#Undermines Democracy & Health

[reasoningdaily]

Dr. Paul Farmer on How US Haiti Policy, Revealed By WikiLeaks, Undermines Democracy & Health

DemocracyNow.org - Dr. Paul Farmer, who was worked in Haiti for nearly three decades and now serves as the the U.N. Deputy Special Envoy for Haiti, discusses how U.S.-backed coups and neo-liberal programs have not only subverted Haiti's democracy, but also seriously weakened its public health.

On Democracy Now!, Dr. Farmer addresses the U.S. influence in Haiti in the context of recent WikiLeaks disclosures of classified U.S. diplomatic cables that documented the United States supported recent elections, despite the exclusion of Haiti's most popular political group, the Famni Lavalas.

The cables also documented that the United States also advocated behind the scenes to block an effort to raise the minimum wage in Haiti. Dr. Farmer's new book, "Haiti After the Earthquake," has just been published.

Violence and instability in Haiti as ongoing crisis deepens

Gripped by gang violence, a new cholera outbreak and widespread shortages of food, water and fuel, the crisis in Haiti has worsened in recent months. Many are calling for international intervention, even as the U.S. continues to deport Haitian migrants back to the island nation. Jacqueline Charles, who covers the Caribbean and Haiti for The Miami Herald, joins Geoff Bennett to discuss the crisis.

[margaretthatchersdead]

Reasons to end the monarchy: Charles Edition

Well it's the coronation so you know what it's time for.

The entire concept of a monarchy is actively undemocratic. The head of state should not be someone who is only in that position because they were born into a certain family.

Having a monarchy upholds classism as a specific family of great wealth and power are viewed as superior to others.

They stand for a history of racism and imperialism. This country has done some truly terrible things in its history and the monarchy are a symbol of that. In order to attempt to begin to undo the harm that we have done, we need to remove this symbol of oppression.

The royal family have previously lobbied the government to hide their own personal wealth. Despite this, we are obviously aware that they have a large amount of wealth.

Prince Charles has himself lobbied the government on a number of occasions. His 'black spider memos' show that he has repeatedly pressured ministers on a wide range of topics from the Iraq war to badger culling to alternative therapies. He has used his power to lobby the government on subjects that would affect him.

The monarch does not occupy a ceremonial role as is frequently claimed. Ministers and civil servants have to consult the monarch. Civil servants have to get the consent of the royals on pieces of legislation, which can cause delays on implementation.

Even if the monarch did occupy a purely ceremonial role, as a literal billionaire he wields a ridiculously high amount of power over people.

Windsor Castle brings in less money than Windsor Legoland does. The many castles that are owned by the royal family could be used to create spaces for the public to enjoy or to be used as a shelter for the homeless. The Louvre in Paris used to be house of the French monarchy and gets over twenty times the tourists. Edinburgh castle hasn't had the monarchy live in it for centuries and yet still brings in tourism.

Prince Andrew is widely known to be connected to Jeffrey Epstein; yet he has not had to face any repercussions for his actions despite blatantly lying when being asked about his actions. The royal family have defended him and prevented him from facing the consequences of his actions.

They cost around £334 million per year. This money could be used to help the poor, given to the NHS, to repair and build infrastructure, to support small businesses that are struggling, pretty much anything.

The royal household publishes a much lower figure about the cost of the royal family, so they are actively trying to cover up their cost.

Charles has had access to confidential Cabinet papers, undermining our democracy.

He has publicly championed alternative medicine and has repeatedly promoted it. He sent at least seven letters to the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, that then shortly relaxed the rules governing the labeling of herbal products, ones he as part of Charles's Duchy Originals produces.

He lobbied the health secretary regarding greater provision of alternative treatments on the NHS.

In 2018, 46% of Britons wanted him to abdicate immediately after Elizabeth died. He’s barely wanted by the country even with the sheer amount of pro-monarchy propaganda going around. Charles specifically is very unpopular.

In order to speak to him, broadcasters had to sign a 15-page contract, which includes Clarence house attending the rough and fine cut edits of films and if unhappy can remove that contribution, as well as stipulating that all questions directed at him must be pre-approved and vetted by his representative.

His personal wealth is £1.8 billion. He inherited a large amount of this from Elizabeth, with it being exempt from inheritance tax. Having an immunity from this tax when others don’t is ridiculous.

The Duchy of Cornwall was named in the Paradise papers.

The coronation is going to cost £100 million during a cost of living crisis.

People have been banned from protesting Charles with official warning letters were sent to anti-monarchists.

Protestors who block roads, airports and railways could face an entire year behind bars. Locking yourself to others, objects or buildings could go to prison for six months and face an unlimited fine. Police are allowed to head off disruption by stopping and searching protestors that they suspect.

The public were encouraged to swear allegiance to the new King when he gets sworn in, this is a deeply disturbing suggestion.

He's a billionaire who's going to use the public's money to celebrate himself.

The monarch has sweeping immunity from many laws

He owns business parks and small rented cottages, six of the ten top residential homes, 285,000 acres of mineral rich land. He’s ridiculously rich in a country where so many people are facing extreme poverty.

[seulszn]

WHAT’S GOING ON IN HAITI 🇭🇹

Haiti is a country in the Caribbean and Latin America that has been exploited and oppressed by colonial powers and imperialist forces for centuries. Its people have suffered unimaginable horrors and atrocities. Haiti was the first Black republic in the world, and the second independent nation in the Americas and the first Latin American country It achieved its independence in 1804, after a successful slave revolt against France. Haiti's independence was a threat to the racist and capitalist system that dominated the world. It inspired other enslaved and oppressed people to fight for their freedom and dignity. Haiti was also punished for its independence by the colonial powers. It was forced to pay a huge indemnity to France, and faced trade embargoes, diplomatic isolation, and military interventions.

