being spied on).

So when the EU, a largely democratic bloc, enacted data localization rules, they were harnessing national soveriegnty in service to human rights.

But the EU isn't the only place that enacted data-localization rules. Russia did the same thing. Once again, there's a strong national sovereignty case for doing this. Even in the 2010s, the US and Russia were hostile toward one another, and that hostility has only ramped up since. Russia didn't want its data stored on NSA-accessible servers for the same reason the USA wouldn't want all its' people's data stored in GRU-accessible servers.

But Russia has a significantly poorer human rights record than either the EU or the USA (note that none of these are paragons of respect for human rights). Russia's data-localization policy was motivated by a combination of legitimate national sovereignty concerns and the illegitimate desire to conduct domestic surveillance in order to identify and harass, jail, torture and murder dissidents.

When you put it this way, it's obvious that national sovereignty is important, but not as important as human rights, and when they come into conflict, we should side with human rights over sovereignty.

Some more examples: Thailand's lesse majeste rules prohibit criticism of their corrupt monarchy. Foreigners who help Thai people circumvent blocks on reportage of royal corruption are violating Thailand's national sovereignty, but they're upholding human rights:

https://www.vox.com/2020/1/24/21075149/king-thailand-maha-vajiralongkorn-facebook-video-tattoos

Saudi law prohibits criticism of the royal family; when foreigners help Saudi women's rights activists evade these prohibitions, we violate Saudi sovereignty, but uphold human rights:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-55467414

In other words, "sovereignty, yes; but human rights even moreso."

Which brings me back to the precipitating incidents for the Locus column: the arrest of billionaire Telegram owner Pavel Durov in France, and the blocking of billionaire Elon Musk's Twitter in Brazil.

How do we make sense of these? Let's start with Durov. We still don't know exactly why the French government arrested him (legal systems descended from the Napoleonic Code are weird). But the arrest was at least partially motivated by a demand that Telegram conform with a French law requiring businesses to have a domestic agent to receive and act on takedown demands.

Not every takedown demand is good. When a lawyer for the Sackler family demanded that I take down criticism of his mass-murdering clients, that was illegitimate. But there is such a thing as a legitimate takedown: leaked financial information, child sex abuse material, nonconsensual pornography, true threats, etc, are all legitimate targets for takedown orders. Of course, it's not that simple. Even if we broadly agree that this stuff shouldn't be online, we don't necessarily agree whether something fits into one of these categories.

This is true even in categories with the brightest lines, like child sex abuse material:

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/sep/09/facebook-reinstates-napalm-girl-photo

And the other categories are far blurrier, like doxing:

https://www.kenklippenstein.com/p/trump-camp-worked-with-musks-x-to

But just because not every takedown is a just one, it doesn't follow that every takedown is unjust. The idea that companies should have domestic agents in the countries where they operate isn't necessarily oppressive. If people who sell hamburgers from a street-corner have to register a designated contact with a regulator, why not someone who operates a telecoms network with 900m global users?

Of course, requirements to have a domestic contact can also be used as a prelude to human rights abuses. Countries that insist on a domestic rep are also implicitly demanding that the company place one of its employees or agents within reach of its police-force.

Just as data localization can be a way to improve human rights (by keeping data out of the hands of another country's lawless spy agencies) or to erode them (by keeping data within reach of your own country's lawless spy agencies), so can a requirement for a local agent be a way to preserve the rule of law (by establishing a conduit for legitimate takedowns) or a way to subvert it (by giving the government hostages they can use as leverage against companies who stick up for their users' rights).

In the case of Durov and Telegram, these issues are especially muddy. Telegram bills itself as an encrypted messaging app, but that's only sort of true. Telegram does not encrypt its group-chats, and even the encryption in its person-to-person messaging facility is hard to use and of dubious quality.

This is relevant because France – among many other governments – has waged a decades-long war against encrypted messaging, which is a wholly illegitimate goal. There is no way to make an encrypted messaging tool that works against bad guys (identity thieves, stalkers, corporate and foreign spies) but not against good guys (cops with legitimate warrants). Any effort to weaken end-to-end encrypted messaging creates broad, significant danger for every user of the affected service, all over the world. What's more, bans on end-to-end encrypted messaging tools can't stand on their own – they also have to include blocks of much of the useful internet, mandatory spyware on computers and mobile devices, and even more app-store-like control over which software you can install:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/03/05/theyre-still-trying-to-ban-cryptography/

So when the French state seizes Durov's person and demands that he establish the (pretty reasonable) minimum national presence needed to coordinate takedown requests, it can seem like this is a case where national sovereignty and human rights are broadly in accord.

But when you consider that Durov operates a (nominally) encrypted messaging tool that bears some resemblance to the kinds of messaging tools the French state has been trying to sabotage for decades, and continues to rail against, the human rights picture gets rather dim.

That is only slightly mitigated by the fact that Telegram's encryption is suspect, difficult to use, and not applied to the vast majority of the communications it serves. So where do we net out on this? In the Locus column, I sum things up this way:

Telegram should have a mechanism to comply with lawful takedown orders; and

those orders should respect human rights and the rule of law; and

Telegram should not backdoor its encryption, even if

the sovereign French state orders it to do so.

