Friday, June 8, 2018
Cornel West: Bernie Sanders is wrong; Democratic party cannot be reformed
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iyyrs5q333I
USA needs a new progressive party
Despite Medicare for All
Support 'Spreading Like Wildfire,' Pelosi Shrugs, Says Dems Will 'Evaluate'...
If They Win
One critic offered this
translation: "My pharmaceutical and health insurance donors hate the idea
of Medicare for All, but just vote me back in and, honest, we'll 'look' at
it."
Despite mounting
evidence that support for Medicare for All is "spreading like
wildfire" and has become a winning issue for Democratic
candidates, House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi is drawing ire from
progressives following a press conference on Thursday where she told reporters
that she is open only to "evaluating" the idea if the party wins
control of Congress in the mid-terms.
According
to the Center for Responsive Politics, Pelosi has taken more than
$200,000 in donations from the health sector in the 2017-2018 election cycle.
Far from being a fringe issue,
Medicare for All now has the support of
51 percent of Americans polled by the Washington Post and Kaiser
Family Foundation.
Several Democratic candidates
running for congressional seats throughout the country—in both blue and red
districts—have won elections in recent months on platforms that proudly support
Medicare for All.
Deb
Haaland is considered likely to win a congressional seat in New
Mexico's 1st district after winning the Democratic primary on Tuesday with a
platform that called for Medicare for All. In Texas and Illinois last month,
universal healthcare proponents Gina
Ortiz-Jones and Sean
Casten also won their Democratic primaries for House seats.
And after sharing with voters
the story of her mother's inability to afford prescriptions while suffering
from cancer, and winning the endorsements of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and
Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.), Medicare for All advocate Kara Eastman beat Brad
Ashford for the Democratic nomination in Nebraska's 2nd district—even as the
Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) threw its support behind
Ashford.
Several Democratic lawmakers
who are considered potential 2020 presidential candidates have also announced
their support for Medicare for All, with Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.),
Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.)
joining Sanders in co-sponsoring his Medicare for All bill.
"I've always been for a
public option so I'm always eager to talk about that," Pelosi said at a
press conference. "Some of the other issues that have been proposed have
to be evaluated in terms of the access that they give, the affordability of it
and how we would pay for it, but again it's all on the table."
Pelosi's statement echoed her
support for reinstating rules, aimed at avoiding legislation that adds to
budget deficits, which progressives say undermines ambitious,
innovative new policies.
Pelosi's statement coincides
with her support this week for reinstating pay-as-you-go
rules—a move progressives warn is a direct
attack on the kind of bold and inspiring policies that voters are
demanding.
Contrary to Pelosi's
suggestion that Medicare for All would be prohibitively expensive, Sanders
estimates that his plan would
cost Americans $6 trillion less than the current for-profit insurance system
over the next decade.
The Democratic Party Cannot Be Reformed
Seen as Undermining Bold
Agenda, Progressives Rip Dem Leaders' Embrace of 'Absurd' Pay-Go Rule
"The old guard of this
pathetic, impotent party needs to retire or be voted out."
Embracing the kind of deficit
phobia frequently deployed by the GOP and corporate Democrats to undercut
ambitious goals like Medicare for All, free public college, and a
transformative green energy plan, Democratic leaders are vowing
to reinstitute"fiscally hawkish" pay-as-you go rules if they
retake control of the House in 2018—a move progressives denounced as severely
wrongheaded and "actively harmful."
"The pay-go thing is an
absurd idea," argued Rep. Raúl Grijalva (D-Ariz.), leader of the
Congressional Progressive Caucus, in response to The Hill's report on
Wednesday that House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Minority Whip
Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) are putting the so-called pay-go policy at the top of their
party's agenda for 2019.
"It would be, I think,
irresponsible to try to tie up Congress's ability to respond to economic
downturns or, in the current discussion, to slash programs," Grijalva
added.
Putting the matter more
bluntly in an analysis on Wednesday, Splinter's Paul Blest artfully argued Democratic
leaders' embrace of the pay-go rule—which would require all spending that adds
to the deficit to be offset by program cuts or tax hikes—is a strong indication
that "they'll do fuck all to put forward a positive vision for the country
they want to run" if they retake the House in 2018.
Others echoed Blest's sharp
critique, declaring that the renewed push for pay-go in the midst of growing
calls for a bold agenda show that
"the old guard of this pathetic, impotent party needs to retire or be
voted out."
While pay-go has long been an
obsession of the Democratic Party's right-wing Blue Dog Caucus, progressives
argue the rule would hamstring the possibility of achieving ambitious and
morally necessary policies like Medicare for All, which is soaring in
popularity among the American public.