Haiti was also exploited by multinational corporations and NGOs, who profited from its cheap labor, natural resources, and humanitarian aid. They also imposed their agendas and policies on the Haitian people, undermining their sovereignty and democracy. Haiti was also devastated by natural disasters, such as earthquakes ( a earthquake they are still recovering from that happened in 2010 and then a earthquake that happened in 2021 that killed 1,419 people) hurricanes, and floods, which worsened its already dire situation. Haiti was also victimized by diseases, such as cholera, malaria, and COVID-19, which ravaged its population and health system. The diseases were often introduced or exacerbated by foreign actors, such as the UN peacekeepers who brought cholera to Haiti in 2010. Haiti was also marginalized and silenced by the mainstream media, which portrayed it as a hopeless and helpless case, ignoring its history, culture, and achievements. The media also spread misinformation and stereotypes, fueling racism and stigma.

Haiti was also betrayed and abandoned by its allies and neighbors, who turned a blind eye to its plight, or worse, contributed to its misery. The United States of America, in particular, has a long history of meddling and undermining Haiti's sovereignty and stability. Taking 500,000 dollars from Haitian banks and still collecting money. The United States of America has invaded, occupied, and intervened in Haiti numerous times, imposing its political and economic interests. It has also exploited Haiti's labor and resources, and blocked its development and trade. sugar refining, flour milling, and cement and textile manufacturing, clothing, scrap metal, vegetable oils, dates and cocoa are all things given to other countries by Haiti. The United States of America has also supported and funded the Core Group, a coalition of foreign powers that has interfered in Haiti's internal affairs, manipulating its elections, constitution, and government. The United States of America has also failed to protect the human rights and dignity of the Haitian people, both in Haiti and in the US. It has deported and detained thousands of Haitian refugees and asylum seekers, and discriminated and criminalized them.

Here are a list of countries who agreed to help the United States and Canada evade Haiti:

Germany

France (the same country that we had to pay just to be free)

Benin

Jamaica

Kenya

Yes I am Haitian my dad side is from Haiti. My fathers family moved up here to Seattle because Haitian was going through a small silent genocide and have been since they have been free from France in 1804, France took my countries money and told them that they have to pay reparations just for existing and they had to pay France just to be free from the French. And then America jumps onto the bandwagon and decides to take billions of dollars from Haiti. Haiti was once the richest country but became the most poorest because of ignorance.

My people are being killed everyday just for speaking out against their government, my people are being killed because nobody was their for them when the 2010 and the 2021 earthquake happened because “Haiti is a bad country and helping them won’t do anything” and they are still recovering from that to this very day. Families are being displaced, the violence is getting worse, innocent people are dying and are fighting trying to stay alive, women and children are being r$ped and kidnapped. I have family that live in Haiti that I lost all contact with because they are fighting everyday, and who knows if they are even alive.

Here are some important links to help you get a better understanding on what’s going on in Haiti and stuff to donate to

Donations:

Haitian Health foundation

Partner in Health: Haiti

Hope For Haiti

Haiti Aid

Haiti Children

Haiti Twitter Link for More Donations. P2 P3

Videos

FYI a lot of these videos are from last year but a lot of them speak really well on what is always going on and why they are going through it

Haiti Debt

What is Happening in Haiti

Haiti and the Rice

Listen Part 2

Free These countries as well

What we want to free in Haiti

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE TAKE THE TIME OUT OF YOUR DAY TO AT LEAST LOOK AT THESE LINKS. For the sake of My dad and the sake of my family I want to see them happy they wanna go home but won’t be able to until Haiti is free I will update this if I need to and please Like, comment, reblog anything is appreciated

[deadpresidents]

Today is a good day to remember Salvador Allende, the democratically-elected President of Chile, who died in September 1973. Allende most likely shot himself in the La Moneda Presidential Palace in Santiago when he could no longer fight off the forces of General Augusto Pinochet as they executed a violent coup heavily supported by the United States and Henry Kissinger. Pinochet then ruled Chile as an American-supported "anti-communist" military dictator for nearly two decades in which tens of thousands of Chileans were killed, jailed, or simply disappeared.

Allende, a socialist, was popularly elected as Chile's President with promises to strengthen democracy in Latin America and institute significant economic, education, and health reforms in order to dramatically improve the social welfare of the Chilean people. Some American leaders, like Henry Kissinger, saw him as a potential threat -- a South American version of Fidel Castro -- and the CIA begin laying the groundwork for eventual regime change.

The biggest problem with Allende, in Kissinger's mind, was the very fact that he was freely and democratically elected. In a memo to President Nixon that is still somewhat shocking to read, Kissinger wrote that "Allende was elected legally...He has legitimacy in the eyes of Chileans and most of the world; there is nothing we can do to deny him that legitimacy or claim he does not have it." Kissinger then reminds Nixon that "We are strongly on record in support of self-determination and respect for free election; you are firmly on record for non-intervention in the internal affairs of this hemisphere and of accepting nations 'as they are.'" Then he spends several pages outlining ways in which to undermine, delegitimize, and potentially eliminate "the Problem." After all, as Kissinger wrote shortly before Allende was elected, "I don't see why we need to stand by and watch a country go communist due to the irresponsibility of its people. The issues are much too important for the Chilean voters to be left to decide for themselves."

[nats-revival]

Not they tryna reenact KOSA… anyway yall, here’s why KOSA is bad!!

If you don’t already know, KOSA, or Kids Online Safety Act is a bill that was proposed to keep children safe on the internet. You might ask ‘why is this bill bad if it’s in favor of supporting the safety of children online’? Well, according to stopkosa.com, it puts pressure on platforms to add even MORE filters on anything they think is inappropriate for children. This is especially harmful for LBGTQIA+ youth because the knowledge about this topic would be censored, as well as knowledge on suicide prevention and LGBTQIA+ support groups. Do you see how this an issue? For those children who are wanting to learn more about these topics they’d be turned away because of this bill. It would also be likely that it’ll allow the shutdown of websites that allow them to learn about race, sexuality and gender.