Sovereignty, sure, but human rights even moreso.

What about Musk? As with Durov in France, the Brazilian government demanded that Musk appoint a Brazilian representative to handle official takedown requests. Despite a recent bout of democratic backsliding under the previous regime, Brazil's current government is broadly favorable to human rights. There's no indication that Brazil would use an in-country representative as a hostage, and there's nothing intrinsically wrong with requiring foreign firms doing business in your country to have domestic representatives.

Musk's response was typical: a lawless, arrogant attack on the judge who issued the blocking order, including thinly veiled incitements to violence.

The Brazilian state's response was multi-pronged. There was a national blocking order, and a threat to penalize Brazilians who used VPNs to circumvent the block. Both measures have obvious human rights implications. For one thing, the vast majority of Brazilians who use Twitter are engaged in the legitimate exercise of speech, and they were collateral damage in the dispute between Musk and Brazil.

More serious is the prohibition on VPNs, which represents a broad attack on privacy-enhancing technology with implications far beyond the Twitter matter. Worse still, a VPN ban can only be enforced with extremely invasive network surveillance and blocking orders to app stores and ISPs to restrict access to VPN tools. This is wholly disproportionate and illegitimate.

But that wasn't the only tactic the Brazilian state used. Brazilian corporate law is markedly different from US law, with fewer protections for limited liability for business owners. The Brazilian state claimed the right to fine Musk's other companies for Twitter's failure to comply with orders to nominate a domestic representative. Faced with fines against Spacex and Tesla, Musk caved.

In other words, Brazil had a legitimate national sovereignty interest in ordering Twitter to nominate a domestic agent, and they used a mix of somewhat illegitimate tactics (blocking orders), extremely illegitimate tactics (threats against VPN users) and totally legitimate tactics (fining Musk's other companies) to achieve these goals.

As I put it in the column:

Twitter should have a mechanism to comply with lawful takedown orders; and

those orders should respect human rights and the rule of law; and

banning Twitter is bad for the free speech rights of Twitter users in Brazil; and

banning VPNs is bad for all Brazilian internet users; and

it’s hard to see how a Twitter ban will be effective without bans on VPNs.

There's no such thing as an internet policy fight that isn't about national sovereignty and speech, and when the two collide, we should side with human rights over sovereignty. Sovereignty isn't a good unto itself – it's only a good to the extent that is used to promote human rights.

In other words: "Sovereignty, sure, but human rights even moreso."

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/11/06/brazilian-blowout/#sovereignty-sure-but-human-rights-even-moreso

Image: © Tomas Castelazo, www.tomascastelazo.com (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Border_Wall_at_Tijuana_and_San_Diego_Border.jpg

CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

[coochiequeens]

The Labour party doesn't know what a woman is when it comes to gender ideology but they know when it comes to shutting down it's own partys conference for women.

Ellie Reeves, Rachel Reeves and Angela Rayner at last year’s Labour conference. The women’s conference was scheduled to take place before the party’s conference in September. Photograph: Stefan Rousseau

Labour to cancel its women’s conference after supreme court gender ruling

Trans rights and gender critical campaigners criticise decision after party told it risks legal challenge if conference goes ahead

Jessica Elgot Deputy political editor Tue 20 May 2025

Labour is to cancel its national women’s conference and restrict all-women shortlists as it awaits full guidance from the equalities watchdog, sparking criticism from trans rights and gender critical campaigners.

The party’s governing body, the national executive committee (NEC) will meet on Tuesday to sign off plans to cancel the women’s conference, which was due to take place before the party’s annual conference in Liverpool in September.

The Equality and Human Rights Commission’s interim advice, published after the supreme court decision that the term “woman” in the Equality Act refers only to a biological woman, has suggested that voluntary organisations should apply that rule.

The NEC has been told the party is at risk of a legal challenge by going ahead with the conference, according to LabourList, and could face protests and direct action if the conference goes ahead as usual on the basis of self-identification.

Guidance to the NEC also advises that “all positive action measures relating to women in the party’s rules and procedures shall be interpreted on the basis of biological sex at birth. Guidance shall be issued to all party units and relevant stakeholders to this effect.

“The party will work with individuals and local parties affected by the judgment to resolve specific cases with sensitivity and compassion, acknowledging the significant effect the judgment will have had on many people.”

The gender critical group Labour Women’s Declaration said it was wrong to cancel the conference, calling it a “kneejerk reaction” and “incendiary action”. The conference acts as a policymaking body on particular issues affecting women.

“It would be exceptionally disappointing if our party, which strives to be a grown-up and serious political force, and a strong government, could not find the courage to run this conference as planned and run it in accordance with law which was introduced under a Labour government,” the group said. “Women deserve better.”

Cancellation of the conference is likely to be costly and the NEC document notes there are “impending contractual commitments for services in connection with the event that involve significant expenditure”.

Labour for Trans Rights and Pride in Labour issued a joint statement, also signed by the trans officer for LGBT+ Labour, condemning the changes and urging NEC members to vote against them.