"Nancy Pelosi and Steny
Hoyer remain 100 percent committed to losing, and if against all odds they
somehow win, doing nothing good with their power," wrote The
Intercept's Jon Schwartz, noting that support for a regressive policy like
pay-go is a serious strategic mistake.
As Blest notes, pay-go is a
particularly absurd policy for Democrats given that Republicans just completely
ditched their deficit fearmongering—which was never genuine in the first
place—to ram through massive tax breaks for the rich and massive corporations.
"There really is no
better time to push bold ideas that actually make a material
difference in the lives of people who the government and business have left
behind," Blest concluded. "No one gives a sh*t about the deficit
anymore, if they ever did at all. It’s long past time for Democrats to stop
letting this albatross hang around their necks."
Opioids Are Responsible For 20% Of Millennial Deaths, "Crisis Will Impact US For Generations
by Tyler Durden
Wed, 06/06/2018 - 23:00
The opioid crisis has become a
significant public health emergency for many Americans, especially for
millennials, so much so that one out of every five deaths among young adults is
related to opioids, suggested
a new report.
The study is called “The
Burden of Opioid-Related Mortality in the United States," published Friday
in JAMA. Researchers from St. Michael’s Hospital in Toronto, Ontario,
found that all opiate deaths — which accounts for natural opiates,
semi-synthetic/ humanmade opioids, and fully synthetic/ humanmade opioids —
have increased a mindboggling 292 percent from 2001 through 2016, with one in
every 65 deaths related to opioids by 2016. Men represented 70 percent of all
opioid-related deaths by 2016, and the number was astronomically higher for
millennials (24 and 35 years of age).
According to the study, one out
of every five deaths among millennials in the United States is related to
opioids. In contrast, opioid-related deaths for the same cohort accounted for 4
percent of all deaths in 2001.
Moreover, it gets worse; the
second most impacted group was 15 to 24-year-olds, which suggests, the opioid
epidemic is now ripping through Generation Z (born after 1995). In
2016, nearly 12.4 percent of all deaths in this age group were attributed to
opioids.
“Despite the amount of
attention that has been placed on this public health issue, we are increasingly
seeing the devastating impact that early loss of life from opioids is having
across the United States,” said Dr. Tara Gomes, a scientist in the Li Ka Shing
Knowledge Institute of St. Michael’s.
“In the absence of a
multidisciplinary approach to this issue that combines access to treatment,
harm reduction and education, this crisis will impact the U.S. for
generations,” she added.
Over the 15-year period, more
than 335,000 opioid-related deaths were recorded in the United States that met
the study’s criteria. Researchers said this number is an increase of 345
percent from 9,489 in 2001 (33.3 deaths per million population) to 42, 245 in
2016 (130.7 deaths per million population).
“By 2014, Canada and the
United States had the highest per capita opioid consumption in the world and
deaths related to opioid use have increased dramatically in both countries,”
the study stated, which also said, “opioid-related death rates are increasing
most quickly among adults aged 25 to 44 years in the United States. Consequently,
the public health burden resulting from early loss of life is substantial.”
“These numbers show us the
dramatic impact of opioid-related harms across all demographics in the
U.S.,” said Dr. Tara Gomes, a scientist in the Li Ka Shing Knowledge Institute
of St. Michael’s. “We know this is not an isolated public health issue – it is
one that spans across North America.”
All in all, the opioid crisis
is much worse than we imagined, as millennials are craving, not just avocados
these days - but, vast amounts of opioids inducing a tidal wave of fatal
overdoses.
A 1,000-year flood in Maryland shows the big problem with so much asphalt
By Greta
Jochem on Jun 5, 2018
The rain
started to fall in Ellicott City, Maryland on the afternoon of May
27. Nearby tributaries of the Patapsco River were already dangerously
swollen from last month’s steady precipitation. The storm intensified, and
floodwaters soon tore through Ellicott City’s main street, submerging the first
floors of buildings, sweeping away cars, and killing at least one person.
The storm was a so-called
“1,000 year flood,” meaning it had a 0.1
percent chance of occurring this year. But this “exceptionally
rare” event is deja vu for residents — they’re still picking up the pieces
from a similar flood
that destroyed the area back in July 2016.
After that big flood, Robin
Holliday spent months rebuilding her business, HorseSpirit Arts Gallery. She
didn’t expect a flood like that to happen again, but she also didn’t think
the proposed
watershed management plan was strong enough. Discouraged, she started
to think about leaving. The recent flood solidified her decision.
So what’s behind the propensity
for floods in Ellicott City? Part of the problem is its vulnerable
location: the town lies at the foot of a hill where river branches meet the
Patapsco River. And, of course, climate
change makes storms wetter and increases the frequency of severe,
record-breaking weather. But there’s another thing people are pointing out:
concrete.