This bill would also add more internet surveillance for all users across all social media platforms. It would expand the use of age verification and parental monitoring controls. These things in itself are already very invasive, but doesn’t take into consideration the children who live in unsafe environments where they are domestically abused and/or are trying to escape these situations. To add my two cents onto this, I strongly believe that the KOSA bill is an unnecessary violation of our first amendment rights (if you’re American), and doesn’t really make the internet any more safer. It actually makes it more unusable for youth. Hypothetically, if this bill were to be passed, then this would make social media unusable for literally anybody. To censor content from the youth about wanting to learn about their identity is extremely harmful. Blocking them from accessing resources that may prove as helpful in their scenarios is outlandish and unneeded. We try to shelter our youth so much to the point where we try to boil them down to only being with their parents want them to be and also not being able to let them learn and explore about other things that they may want to identify themselves with. This is very harmful.

This is a list of companies who are saying no to KOSA ..

• Access Now

• ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union)

• Black and Pink National

• Center for Democracy & Technology

• COLAGE

• Defending Rights & Dissent

• Don’t Delete Art

• EducateUS: SIECUS In Action

• Electronic Frontier Foundation

• Equality Arizona

• Equality California

• Equality Michigan

• Equality New Mexico

• Equality Texas

• Fair Wisconsin

• Fairness Campaign

• Fight for the Future

• Free Speech Coalition

• Freedom Network USA

• Indivisible Eastside

• Indivisible Plus Washington

• Internet Society

• Kairos

• Lexington Pride Center

• LGBT Technology Partnership

• Massachusetts Transgender Political Coalition

• Media Justice

• National Coalition Against Censorship

• Open Technology Institute

• OutNebraska

• PDX Privacy

• Presente.org

• Reframe Health and Justice

• Restore The Fourth

• SIECUS: Sex Ed for Social Change

• SWOP Behind Bars 

• TAKE

• TechFreedom

• The 6:52 Project Foundation, Inc.

• The Sex Workers Project of the Urban Justice Center

• Transgender Education Network of Texas

• TransOhio

• University of Michigan Dearborn – Muslim Student Association 

• URGE

• WA People’s Privacy

• Woodhull Freedom Foundation

There is something you can do to stop the KOSA bill from being passed! On the website I linked, there is a petition. All you have to do is fill out the information and it’ll send off an email for you. The email reads as follows:

I’m writing to urge you to reject the Kids Online Safety Act, a misguided bill that would put vulnerable young people at risk. KOSA would fail to address the root issues related to kid’s safety online. Instead, it would endanger some of the most vulnerable people in our society while undermining human rights and children’s privacy. The bill would result in widespread internet censorship by pressuring platforms to use incredibly broad “content filters” and giving state Attorneys General the power to decide what content kids should and shouldn’t have access to online. This power could be abused in a number of ways and be politicized to censor information and resources. KOSA would also likely lead to the greater surveillance of children online by requiring platforms to gather data to verify user identity. There is a way to protect kids and all people online from egregious data abuse and harmful content targeting: passing a strong Federal data privacy law that prevents tech companies from collecting so much sensitive data about all of us in the first place, and gives individuals the ability to sue companies that misuse their data. KOSA, although well-meaning, must not move forward. Please protect privacy and stop the spread of censorship online by opposing KOSA.

The website also gives you like a format of what you can say if you chose to call your representatives. If after reading this post, you feel inclined to do something then I would say just go ahead and do it. My first time learning about KOSA was today immediately after seeing the post I felt inclined to send my lawmakers an email. Please try to help when you can and this will only take a few minutes so I think this is something that you can consider. This post is getting a little long now, so I’ll stop here. There are more resources online if you would like to learn more about the cons of this KOSA bill, thank you for reading.

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

Former President Donald Trump has filed a new lawsuit against Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer accusing her of breaking state law when she allowed voter registration at places such as the Department of Veterans Affairs and U.S. Small Business Administration offices.

The 22-page lawsuit, filed Monday in the U.S. District Court Western District of Michigan, claims only the state legislature, not the governor, can designate voter registration agencies (VRA’s). Whitmer last year issued an executive directive to designate Saginaw VA Medical Center, the Detroit VA Medical Center and the Department’s Detroit Regional Office as VRAs. She also allowed people to register to vote at the state Department of Health and Human Services and Housing Development Authority, among other agencies.

“Voting is the lifeblood of our democracy,” she said at the time of the directive. “When more Michiganders vote, our government is more accountable to the people. I am fully committed to protecting the fundamental right to vote, making participation in our democracy more accessible, combating misinformation, and empowering all eligible voters to make their voices heard.”

Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson and elections chief Jonathan Brater are also named in the suit. Attorneys for Trump say Whitmer’s directive “undermines the integrity of elections by increasing the opportunity for individuals to register to vote even though they are ineligible to do so.” The plaintiffs claim they must “deploy their time and resources to monitor Michigan elections for fraud and abuse.” Trump’s team provides no evidence of any voter fraud.

The lawsuit says no VRAs have been established in Michigan since 1995 when then-Gov. John Engler enacted them in response to the National Voter Registration Act of 1993. Whitmer in her directive said, “The operative list of Michigan’s voter registration agencies is nearly 30 years old and in need of an update.”

Trump’s lawsuit also claims that the VA and SBA violated the registration act and are “undermining confidence in the integrity of the electoral process and discouraging participation in the democratic process, which will harm the electoral prospects of Republican candidates.”

Whitmer has become one of the people mentioned to replace President Joe Biden on the ballot should he decide to step aside in November’s presidential election, though Biden insists he’s staying in the race. She has expressed support for Biden. Either way, Michigan is expected to be a key battleground state.

The lawsuit asked a judge to order an injunction to bar the SBA and VA from operating as voter registration agencies without authorization from the state legislature and declare Whitmer’s executive directive as invalid.

A spokesperson for Whitmer said in an email to Law&Crime that her office is reviewing the lawsuit.

[socialjusticeinamerica]

☝️

Highly recommend. A glimpse into the right-wing network of conservative think tanks and non-profits working to promote a pro-business culture, weaken all social programs, and undermine democracy.