“The Labour party must set an example and stand on the right side of history,” the statement said. It added that the proposals were “not effective ways to ‘clarify’ anything”.

“We would also question whether the exclusion of trans women from women’s conference is a proportionate means to achieve a legitimate aim, as trans issues have come up time and time again during the conference. This seems to completely remove trans people from that debate. It is a blatant attack on trans rights and is seemingly an attempt to isolate trans people even further within the Labour party and the labour movement more widely.”

LGBT+ Labour’s trans officer, Georgia Meadows, said: “Trans people are already greatly underrepresented in British politics, and if passed, this decision by the NEC will further harm trans people’s ability to engage with the democratic process and make them feel unwelcome at a time when the trans community is increasingly under attack.”

A Labour party source said the party would respect the supreme court judgment and would comply with statutory guidance once published. Ministers will consider the EHRC code of practice when a draft is submitted.

[reasonsforhope]

Donald Trump charged in Georgia for efforts to overturn the 2020 election

Link here, because WaPo's security measures stop Tumblr previews. Non-paywall link here.

"Former president Donald Trump and 18 others were criminally charged in Georgia on Monday in connection with efforts to overturn Joe Biden’s 2020 victory in the state, according to an indictment made public late Monday night [on August 14, 2023].

Trump was charged with 13 counts, including violating the state’s racketeering act, soliciting a public officer to violate their oath, conspiring to impersonate a public officer, conspiring to commit forgery in the first degree and conspiring to file false documents.

The Recap

The historic indictment, the fourth to implicate the former president, follows a 2½-year investigation by Fulton County District Attorney Fani T. Willis (D). The probe was launched after audio leaked from a January 2021 phone call during which Trump urged Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R) to question the validity of thousands of ballots, especially in the heavily Democratic Atlanta area, and said he wanted to “find” the votes to erase his 2020 loss in the state.

Willis’s investigation quickly expanded to other alleged efforts by Trumpor his supporters, including trying to thwart the electoral college process, harassing election workers, spreading false information about the voting process in Georgia and compromising election equipment in a rural county. Trump has long decried the Georgia investigation as a “political witch hunt,” defending his calls to Raffensperger and others as “perfect.”

The Details

“Trump and the other Defendants charged in this Indictment refused to accept that Trump lost, and they knowingly and willfully joined a conspiracy to unlawfully change the outcome of the election in favor of Trump,” the indictment states.

A total of 41 charges are brought against 19 defendants in the 98-page indictment. Not all face the same counts, but all have been charged with violating the Georgia Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. Willis said she has given those charged until Aug. 25 to surrender.

Among those charged are Rudy Giuliani, the former New York mayor who served as Trump’s personal attorney after the election; Trump’s former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows; and several Trump advisers, including attorneys John Eastman, Sidney Powell and Kenneth Chesebro...

Prosecutors brought charges around five subject areas: false statements by Trump allies, including Giuliani, to the Georgia legislature; the breach of voting data in Coffee County; calls Trump made to state officials, including Raffensperger, seeking to overturn Biden’s victory; the harassment of election workers; and the creation of a slate of alternate electors to undermine the legitimate vote. Those charged in the case were implicated in certain parts of what prosecutors presented as a larger enterprise to undermine the election."

-via The Washington Post, August 14, 2023

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Rachel Leingang at The Guardian:

The Republican president is taking aim at a Democratic fundraising platform, issuing a presidential memorandum to crack down on supposed foreign contributions to elections, an unsubstantiated claim from the right.. Donald Trump announced the memo on Thursday, directing the attorney general to investigate, and report to the president, “concerning allegations regarding the use of online fundraising platforms to make ‘straw’ or ‘dummy’ contributions and to make foreign contributions to US political candidates and committees, all of which break the law”. ActBlue, the largest online donation platform on the left, has anticipated the presidential action. Its CEO and president, Regina Wallace-Jones, sent an email this week saying the organization expected an executive order targeting it, and that the threat of these investigations had “caused many in the ecosystem anxiety and distress”. “If we look past rumors and innuendo, here is what we know to be true: Nothing will deter or interrupt ActBlue’s mission and work to enable millions of Americans to participate in our democracy,” she wrote. “There is an ongoing and persistent effort to weaken the confidence of the American people in what’s possible. This is the next version of ‘the big lie.’”

ActBlue is the main platform used to collect donations for Democratic candidates and causes. The move is among several actions the Trump administration has taken to “cripple the left”, the New York Times has reported, part of a “series of highly partisan official actions that, if successful, will threaten to hobble Democrats’ ability to compete in elections for years to come”. The memo comes amid ongoing unsubstantiated claims on the right about the fundraising platform. Elon Musk has tweeted about ActBlue multiple times since Trump took office. “Something stinks about ActBlue,” he said in one post. Republican lawmakers have called on the treasury department to investigate ActBlue. Representative Darrell Issa wrote to the treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, in March, saying the department should investigate whether ActBlue facilitated donations from “terror-linked organizations and non-profits”, based on reporting in rightwing media that the platform had cut ties with a Palestinian organization that advocates for divestment in Israel.