When hard,
impermeable concrete replaces absorbent green spaces, it’s much easier
for floodwaters to overwhelm stormwater drainage. “That’s what happened in
Ellicott City,” says Marccus Hendricks,
an assistant professor at the University of Maryland School of Architecture,
Planning, and Preservation.
In Ellicott City, development
has flourished.
“Nearly one-third of the
Tiber-Hudson sub-watershed that feeds into historic Ellicott City is now
covered by roads, rooftops, sidewalks and other hard surfaces that don’t absorb
water,” the Baltimore Sun wrote
in 2016.
In a press
release, the Sierra Club’s Maryland Chapter called for a stop to development
in the Tiber-Hudson watershed: “We may not have control over severe weather
events (except by fighting climate change), [but] we can take ownership over
the role that development played in this disaster.”
At a recent press
conference, a local county official said that Howard County, home
to Ellicott City, has been taking steps to prepare for more floods.
“We’re focusing on making sure
that what has been approved is being done by the code and by law, making sure
that stormwater regulations are being abided by,” said Allan Kittleman,
the Howard County executive. Since the flood in 2016, he said the county
has designed and engineered more stormwater retention facilities, but larger
projects will take time.
This is far from the first
time that development and asphalt have had a violent run-in with climate
change. Last summer, Hurricane Harvey drenched sprawling Houston with trillions
of gallons of water and caused
$125 billion in damage. The area saw a 25
percent increase in paved surfaces between 1996 and 2011, according to
Texas A&M professor Samuel
Brody. Brody found that every square meter of Houston’s pavement cost
about $4,000 more in flood damage.
And, rapidly developing or
not, our cities are full of these paved surfaces. In the majority of the
country, surfaces like pavement or brick make up just 1
percent of the land. Yet in cities, hardscapes account for upwards of 40
percent of land area.
Environmental change coupled
with development will likely make this issue one of major national importance,
Brody tells Grist.
“Every week, there’s some
urbanized area that floods. We look up and say, ‘Oh that’s never happened
before and it’s never going to happen again.’ But if you look at the big
picture, it’s happening all the time with increasing severity.”
Giuliani as Master Diplomat
JUNE 7, 2018
by GARY LEUPP
Former New York Mayor and
Trump personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani said Wednesday in Israel:
“Well, somehow North Korea,
after he [Trump] canceled the summit because they insulted the vice president,
they insulted his national security adviser and they also said that they would
go to nuclear war against us, they were going to defeat us in a nuclear war, we
said, ‘Well, we’re not going to have a summit under those
circumstances.’ Well, Kim Jong Un got back on his hands and knees and begged
for it, which is exactly the position you want to put him in.”
This is as historically
accurate at Giuliani’s insistence that Donald Trump never had sex with Stormy
Daniels because, well, look at her.
The real history is that,
after the summit had been set, National Security Advisor John Bolton (April 29)
and Vice President Mike Pence (May 22) both made extremely stupid, ugly, smug
statements comparing North Korea to Libya. Bolton suggested that the “Libyan
model” of disarmament would apply. This means the model of negotiating disarmament
followed by regime change in the newly vulnerable state. It conjures up visions
of Muammar Gaddafy’s grotesque demise, which Hillary Clinton so savagely
cheered. It was not an inadvertent reference. Bolton has long advocated regime
change in North Korea and is probably the most toxic of all the neocons. In the
past Pyongyang has called him “human scum” and refused to deal with him as a
diplomat. State Department officials have acknowledged that Bolton is
attempting to sabotage the summit.
Pence followed up that the
Libyan model would only apply if Kim failed to fully denuclearize. “There was
some talk about the Libyan model last week, and you know, as the President made
clear, this will only end like the Libyan model ended if Kim Jong Un doesn’t make
a deal.” Asked if this could be interpreted as a threat, he replied, “Well, I
think it’s more of a fact.”
This of course only made
things worse. A top official in Pyongyang called Pence a “political dummy” and
issued this message:
“Before making such reckless
threatening remarks without knowing exactly who he is facing, Pence should have
seriously considered the terrible consequences of his words.
It is the US who has asked for
dialogue, but now it is misleading the public opinion as if we have invited
them to sit with us.
I only wonder what is the
ulterior motive behind its move and what is it the US has calculated to gain
from that.
We will neither beg the US for
dialogue nor take the trouble to persuade them if they do not want to sit
together with us.
Whether the US will meet us at
a meeting room or encounter us at nuclear-to-nuclear showdown is entirely
dependent upon the decision and behavior of the United States.