Everything from weakening child labor laws to writing Trump’s Project 2025, although the authors refused to use the term “Project 2025” in their description of it.

Republican politicians never come up with legislation on their own. All Republican policy is crafted and written by right-wing political associations and then handed to Republicans stooges to sign and introduce into Congress. It is this behind the scenes network of oligarch dark money funded think tanks that are waging war against us.

You protest individual Republican politicians and their policies but neglect the oligarchs like Koch, Walton, Crow, and DeVos that actually write those policies. Then you support those same oppressive oligarchs by buying Koch products, shopping at Walmart, and sending your kids to charter schools operated by DeVos.

Thousands of us have been calling for a boycott of Walmart since the 90’s but the majority refuse because it would be inconvenient. I don’t want to drive an extra few miles to the store or I don’t want to spend and extra dollar at another store. Common refrains whenever a boycott is broached. Walmart is the most obvious target because they are not diversified like other oligarch families. A short boycott would change their tune real fast.

You know what’s really inconvenient; black people being executed in the streets by cops and denied the right to vote. You know what else, trans people being eliminated and lgbt being stripped of legal rights as citizens. How about bounties being placed on women who have abortions and women who have to travel across country to have those abortions and often having lost the right yo safely return to their home state at all. Migrants being held in camps and being separated permanently from their children is also inconvenient as is the human trafficking of them. How about the re-introduction of child labor without parental consent being required. Maybe unions being busted, pensions and health insurance being stripped, minimum wage being reduced and full-time jobs arbitrarily being turned into part-time jobs. I could go on and on here.

STOP USING YOUR DOLLARS TO SUPPORT THE OLIGARCHS AND CORPORATIONS THAT OPPRESS YOU.

[redditreceipts]

women's rights in Palestine

Women in Palestine face a double burden: first, from the islamic patriarchal society they live in, and second, from the Israelian occupation. According to the recent UN report, the main factors are:

Palestinian women’s rights organisations are hindered in their activism as they get labeled "terrorist organisations" by Israelian authorities.

Because of the focus on Israeli occupation, the political climate in Palestinian society makes it so the women’s liberation movement in is considered of secondary importance. 

The Gaza blockade has an especially heavy toll on women and girls by limiting their access to essential services and increasing their care burden.

The difficult living conditions make women more dependent on male family members and vulnerable to gender-based violence.

Violence outbreaks and economic insecurity in Palestine are responsible for a stronger adherence to gender and patriarchal norms, as is observed everywhere in the world. 

Women’s access to quality health services is undermined by Israeli policies restricting the movement of people and goods, for example medical staff and supplies. Also, hospitals in Palestine are frequently bombed, so the construction of a solid health infrastructure is near impossible. While men face direct injury more often, women are vulnerable to the indirect consequences of the conflict, such as lack of access to reproductive medicine. This leads to a higher rate of maternal mortality: from 2019 to 2020, the maternal mortality rate rose by 43 percent. Pregnant and lactating women are especially vulnerable to malnutrition because of their lack of access to nutrient-rich foods. The lack of healthcare services disproportionately affects women, because oftentimes, they are the ones carrying the burden of caring for sick family members. 

Destroyed hospital in Gaza. (source)

The patriarchal Palestinian society also burdens women with high rates of gender-based violence. This is exacerbated by the lack of a stable justice system, so many cases of domestic violence, rape and femicide don’t get reported. The lack of access to employment makes women dependent on their husbands, which also increases the rate of gender-based violence and makes women unable to leave their abusive partners. 

Living conditions in a Palestinian refugee camp in Lebanon. (source)

Also, women’s rights campaigns in Palestine suffer from the Israeli occupation. In October 2021, the Union of Palestinian Women’s Committees was one of six Palestinian organisations labelled a “terrorist organisation” by the Israeli Government. Other organisations such as the National Women’s Coalition for the Implementation of the CEDAW Convention, which is a coalition of human rights and women’s rights organisations and trade unions, are under fierce attack of conservative Palestinian forces such as clan leaders and right-wing political forces in Palestine. 

Khitam al-Saafin, chairwoman of the Union of Palestinian Women's Committee, was sentences by Israeli authorities to three months in "administrative detention" without trial or charges. (source)

The United Nations’ report concludes: “[A]s  long as the Israeli occupation, policies and practices, including violence against Palestinians, continue, the enjoyment of rights by Palestinian women will remain unattainable.”

Women in Palestine should not be the ones to suffer from religious patriarchal oppression from Palestinian society nor from Israeli occupation. A stable and just democracy is crucial for women’s emancipation, and for that, the Israeli occupation and the blockades, as well as the patriarchal oppression from their own society, have to end!

(source)

[kp777]

The US has a mental health crisis that could undermine our democracy, US Surgeon Generals say | CNN

[amaditalks]

Heather Cox Richardson is a US based political historian, who connects facts from our history to current events to provide context. She writes daily on Substack, this is an excerpt from her March 17 post. It’s a longer read but very crucial toward understanding the American right’s plans for the future of this country, as illustrated by the close connections of The Heritage Foundation, a powerful right wing think tank, and Viktor Orbán, the autocratic prime minister of Hungary. 

“The tight cooperation between Heritage and Orbán illuminates Project 2025, the plan Heritage has led, along with dozens of other right-wing organizations, to map out a future right-wing presidency. In Hungary, Orbán has undermined democracy, gutting the civil service and filling it with loyalists; attacking immigrants, women, and the rights of LGBTQ+ individuals; taking over businesses for friends and family, and moving the country away from the rules-based international order supported by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).

In the January interview, Roberts told Garcia-Navarro that Project 2025 was designed to jump-start a right-wing takeover of the government. “[T]he Trump administration, with the best of intentions, simply got a slow start,” Roberts said. “And Heritage and our allies in Project 2025 believe that must never be repeated.”

Project 2025 stands on four principles that it says the country must embrace. In their vision, the U.S. must “[r]estore the family as the centerpiece of American life and protect our children”; “[d]ismantle the administrative state and return self-governance to the American people”; “[d]efend our nation’s sovereignty, borders, and bounty against global threats”; and “[s]ecure our God-given individual rights to live freely—what our Constitution calls ‘the Blessings of Liberty.’”