Congressman Bryan Steil, the chair of the committee on House administration, requested documents from ActBlue in October “related to the platform’s donor verification policies and potential vulnerabilities that foreign actors may exploit to illegally participate in the US political process”. Those documents showed that the platform had updated its policies to automatically reject certain donations from gift cards and other avenues, Steil said. The organization has seen internal strife, the New York Times reported, leading to departures of senior officials. Republicans demanded more documents from ActBlue based on the departures, the paper reported. The attack on the fundraising platform comes as Democrats prepare efforts to win back majorities in Washington in the midterms. On Thursday, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) announced a plan to revitalize state Democratic parties by sending monthly donations from the national party to the states, with more funding going to red states.

Tyrant Trump’s election-rigging memorandum that targets ActBlue is an authoritarian attack on fair elections that could make Democratic chances at winning elections more difficult. The memorandum is supposedly about “foreign contributions” but is in reality about legitimizing far-right conspiracy theories about ActBlue.

See Also:

Politico: Dems brace for Trump’s assault on ActBlue: ‘We’re not going to let Donald Trump attack our core infrastructure’

The New Republic: Trump Prepares to Take Revenge With Order Targeting ActBlue

The Verge: Trump goes after websites that raise money for his enemies

[kropotkindersurprise]

May 12, 2025 - Here's the full statement on the PKK's congress and the decision to disband:

PKK Final Declaration: Activities under the name of the PKK have ended

The final declaration of the PKK's 12th Congress has been released. The congress decided to dissolve the PKK’s organizational structure and end its armed struggle, effectively concluding all activities carried out under the PKK of the PKK. The PKK (Kurdistan Workers' Party) 12th Congress Board issued the following statement: “The process initiated by Leader Abdullah Öcalan’s statement on February 27, and further shaped by his extensive work and multidimensional perspectives, culminated in the successful convening of our 12th Party Congress between May 5–7.  Despite ongoing clashes, aerial and ground attacks, continued siege of our regions, and the KDP embargo, our congress was held securely under challenging conditions. Due to security concerns, it was conducted simultaneously in two different locations. With the participation of 232 delegates in total, the PKK 12th Congress discussed Leadership, Martyrs, Veterans, the Organizational Structure of the PKK and Armed Struggle, and Democratic Society Building, culminating in historic decisions marking the beginning of a new era for our Freedom Movement.

All activities under the PKK name have been concluded The Extraordinary 12th Congress evaluated that the PKK’s struggle has dismantled the policies of denial and annihilation imposed on our people, bringing the Kurdish issue to a point where it can be resolved through democratic politics. It concluded that the PKK has fulfilled its historical mission. Based on this, the 12th Congress resolved to dissolve the PKK’s organizational structure and end the armed struggle, with the implementation process to be managed and led by Leader Apo [Abdullah Öcalan]. All activities conducted under the PKK name have therefore been concluded.

Our party, the PKK, emerged as a Kurdish freedom movement in opposition to the denial and annihilation policies rooted in the Treaty of Lausanne and the 1924 Constitution. Influenced by real socialism at its inception, it embraced the principle of national self-determination and carried out a legitimate, just struggle through armed resistance. The PKK was formed under conditions dominated by aggressive Kurdish denial, annihilation, genocide, and assimilation policies. Since 1978, the PKK has conducted a freedom struggle aimed at securing recognition for Kurdish existence and establishing the Kurdish issue as a fundamental reality of Turkey. As a result of this successful struggle, our movement achieved a resurrection revolution for our people, becoming a symbol of hope and a dignified life for the peoples of the region. During the 1990s, a period of major gains for our people, Turkish President Turgut Özal began seeking a political solution to the Kurdish issue. In response, Leader Apo declared a ceasefire on March 17, 1993, launching a new phase. However, the collapse of real socialism, the imposition of gang-like tactics on our war strategy, and the deep state’s elimination of Özal and his team sabotaged this initiative. The state intensified its denial and annihilation policies, escalating the war. Thousands of villages were evacuated and burned; millions of Kurds were displaced; tens of thousands were tortured and imprisoned; and thousands were killed under suspicious circumstances. In response, the Freedom Movement grew both in size and capacity. Guerrilla warfare spread across Kurdistan and Turkey. The impact of the guerrilla struggle led the Kurdish people to rise in mass uprisings (serhildans), turning war into the primary option for both sides. The resulting mutual escalation of war could not be reversed, and Leader Apo’s efforts to solve the Kurdish issue through democratic and peaceful means ultimately failed."

Rebuilding Turkish-Kurdish relations is inevitable The process entered a different phase with the international conspiracy of February 15, 1999. In this process, one of the main goals of the conspiracy, a Kurdish-Turkish war, was prevented thanks to the great sacrifices and efforts of Leader Apo. Despite being held in the İmralı torture and genocide system, he persisted in seeking a democratic and peaceful solution to the Kurdish issue. For 27 years, Leader Apo has resisted the İmralı system of annihilation, nullifying the international conspiracy. In his struggle, he analyzed the male-dominated, power-driven statist system and developed a paradigm for a democratic, ecological, and women's freedom-oriented society. Thus, he materialized an alternative freedom system for our people, women, and oppressed humanity. Leader Apo, by referring to the period before the Treaty of Lausanne and the 1924 Constitution, where Kurdish-Turkish relations became problematic, proposed a framework for resolving the Kurdish issue based on the Democratic Republic of Turkey and the concept of a Democratic Nation, founded on the idea of a Common Homeland and co-founding peoples. The Kurdish uprisings throughout the history of the Republic, the 1000-year Kurdish-Turkish dialectic, and 52 years of leadership struggle have shown that the Kurdish issue can only be resolved based on a Common Homeland and Equal Citizenship. Current developments in the Middle East within the scope of World War III also make the restructuring of Kurdish-Turkish relations inevitable.