In case the US offends against
our goodwill and clings to unlawful and outrageous acts, I will put forward a
suggestion to our supreme leadership for reconsidering the DPRK-US summit.”
Following this, Trump
announced the cancellation of the summit, presumably to avoid the indignity of
a North Korean announcement. But the North Koreans then unexpectedly issued a
message praising Trump’s courage and regretting the cancellation. Plans to
conduct the summit were resumed following a high-ranking DPRK official’s visit
to the U.S. The North Koreans, fully aware of Trump’s instability and contradictions
among his advisors and officials, have no doubt warned Trump that there are
people around him who want no deal but rather the overthrow of the Kim regime.
Trump has perhaps acknowledged awareness of that, allaying North Korean
concerns temporarily.
But then his personal lawyer
makes his amazing statement, in a rambling interview in Tel Aviv in which among
other things he said sex between Trump and Stormy was impossible due to her
appearance. That’s what you’d expect from a (sexist) personal lawyer, as
opposed to spontaneous geopolitical analysis offered Israeli journalists.
He attributed the temporary
suspension of the Singapore summit to Trump, as a response to North Korean
insults (directed to the two top U.S. officials who’ve suggested a Libyan fate
for the DPRK) and a nuclear war threat. He depicts Kim Jong-un (in his
pronunciation, Kim Yong-un) as groveling before the president begging to get
the meeting back on track.
Giuliani’s chuckly
garrulousness does not suggest premeditation. He is ignorant of the history and
context. He perhaps does not realize that portraying a very proud and powerful
man as kowtowing to his boss looks designed to do what Bolton and Pence
couldn’t do: sabotage the summit. Talk about an insult.
I think it likely that at any moment
Pyongyang might issue a statement calling off the meeting.
Giuliani is not a U.S.
government official, but he is a longtime Trump intimate and his personal
attorney responding to multiple scandals, making a fool of himself and perhaps
not long in his job. Daniels’ lawyer is calling for his firing due to his
ridiculous comments about his client. Trump may see him at this point as a
liability. His immediate dismissal would be understood and welcomed by the
media, which has come to despise the one-time 9/11 hero as a thuggish stooge.
More importantly, it could be seen by Kim Jong-un as an expression of regret
that someone close to the president had said something so totally, totally
stupid, maybe jeopardizing his Nobel.
Giuliani might not know that
for centuries Korea sent envoys to the Chinese court where in presenting
credentials to the emperor they prostrated themselves (kowtowed) before him.
The Chinese emperor thought he was the Son of Heaven, China the Central
Country, all the world’s peoples protected by its benevolent leadership. It was
appropriate that foreign leaders get on their hands and knees showing deference
to him. Korea was for centuries the most important participant in what’s
sometimes called the Sinocentric tribute system.
The former mayor’s smirking
suggestion that the North Korean leader had gotten down on his hands and knees
(“again”—as though he had done so earlier to Trump) has to infuriate the North
Koreans. If Giuliani had planned it, he could not have said something more
explosive.
There are apparently some very
astute, well-informed people in the DPRK Foreign Ministry. They realize chaos
reigns in the White House and that if they meet, Kim will engage with a man
who’s not all there. Their point is to stoke his vanity to get a deal which
avoids war and leads to normalization of relations. But they realize that Trump
is surrounded by people who still envision regime change—even at this point,
five days before the summit. It will require restraint on Chairman Kim’s part
to go through with the planned meeting.
Giuliani Says Kim Jong-Un Begged Like A Has-Been-Politician-Turned-Hack-Attorney Trying To Get A Job At The White House
NEW YORK—Describing the
pathetic manner in which the North Korean dictator debased himself while pleading
for a meeting with President Trump, Rudy Giuliani claimed Thursday that Kim
Jong-un begged like a has-been-politician-turned-hack-attorney trying to get a
job at the White House.
“He groveled like a washed-up
former mayor who hasn’t been relevant since the early 2000s, begging on his
knees for a mid-level position in the Justice Department,” said Giuliani,
adding that the pathetic doofus demonstrated a level of self-respect on par
with a failed presidential candidate who built his entire career on being in
the right place at the right time, babbling incoherently about the relationship
between a reality TV star and a pornographic actress.
“I kid you not, this guy was
prepared to bow down and kiss Trump’s boots like some cigar-chomping numbskull
who actually thought he had a chance at being Attorney General. I mean, the
look on his face—it was like a guy who just found out he married his second
cousin or got 9 percent of the vote in a Republican primary—just a total,
irredeemable jackass.”
At press time, Giuliani was
forced to walk back his comments by Trump’s actual lawyer, Emmet Flood.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)