In almost 1,000 pages, the document explains what these policies mean for ordinary Americans. Restoring the family and protecting children means making “family authority, formation, and cohesion” a top priority and using “government power…to restore the American family.” That, the document says, means eliminating any words associated with sexual orientation or gender identity, gender, abortion, reproductive health, or reproductive rights from any government rule, regulation, or law. Any reference to transgenderism is “pornography” and must be banned.

The overturning of the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision recognizing the right to abortion must be gratefully celebrated, the document says, but the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision accomplishing that end “is just the beginning.””

[eaglesnick]

The NHS will last as long as there are folk left to fight for it” – Aneurin Bevan

I’m no fan of Keir Starmer or Rishi Sunak. Sunak is completely out of touch with ordinary people and Starmer will promise just about anything to get himself into power and then break those promise when it suits him.  However when it comes to the future of the NHS I feel it will be safer under a Labour government than one run by free market, neo-liberal Tories.

From a purely selfish perspective  - something the Conservative Party excels at - the NHS saves all of us a small fortune. When your child needs medical care it is free at the point of use; when your parents need medical care it is free at the point of use; and when YOU need medical care it is free at the point of use.

Of course we pay for this through taxes and national insurance contributions but the clue is in the phrase “national insurance”. Medical treatment in Britain, is, at the moment, paid for through collective funding. It is a system based on community, social responsibility, and the old fashioned concept of caring for your neighbour. . Aneurin  Bevan, the "Father of the NHS” said:

“No society can legitimately call itself civilized if a sick person is denied medical aid because of lack of means."

It is a sad fact that Conservative Party members, many of them rich individuals who can afford private medical treatment, have been undermining the NHS because of their unwavering adherence to the ideological belief that all things run by private enterprise are good while all public sector institutions are bad. . The Tory’s will, of course deny this, claiming the NHS is save in their hands and that they have no plans to privatise it.

 Lets look at the facts.

Despite Prime Minister David Cameron promising there would be no cuts to the NHS this was the headline in the Daily Mirror when the Conservatives took over from Labour in 2012.

“David Cameron cuts NHS spending by £500million.” (06/11/12)

Two years later and we have this headline from the Guardian:

“David Cameron accused of hypocrisy over £1.4bn ‘raid’ on NHS funding." (06/07/2012)

By 2014 NHS staff were on strike because of the Tory government refused to give them a 1% pay rise. Rows over poor pay and under-funding continue to this day.

While Jeremy Hunt was Health Secretary patient experience and staff moral took a dramatic turn for the worse. Despite presenting himself as a “champion of patient safety”, targets were missed, waiting times increased, and the very fabric of some hospitals began to crumble, leading to Hunt being labelled “the man who ruined the NHS”. (Open Democracy: 08/07/22)

In 2016 The Independent ran this headline:

“Jeremy Hunt co-authored book calling for NHS to be replaced with private insurance.” (10/02/2016)

Is it any wonder the NHS has been seriously under-funded and run down when the man in charge was an advocate of private medical health insurance? Millionaires like Cameron (£40m) Hunt (£15m) and Sunak (£651m) can afford to pay for expensive medical care but the rest of us are not so fortunate.

This brings me back to the purely selfish reason we should vote for the party most likely to protect the NHS. Below are some AVERAGE costs for private medical procedures and treatments in the USA provided by Statistica 2021

Heart valve replacement…….$170,000     £133,390

Heart bypass………………….......$123,000     £96,518

Cornea (per eye) ……………......$17,000       £13,339

IVF treatments ………………......$15,400      £12,084

Hysterectomy ………………….....$5200          £4,080

In addition, Americans have to pay for their stay in hospital. This fee is on top of medical treatment costs. According to Debt.org (30/11/23) the price for the average stay in hospital of 4.6 days is $13,262. (£10,406)

Whatever your political leanings, the protection and restoration of the NHS should take precedent over all other electoral considerations because we will ALL need medical treatment at some stage in our lives be that as a child or as an adult.

We know the Tory mantra "private sector good public sector bad” just doesn’t live up to reality: we only have to look at our polluted waterways to realise this. Whether Keir Starmer would be any better at protecting the NHS from profit motivated private companies is a moot point.

With headlines like:

“Can Wes Streeting’s private sector plans save the NHS?” (Guardian: 14/04/24)

and

“Labour’s Wes Streeting just used the SUN to talk up NHS privatisation” (Canary: 08/04/24)

we cannot rely on the Labour Party leadership to protect the NHS from the profiteering private sector, not least because Wes Streeting has been paid £175,000 from donors linked to private health firms. (National: 14/04/24) There is no such thing as a free lunch so one doesn’t have to wonder to hard what these “donors” might want in return for their money!

Even so, I feel there are those within the Labour Party who would work very hard to stop the leadership of the party from running down the NHS to the point of collapse, as is the Tory plan, so with great reservation I will be voting Labour in the coming elections.

Save Our NHS

[warningsine]

Robert Fico is in a life-threatening condition, the Slovak government office said in an emailed statement.

Slovakia’s populist Prime Minister Robert Fico has been shot and injured in a shooting in Handlova, Slovakia, local media reports.

"Three or four" shots were heard, according to a journalist on the scene. Euronews understands Fico acquired wounds to his head and chest. Local reports say he was airlifted to a nearby hospital.

A suspect has been detained by police.

Deputy speaker of parliament Lubos Blaha confirmed the incident during a session of Parliament and adjourned it until further notice, the Slovak TASR news agency said.

EU Commission President Ursula Von der Leyen was quick to react the news on X. "I strongly condemn the vile attack on Prime Minister Robert Fico. Such acts of violence have no place in our society and undermine democracy, our most precious common good."

"My thoughts are with PM Fico and his family."

In an initial reaction to the incident, Slovak President Zuzana Čaputová condemned “a brutal and ruthless” attack targeting Fico.