Our people will understand the dissolution of the PKK and the end of armed struggle better than anyone and embrace the duties of this era Our honorable people, who have joined the Leadership and PKK path for 52 years at great cost, resisting policies of denial, annihilation, genocide, and assimilation, will support the peace and democratic society process more consciously and organizedly. We firmly believe that our people will understand the decision to dissolve the PKK and end the method of armed struggle better than anyone and will embrace the responsibilities of the democratic struggle era based on building a democratic society. It is of vital importance that our people, led by women and youth, build their self-organizations in all areas of life, organize on the basis of self-sufficiency through their language, identity, and culture, become self-defensive in the face of attacks, and build a communal democratic society with a spirit of mobilization. On this basis, we believe that Kurdish political parties, democratic organizations, and opinion leaders will fulfill their responsibilities to advance Kurdish democracy and the democratic nationhood of the Kurds. With the legacy of our history of freedom, struggle, and resistance, and the decisions of the PKK’s 12th Congress, the democratic political path will develop more strongly, and the future of our peoples will progress based on freedom and equality. The poor and working peoples, all faith groups, women and youth, workers, peasants, and all excluded segments will assert their rights and develop a common life in a just and democratic environment.

We call on everyone to join the peace and democratic society process The decision of our Congress to dissolve the PKK and end the method of armed struggle offers a strong basis for lasting peace and a democratic solution. Implementing these decisions requires that Leader Apo lead and guide the process, that his right to democratic politics be recognized, and that solid, comprehensive legal guarantees be established. At this stage, it is essential that the Grand National Assembly of Turkey play its role with historical responsibility. Likewise, we call on the government, the main opposition party, all political parties represented in parliament, civil society organizations, religious and faith communities, democratic media outlets, opinion leaders, intellectuals, academics, artists, labor unions, women’s and youth organizations, and ecological movements to assume responsibility and join the peace and democratic society process. The involvement of Turkey’s leftist-socialist forces, revolutionary structures, organizations, and individuals in the peace and democratic society process will elevate the struggle of peoples, women, and the oppressed to a new level. This will mean achieving the goals of the great revolutionaries whose last words were “Long live the brotherhood of the Turkish and Kurdish peoples and a fully independent Turkey!” With Democratic Society Socialism representing a new phase in the peace and democratic society process and the struggle for socialism, the global democracy movement will advance, and a just and equal world will emerge. On this basis, we call on democratic public opinion, especially our comrades leading the Global Freedom Initiative, to expand international solidarity within the framework of the democratic modernity theory. We call on international powers to acknowledge their responsibilities in the century-long genocide policies against our people, not to obstruct a democratic solution, and to contribute constructively to the process.

We announce the martyrdom of Ali Haydar Kaytan and Riza Altun Our 12th PKK Congress, convened at the call of our leadership, has declared the martyrdom of Fuat-Ali Haydar Kaytan, one of our party’s leading cadres, who was martyred on July 3, 2018, and comrade Riza Altun, martyred on September 25, 2019. On this basis, it has recognized comrade Fuat-Ali Haydar Kaytan, one of the founding leading cadres of the PKK, as the symbol of “Loyalty to the Leader, Truth, and Sacred Life,” and comrade Riza Altun, one of Leader Apo’s first comrades, as the symbol of “Freedom Comradeship.” We dedicate our historic 12th Party Congress to these two great martyr comrades who have led us from the beginning of our Freedom Movement until today with their uninterrupted struggle. In their names, we renew our promise to all martyrs of the struggle and affirm our commitment to fulfilling the dreams of Peace and Democracy Martyr Comrade Sırrı Süreyya Önder.

[pintadorartist]

Bill H.R. 9495 Update

Democrat Representative Schneider of Illinois has added a provision that: " Adds an exception for humanitarian aid provided with OFAC (Office of Foreign Asset Control) approval to ensure legitimate organizations providing aid are not wrongfully designated as a terrorist supporting organization."

This is not good enough; it's still too broad and would still allow the Government to remove the non-profit status of any non-profit organization considered "terrorist supporting" just because they aren't approved by OFAC.

I ask that you all continue flooding the Phones and Emails of your representatives, telling them to vote against HR 9495 and bills like it.

Here's the FFTF link, it will cycle you through a list of phone numbers:

Here's where you can find your Representative:

Fax them too as well:

If you have a Dem Rep here's a good script for email and calling:

"I am calling to urge my representative to vote no on H.R. 9495 . This is a dangerous bill would give the Trump administration unilateral power to label any non-profit as terrorist supporting and shut it down without due process. I am calling on my representative to defend civil rights organizations and oppose this bill. Thank you.”