"I strongly condemn today's brutal and reckless attack on Prime Minister Robert Fico. I am shocked. I wish Robert Fico every strength to recover from the attack at this critical time." Čaputová said on her social media post.

Hungarian Prime Minister Victor Orbán wrote on X: "I was deeply shocked by the heinous attack against my friend, Prime Minister Robert Fico. We pray for his health and quick recovery! God bless him and his country!"

Donald Tusk, Prime Minister of Poland, also writing on X, said "Shocking news from Slovakia. Robert, my thoughts are with you in this very difficult moment."

Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala also expressed her shock at the news: "The news about the shooting of Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico is shocking. I wish the prime minister to get well as soon as possible. We must not tolerate violence, it must have no place in society."

Gitanas Nausėda, President of Lithuania, called for an investigation into the incident. He condemned the attack on X: "There should be zero tolerance to such acts of violence. I call on a thorough investigation and wish PM Fico a full recovery."

Handlova is located about 150km northeast of Bratislava, the capital.

PM Fico has been a politically contentious character in Slovakia, and rose to prominence on a pro-Russian and anti-US message. In January, he halted aid to Ukraine.

[liskantope]

Do you think that a more successful version of 1/6/2021 (either via more violence or successfully pressuring the Vice President not to certify votes) would not be a threat to democracy? To me that seems like the most likely way for Trump's general antagonism to liberal democracy to manifest itself.

A fair question.

So first of all, I would say January 6th was the biggest embarrassment to MAGA people, and to Republicans in general, of the last seven years or so. You can see this just by listening to the political discourse surrounding Trump. Democrats love to bring it up as much as possible, while Republicans find every possible way to be on the defensive ("Yeah, it was bad, but its badness is exaggerated -- it doesn't technically fit the definition of coup or even insurrection -- nobody brought guns or was actually killing people -- you just want to make everything about January 6th -- what about the BLM riots around the country the previous summer?"). I once was confronting a previously staunchly liberal friend who started voting Republican and seeming to abandon most of her left-wing stances on a variety of issues following being pissed off at how Democrats in California dealt with school closures during the pandemic, and asking her whether her new convictions really outweighed the horrors of another Trump term; when I brought up January 6th, the best response she had was, "That was terrible and the truth is I think most Republicans feel terrible about January 6th."

My point being that January 6th, 2021 was a disaster for MAGAism and the Republican party in general (if Harris winds up winning narrowly in November, I'm going to say that if January 6th hadn't happened, she would have lost, and that is truly a silver lining), and most Republicans know it. Unfortunately, Trump himself and his most impassioned cult followers are among the only ones not wise enough to know it. So yes, I expect a worse version of January 6th could occur, which would be an even bigger disaster for the Republican party and likely spell the death of MAGAism altogether (as opposed to, say, turning us into a one-party state under Trump and the MAGAists) but be a very, very horrible event in and of itself. I guess my point is, what effects would this have beyond the immediate? I guess the worst-case scenario -- which is admittedly historically bad for our country -- would be that that the VP is willing not to certify votes this time, that a constitutional crisis is triggered which has to be decided by various courts now stacked explicitly in Trump's favor, and a Trumpist president (which could only be Trump himself if he managed to ram through an end to term limits and if his health is holding up at 82) and/or members of Congress wrongly get elected.

This would be a highly, highly undemocratic event in the history of our country, but not much more undemocratic than, say, Bush's election in 2000 was; meanwhile, I predict that Trump himself will be not much longer for this world, that a very solid majority of Americans will be awake to the dangers of MAGA and fight against it like nothing we've seen before, that an actual focused policy agenda would fail to come to fruition, and that the political backlash would be decisive (the basic form of our government and mechanisms for elections would still be in place, and could those in power really fix the results if they were losing by a true landslide rather than marginally? I tend to think not.)

Would this worst-case scenario be an absolutely appalling sequence of events? Yes, and plenty of reason to fear Trump's return to power (even though it still relies on a lot of "if"s). Would it unravel the structure of our government to turn it into something more like a dictatorship, or in other words, "destroy democracy"? It's hard for me to concretely imagine a way that it would.

I suppose I'd prefer that phrases like "insult to democracy", "degrade/undermine democracy", and "antidemocratic" be used over phrases like "destroy democracy" and "make himself a dictator". But, I don't know, if the latter are doing a better job of turning swing voters against Trump than they are at giving Trump supporters more ammunition for diagnosing half the country has having Trump Derangement Syndrome, then I guess I'm in favor of that rhetoric for the short term of the next three months.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

June 17, 2024

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

JUN 18, 2024

Leaders from the Group of Seven (G7) met for their fiftieth summit in Italy from June 13 to June 15. Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States formed the G7 in 1975 as a forum for democracies with advanced economies to talk about political and economic issues. The European Union is also part of the forum, and this June, Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky also attended.

This summit was a particularly fraught one. When it took office, the Biden-Harris administration, along with the State Department under Secretary of State Antony Blinken, set out to reshape global power structures not only in light of Trump’s attempt to abandon international alliances and replace them with transactional deals, but also in light of a larger change in international affairs. 

In a speech at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in September 2023, Blinken explained that the end of the Cold War between the U.S. and the Soviet Union had promised a new era of peace and stability, with more international cooperation and political freedom. But while that period did, in fact, lift more than a billion people out of poverty, eradicate deadly diseases, and create historic lows in conflicts between state actors, it also gave rise to authoritarians determined to overthrow the international rules-based order. 

At the same time, non-state actors—international corporations; non-governmental organizations, or NGOs, that provide services to hundreds of millions of people across the globe; terrorists who can inflict catastrophic harm; and transnational criminal organizations that traffic illegal drugs, weapons, and human beings—have growing influence.

Forging international cooperation has become more and more complex, Blinken explained, at the same time that global problems are growing: the climate crisis, food insecurity, mass migration and mass displacement of populations, as well as the potential for new pandemics. In the midst of all this pressure, “many countries are hedging their bets.” 