If your Rep is one of the Dems that voted "Yes" on this, tell them this is their chance to stop this bill and not give Trump more powers. Tell them you'll vote for them in the next election if they vote "no" on this bill.

If your Rep is Republican, tell them that this bill would also affect the Salvation Army as it is nonprofit.

If your Rep previously voted "No" on this bill,encourage them to keep their stand and stick to their "No",and thank them for this.

[shego1142]

Okay so… I don’t really want to make this post, mostly because I feel like I’m always the one wearing tin foil hats on tumblr

But listen… I understand being upset and sad and afraid right now

But yall some of these posts are going beyond doomerism

Some of these posts

A lot of these posts, actually

Look quite a bit like demoralisation

So many of these posts I’ve seen look very much like purposeful targeted demoralisation

And I do hope everyone can understand very quickly how bad demoralising people right now is.

I do hope everyone can very quickly understand just how much people in power stand to gain from demoralising us.

I mean, you know, not that I’m saying that there’s a psyop taking place on the website that has routinely had multiple proven right wing/conservative/white supremacist psyops take place or anything

You know, that would be bonkers.

But all of these blogs out here saying that everything is hopeless and nothing will ever get better and we are all doomed and we should just tear each other apart and play the blame game?

That’s a little fishy.

Especially given that now more than ever is a time to stand with one another and hold on to hope and start organising together.

All of these blogs just blind faith accepting the election results as they are and not even considering any bad acting is at play? Just rolling over without any hint of a fight and implying that everyone else has to as well?

That’s a little fishy.

Especially given that:

The election results are not certified until December 25th and the House and Senate do have the power to object to the electoral college votes (especially if enough pressure is put on them to do so)

Especially given that it took a long time before we were sure who won in the last presidential race and it looked like Trump had won that first week back then too

Especially given that Kamala Harris’ Concession speech is not legally binding, and if it is found out between now and December 25th that she has won, then that will still be considered a legal win.

Especially given that many states, including battleground states, are already doing a recount and many more states are presumed to follow (So far Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Nevada are recounting the ballots and Arizona and Texas are considering)

Especially given that there has already been proven minimal forms of tampering with the election process including multiple burnt absentee ballot boxes, bomb threats at polling places, as well as just plain human error whether malicious or benign.

So… you know… anyone posting on here saying that hope is dead and that we should all hate each other and everyone should just fuck off and stop caring about everything and stop supporting each other?

That seems a little bit fishy, doesn’t it?

That seems a little bit fucking sus, doesn’t it?!

Especially given that, even after all is said and done, even if he 100% did win and there’s no doubt that it’s legitimate

He’s still being sued for multiple charges and violations of conduct, he could still end up in jail

Especially since even if he doesn’t, even if he is sitting as acting president one January:

We have 2 and 1/2 months to mobilise

2 and 1/2 months to organise

Sure would be convenient for Trump and the 1% and the right wing pundits to make everyone feel like everything is hopeless and tragic and to pit leftist against democrats and what not

Sure would be useful to them if we were all just sad and hateful to each other these next coming months

Like I’ve seen many posts tying to do.

You can feel your feelings but if you start advocating for us to attack one another, for women to fight and hate leftist men who voted for Kamala, for black people to fight and hate other people of color, for leftists to hate democrats for not “going far enough” and for democrats to hate leftists for “going too far”

And all this bullshit in-fighting

I’m just going to assume you’re a bad actor and block you

This isn’t the time for the blame game, there’s no fucking one to blame other than Trump and most likely Elon Musk’s money.

Now isn’t the time to give a shit about why the election results are what they are.

Now is a time to stand together, united, to make our communities better, safer, sanctuaries.

Now is the time to talk to one another, to not strive for perfection but for safety.

Call your representatives

Get your passport

Print out as many copies of books (especially banned ones) as possible and fill your local little libraries with them, fill it with zines about community building too,

Check out these links:

Talk to the queers and the people of colour and the disabled people in your community

Book a meeting room in your local library

Talk to your librarians, talk to your teachers and health care workers

Talk to your local conservationists.

Don’t just talk to leftist spaces either, remember:

There is Power in Making Friends, Not Winning Battles - reach out to your community and find out what the real issues are, it’s very rarely actually just hate, it’s usually fear and poverty.

Do nice things for your community in the name of Queerness - in some places you can adopt a road and make it beautiful, so this with a group of queer friends and get a plaque that says “This Road Was Adopted by The Queer Community”

Get together with your minority friends and figure out how to open a soup kitchen (easiest than you think and registering as a non profit is actually a great way to stay safe for many reasons)

Have your community see you as a part of it, not a threat to it.

Speak at schools

Fundraiser for the library

If you’re included to do so, you could partner with different religious groups as well, especially since there are in fact religious groups that are inclusive and welcoming and supportive.

Make your community know that the “threat” of the “lgbtqia” is non-existent

Don’t make yourself less queer, less a person of colour, less disabled, etc, don’t fade into the background

Become a shining beacon of positivity and goodness that everyone in your community can see as an asset to the community.