They have lost faith in the international economic order, as a handful of governments have distorted the markets to gain unfair advantage while technology and globalization have hollowed out communities and inequality has skyrocketed. “Between 1980 and 2020,” Blinken noted, “the richest .1 percent accumulated the same wealth as the poorest 50 percent.” Those who feel the system is unfair are exacerbating the other drivers of political polarization. 

These developments have undermined the post–Cold War political order, Blinken said. “One era is ending, a new one is beginning, and the decisions that we make now will shape the future for decades to come.”

In his inaugural address on January 20, 2021, President Joe Biden vowed to “repair our alliances and engage with the world once again.” Saying that “America’s alliances are our greatest asset” just weeks later at the State Department, the president and officers in the administration set out to rebuild alliances that had fallen into disrepair under Trump. They reinforced the international bodies that upheld a rules-based international order, bodies like the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) organized in 1947 to stand against Soviet aggression and now a bulwark against Russian aggression. They began the process of rejoining the Paris Climate Agreement and the World Health Organization, both of which Trump had abandoned. 

Officials also worked to make international bodies more representative by, for example, welcoming into partnerships the African Union and Indonesia. They also broadened cooperation, as Blinken said, to “work with any country—including those with whom we disagree on important issues—so long as they want to deliver for their citizens, contribute to solving shared challenges, and uphold the international norms that we built together.”

At home, they worked to erase the “bright line” between foreign and domestic policy, investing in policies to bring jobs back to the U.S. both to restore the economic fairness they identified as important to democracy and to stabilize the supply chains that the pandemic had revealed to be a big national security threat. 

On April 28, 2021, in his first address to a joint session of Congress,  President Biden said he had told world leaders that “America is back.” But they responded: “[F]or how long?”  

That question was the backdrop to the G7 summit. Trump has said he will abandon international alliances, including NATO, in favor of a transactional foreign policy. He supports Russian president Vladimir Putin’s attempt to replace the rules-based international order with the idea that might makes right and that any strong country can grab the land of weaker states. 

Earlier this month, Biden used the occasion of the commemoration ceremonies around the 80th anniversary of D-Day to reinforce the international rules-based order and U.S. leadership in that system. On June 4, before Biden left for France, Massimo Calabresi published an interview with Biden in Time magazine in which Calabresi noted that the past 40 months have tested Biden’s vision. Russia reinvaded Ukraine in February 2022, and Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, 2023. Putin is trying to create “an axis of autocrats,” as Calabresi puts it, including the leaders of China and Iran, the state that is backing the non-state actors Hamas in Gaza, the Houthis of Yemen, and Hezbollah in Lebanon in order to destabilize Israel and the Arab states. China is threatening Taiwan. 

Calabresi pointed out that Biden has responded to these threats by shoring up NATO and welcoming to it Finland and Sweden, with their powerful militaries. His support has enabled Ukraine to decimate the Russian military, which has lost at least 87% of the 360,000 troops it had when it attacked Ukraine in February 2022, thus dramatically weakening a nation seen as a key foe in 2021. He has kept the war in Gaza from spreading into a regional conflict and has forced Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government to allow humanitarian aid into Gaza, although the Palestinian death toll has continued to mount as Netanyahu has backed devastating attacks on Gaza. Biden’s comprehensive deal in the Middle East—an immediate ceasefire, the release of all hostages held by Hamas, a big increase in humanitarian aid to Gaza, and an enduring end to the crisis with the security of both Israelis and Palestinians assured—has yet to materialize.

In Italy the leaders at the G7 summit stood firm behind Biden’s articulated vision, saying that the G7 “is grounded in a shared commitment to respect the U.N. Charter, promote international peace and security, and uphold the free and open rules-based international order.” On hot-button issues, the G7 backed Biden’s Middle East deal and support for Ukraine, agreeing to transfer $50 billion to Ukraine from the interest earned on Russian assets frozen in the European Union and elsewhere. 

The Biden administration announced additional economic sanctions to isolate Russia even more from the international financial system. At the summit, on June 13, 2024, Presidents Biden and Zelensky signed a ten-year bilateral security agreement that commits the U.S. to supporting Ukraine with a wide range of military assistance but, unlike the NATO membership Ukraine wants, does not require that the U.S. send troops. The agreement is legally binding, but it is not a treaty ratified by the Senate. If he is reelected, Trump could end the agreement.

Immediately after the G7 summit, world leaders met in Switzerland for the Summit on Peace in Ukraine, held on June 15 and 16. Ukraine called the summit in hopes of persuading major countries from the global south to join and isolate Russia, but the group had to be content with demonstrating their own support for Ukraine. Vice President Kamala Harris, who attended the summit, today posted: “The more than 90 nations that gathered at the Summit on Peace in Ukraine hold a diverse range of views on global challenges and opportunities. We don’t always agree. But when it comes to Putin’s unprovoked, unjustified war—there is unity and solidarity in support of Ukraine and international rules and norms.”

Earlier this month, Finnish software and methodologies company Check First released a report exposing “a large-scale, cross-country, multi-platform disinformation campaign designed to spread pro-Russian propaganda in the West, with clear indicators of foreign interference and information manipulation.” The primary goal of “Operation Overload” is to overwhelm newsrooms and fact-checkers and spread “the Kremlin’s political agenda.” 

Foreign affairs journalist Anne Applebaum told Bill Kristol of The Bulwark that China, Russia, Iran, Venezuela, and North Korea do not share an ideology, but “they do share a common interest, and the common interest is undermining…America, Europe, the liberal world, the democratic world.” They do this, she said, because the oppositions in their own countries are inspired by and use the democratic language of freedom and liberty and rights and rule of law, and leaders need to undermine that language to hold onto power. They also recognize that chaos and uncertainty give them business opportunities in the West. Disrupting democracies by feeding radicalism makes the democratic world lose its sense of community and solidarity.

When it does that, Applebaum notes, it loses its ability to stand up to autocrats. 