Give back more than you e ever gotten.

I know how difficult that can be but trust me, it will be worth it. Work with the leaders in your community to lobby for more rights just in your town and then you can lobby for more rights in your state.

Just like how many states have now said that if Trump tries to do mass deportations they will stop him, work to create that solidarity within your own communities.

Do not sit quietly in fear doing and saying nothing but hopeless things for the next two months.

Do not let anyone convince you that it’s over.

Do not become another statistic.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

John Buss

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

February 9, 2025

Heather Cox Richardson

Feb 09, 2025

On Friday, President Donald Trump issued an executive order “protecting Second Amendment rights.” The order calls for Attorney General Pam Bondi to examine all gun regulations in the U.S. to make sure they don’t infringe on any citizen’s right to bear arms. The executive order says that the Second Amendment “is foundational to maintaining all other rights held by Americans.”

In fact, it is the right to vote for the lawmakers who make up our government that is foundational to maintaining all other rights held by Americans.

The United States Constitution that establishes the framework for our democratic government sets out how the American people will write the laws that govern us. We elect members to a Congress, which consists of the House of Representatives and the Senate. That congress of our representatives holds “all legislative powers”; that is, Congress alone has the right to make laws. It alone has the power to levy taxes on the American people, borrow money, regulate commerce, coin money, declare war, “to make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper.”

After Congress writes, debates, and passes a measure, the Constitution establishes that it goes to the president, who is also elected, through “electors,” by the people. The president can either sign a measure into law or veto it, returning it to Congress where members can either repass it over his veto or rewrite it. But once a law is on the books, the president must enforce it. The men who framed the Constitution wrote that the president “shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.” When President Richard Nixon tried to alter laws passed by Congress by withholding the funding Congress had appropriated to put them into effect, Congress shut that down quickly, passing a law explicitly making such “impoundment” illegal.

Since the Supreme Court’s 1803 Marbury v. Madison decision, the federal courts have taken on the duty of “judicial review,” the process of determining whether a law falls within the rules of the Constitution.

Right now, the Republicans hold control of the House of Representatives, the Senate, the presidency, and the Supreme Court. They have the power to change any laws they want to change according to the formula Americans have used since 1789 when the Constitution went into effect.

But they are not doing that. Instead, officials in the Trump administration, as well as billionaire Elon Musk— who put $290 million into electing Trump and Republicans, and whose actual role in the government remains unclear— are making unilateral changes to programs established by Congress. Through executive orders and announcements from Musk’s “Department of Government Efficiency,” they have sidelined Congress, and Republicans are largely mum about the seizure of their power.

Now MAGA Republicans are trying to neuter the judiciary.

After yet another federal judge stopped the Musk/Trump onslaught by temporarily blocking Musk and his team from accessing Americans’ records from Treasury Department computers, MAGA Republicans attacked judges. “Outrageous,” Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) posted, spreading the lie that the judge barred the Secretary of the Treasury from accessing the information, although in fact he temporarily barred Treasury Secretary Bessent from granting access to others. Senator Mike Lee (R-UT) said the decision had “the feel of…a judicial” coup. Right-wing legal scholar Adrian Vermeule called it “[j]udicial interference with legitimate acts of state.”

Vice President J.D. Vance, who would take over the office of the presidency if the 78-year-old Trump can no longer perform the duties of the office, posted: “Judges aren’t allowed to control the executive’s legitimate power.”

As legal scholar Steve Vladeck noted: “Just to say the quiet part out loud, the point of having unelected judges in a democracy is so that *whether* acts of state are ‘legitimate’ can be decided by someone other than the people who are undertaking them. Vermeule knows this, of course. So does Vance.” Of Vance’s statement, Aaron Rupar of Public Notice added: “this is the sort of thing you post when you’re ramping up to defying lawful court orders.”

The Republicans have the power to make the changes they want through the exercise of their constitutional power, but they are not doing so. This seems in part because Trump and his MAGA supporters want to establish the idea that the president cannot be checked. And this dovetails with the fact they are fully aware that most Americans oppose their plans. Voters were so opposed to the plan outlined in Project 2025—the plan now in operation—that Trump ran from it during the campaign. Popular support for Musk’s participation in the government has plummeted as well. A poll from The Economist/YouGov released February 5 says that only 13% of adult Americans want him to have “a lot” of influence, while 96% of respondents said that jobs and the economy were important to them and 41% said they thought the economy was getting worse.

Trump’s MAGA Republicans know they cannot get the extreme changes they wanted through Congress, so they are, instead, dictating them. And Musk began his focus at the Treasury, establishing control over the payment system that manages the money American taxpayers pay to our government.

Musk and MAGA officials claim they are combating waste and fraud, but in fact, when Judge Carl Nichols stopped Trump from shutting down USAID, he specifically said that government lawyers had offered no support for that argument in court. Indeed, the U.S. government already has the Government Accountability Office (GAO), an independent, nonpartisan agency that audits, evaluates and investigates government programs for Congress. In 2023 the GAO returned about $84 for every $1 invested in it, in addition to suggesting improvements across the government.