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[charyou-tree]

Unfriendly reminder that CNN was recently bought out by rightwing billionaire John Malone, a board member of the far-right "libertarian think tank" called the Cato Institute, where he rubs elbows with other evil bastards like the Koch brothers.

From their wikipedia page:

Cato scholars have consistently called for the privatization of many government services and institutions,[77] including NASA,[78] Social Security,[79] the United States Postal Service,[80] the Transportation Security Administration,[81] public schooling, public transportation systems,[82][83] and public broadcasting.[84] The institute opposes minimum wage laws, saying that they violate the freedom of contract and thus private property rights, and increase unemployment.[85][86] The institute is opposed to expanding overtime regulations, arguing that it will benefit some employees in the short term, while costing jobs or lowering wages of others, and have no meaningful long-term impact.[87][88] It opposes child labor prohibitions,[89][90][91] opposes public sector unions, and supports right-to-work laws.[92][93] It opposes universal health care, arguing that it is harmful to patients and an intrusion onto individual liberty.[94][95] It is against affirmative action.[96] It has also called for total abolition of the welfare state, and has argued that it should be replaced with reduced business regulations to create more jobs, and argues that private charities are fully capable of replacing it.[97][98] Cato has also opposed antitrust laws.[99][100] Cato is an opponent of campaign finance reform, arguing that government is the ultimate form of potential corruption and that such laws undermine democracy by undermining competitive elections. Cato also supports the repeal of the Federal Election Campaign Act.[101][102]

They're for pretty much every horrible far-right policy there is. This man is a board member of the organization that was created for billionaire oligarchs to funnel money into bribing politicians and spreading propaganda to influence public opinion on regulations to try and make this vision of America a reality.

One of the best lies by Fox News that everyone swallowed uncritically is the idea that everyone else is "The Liberal Media".

CNN should be regarded as a fascist propaganda outlet for the indefinite future.

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

In the aftermath of the right-wing U.S. Supreme Court's potentially deadly rampage against federal regulators, its ruling in support of the criminalization of homelessness, and its decision to grant former President Donald Trump sweeping immunity from criminal prosecution, Sen. Bernie Sanders said late Monday that nation's highest judicial body is "out of control" and must be reined in before it can inflict even more damage.

"Over the years, among other disastrous rulings, this right-wing court has given us Citizens United, which created a corrupt, billionaire-dominated political system," Sanders (I-Vt.) said in a statement. "It overturned Roe v. Wade, removing women's constitutional right to control their own bodies. Last week, the court chose to criminalize poverty by banning homeless encampments in public spaces—forcing more poor people into the cycle of debt and poverty."

"With the Chevron case," the senator continued, "they have made it far more difficult for the government to address the enormous crises we face in terms of climate change, public health, workers' rights, and many other areas. And, today, the court ruled in favor of broad presidential immunity, making it easier for Trump and other politicians to break the law without accountability."

Such far-reaching and devastating decisions, Sanders argued, highlight the extent to which unelected Supreme Court justices—with the backing of right-wing billionaires and corporations bent on sweeping away all regulatory constraints—have arrogated policymaking authority to themselves with disastrous consequences for U.S. society and the world.

"If these conservative justices want to make public policy, they should simply quit the Supreme Court and run for political office," said Sanders. "At a time of massive income and wealth inequality, billionaire control of our political system, and major threats to the foundations of American democracy, it is clear to me that we need real Supreme Court reform. A strong, enforceable code of ethics is a start, but just a start. We'll need much more than that."

Sanders did not make specific reform recommendations beyond an ethics code in his statement Monday, but he has previously suggested rotating judges off the Supreme Court—which would effectively end lifetime appointments.

The Vermont senator's progressive colleagues floated a range of possible actions following the high court's presidential immunity ruling on Monday, including adding seats to the Supreme Court and impeaching individual justices.

"Today's decision, along with the court's decision to overturn Chevron, is an assault on the separation of powers under the Constitution," Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) said in response to the court's ruling in Corner Post Inc. v. Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System.

"An extremist Supreme Court stacked by Donald Trump has snatched power away from an elected Congress and handed lawmaking power over to a few far-right unelected judges," Warren added. "This Supreme Court is undermining the foundations of our democracy; Congress must restore balance by adding more justices to the court."

The Supreme Court's recent flurry of rulings has already thrown existing cases into chaos and opened the floodgates to new corporate-backed lawsuits against longstanding federal regulations.

The Washington Post reported Sunday that "mere hours after the Supreme Court sharply curbed the power of federal agencies" by scrapping the Chevron doctrine, "conservatives and corporate lobbyists began plotting how to harness the favorable ruling in a redoubled quest to whittle down climate, finance, health, labor, and technology regulations in Washington."

"The National Association of Manufacturers, a lobbying group whose board of directors includes top executives from Dow, Caterpillar, ExxonMobil, and Johnson & Johnson, specifically called attention to what it described as regulatory overreach at the [Securities and Exchange Commission] and the Environmental Protection Agency," the Post noted.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the nation's largest corporate lobbying organization, and the American Petroleum Institute were also among the big business groups applauding the fall of Chevron, fueling calls for Congress to codify the doctrine into federal law.

The American Prospect's Hassan Ali Kanu wrote Tuesday that the high court's latest term has "demonstrated how lacking our system is in terms of safeguards that can prevent or correct the Supreme Court when it oversteps its authority or engages in unjustified exercises of power."

"President Joe Biden's commission to explore Supreme Court reform produced a number of viable and sensible options," Kanu continued. "Congress could curtail or end judicial review, the power the court aggregated to itself to exclusively interpret the Constitution."

"Even more modest proposals could further democratize the Court and judiciary, like prohibiting them from declining to apply laws passed by Congress unless they have at least a supermajority vote; or implementing sortition, random assignment, and rotation into the process of appointing or assigning judges to the Supreme Court," he added. "At this point, when a six-member majority is literally declaring a former president who appointed three of them to be functionally above the law, against all prevailing opinion, scholarship, analysis, and experience, the case for court reform couldn't be clearer."