Until Trump fired 18 of them when he took office, major departments also had their own independent inspectors general, charged with preventing and detecting fraud, waste, abuse, misconduct, and mismanagement in the government and promoting economy, efficiency, and effectiveness in government operations and programs.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation also investigates corruption, including that committed by healthcare providers.

According to Musk’s own Grok artificial intelligence tool on X, the investigative departments of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the Department of Justice (DOJ), the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the Department of Transportation, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), as well as USAID, have all launched investigations into the practices and violations of Elon Musk’s companies.

But Trump has been gutting congressional oversight, apparently wanting to make sure that no one can oversee the president. Rather than rooting out waste and corruption in the government, Musk and his ilk have launched a hostile takeover to turn the United States of America into a business that will return huge profits to those leaders who, in the process of moving fast and breaking things, are placing themselves at the center of the lives of 332 million people. Breaking into the U.S. Treasury payment system puts Musk and his DOGE team at the head of the country’s nerve center.

The vision they are enacting rips predictability, as well as economic security, away from farmers, who are already protesting the loss of their markets with the attempted destruction of USAID. It hurts the states—especially Republican-dominated states—that depend on funding from the National Institutes of Health and the Department of Education. Their vision excludes consumers, who are set to lose the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau as well as protections put in place by President Joe Biden. Their vision takes away protections for racial, ethnic, religious, and gender minorities, as well as from women, and kills funding for the programs that protect all of us, such as cancer research and hospitals.

Musk and Trump appear to be concentrating the extraordinary wealth of the American people, along with the power that wealth brings, into their own hands, for their own ends. Trump has championed further tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations, while Musk seems to want to make sure his companies, especially SpaceX, win as many government contracts as possible to fund his plan to colonize Mars.

But the mission of the United States of America is not, and has never been, to return huge profits to a few leaders.

The mission of the United States of America is stated in the Constitution. It is a government designed by “We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.” Far from being designed to concentrate wealth and power in the hands of a single man, it was formed to do the opposite: spread wealth and power throughout the country’s citizenry and enable them to protect their rights by voting for those who would represent them in Congress and the presidency, then holding them accountable at the ballot box.

The people who think that bearing arms is central to maintaining American rights are the same people who tried to overturn the 2020 presidential election by storming the United States Capitol because they do not command the votes to put their policies in place through the exercise of law outlined in the U.S. Constitution.

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[eretzyisrael]

by Ruthie Blum

When all hell broke loose over Schocken’s mendacious depiction of an Israel that only exists in the minds of those who wish to see it disappear, he issued a clarification.

“I’ve reconsidered what I said,” he announced on Thursday. “There are many freedom fighters in the world and through history, perhaps also on the path to the establishment of the State of Israel, who carried out shocking and dreadful terrorist activities and harmed innocent people in order to achieve their goals. I should have said, ‘Freedom fighters who also use terrorist methods and need to be fought against.’ The use of terrorism is not legitimate.”

The implication was obvious: Jews also employed evil methods to achieve statehood. Whatever neat trick he thought he was pulling flopped at generating sympathy, let alone applause.

Which brings us to the second speech, that also had a jaw-dropping effect, but for the opposite reason. This one was delivered by former U.S. President Bill Clinton.

At a rally on Wednesday for Kamala Harris in the swing state of Michigan, Clinton appealed to the voters who’ve come out against the Democratic candidate for her administration’s ostensibly unforgiveable support for Israel. He did this by setting the record straight about the Palestinians’ attitude to the Jewish state.

Though opening with a call for a re-start of the “peace process,” he acknowledged the culprit behind its repeated failure.

“I understand why young Palestinian and Arab Americans in Michigan think too many people have died,” he began. “But if you lived in one of those kibbutzim in Israel, right next to Gaza, where the people there were the most pro-friendship with Palestine—the most pro-two-state-solution of any of the Israeli communities were the ones right next to Gaza, and Hamas butchered them.”

He continued: “The people who criticize [Israel’s response] are essentially saying, ‘Yeah, but look how many people you’ve killed in retaliation. How many is enough for you to kill to punish them for the terrible things they did?’ That all sounds nice until you realize what you would do if it was your family and you hadn’t done anything but support a homeland for the Palestinians, and one day they come for you and slaughter the people in your village. You would say, ‘You have to forgive me, but I’m not keeping score that way.’ It isn’t how many we’ve had to kill because Hamas makes sure that they’re shielded by civilians. They’ll force you to kill civilians if you want to defend yourself.”

Invoking the authority born of having hosted the 2000 Camp David Summit to forge a treaty that would result in the creation of an independent Palestinian state, Clinton admitted, “Look, I worked on this hard. And the only time [PLO chief] Yasser Arafat didn’t tell me the truth was when he promised me he was going to accept the peace deal that we had worked out, which would have given the Palestinians a state on 96% of the West Bank and 4% of Israel—and they got to choose where the 4% of Israel was. So they would have the effect of the same land of all the West Bank. They’d have a capital in east Jerusalem.”

Pausing to express sadness mixed with frustration, he interjected, “I can hardly talk about this.”