Characteristics of a popular politician: a horrible voice,
bad breeding, and a vulgar manner.
—Aristophanes
Tuesday, September 4, 2018
Scientists Determine Tingling Sensation Of ASMR Caused By Mass Brain Cell Die-Off
URBANA, IL—In a warning of
what they are calling an impending public health crisis, scientists from the
University of Illinois announced Monday that the tingling sensation of
autonomous sensory meridian response-inducing stimuli, or ASMR, is actually
caused by mass cell death in the brain.
“What you are feeling in the
back of your mind is slowly killing you, so please, for the love of God, stop
now,” said neurologist Samantha Bergmann, who added that even brief episodes of
ASMR were found to cause permanent and catastrophic damage to the central
nervous system of the listener.
“That tingling sensation
represents hundreds of millions of your neurons firing one last time as they
die then slough off inside your brain. Furthermore, as the tingling progresses
down your back, you are feeling the mildly pleasant effects of your spinal cord
shriveling and necrotizing. Every time you listen to an ASMR recording, you are
literally turning your brain to mush.
So please, if you feel even
the slightest tingle, put down the headphones and call 911 immediately.”
Bergmann also stressed that
the tingling sensation of ASMR should not be confused with the tingling
sensation that often precedes a stroke, a far less serious phenomenon.
Why are the midterm elections in the US so important?
The November vote is
increasingly looking like a battle for the future of the country.
by David A Love
2 Sept 2018
The stakes could not be higher
in the upcoming US midterm elections, as a battle is being waged to decide
which vision of America will prevail - that of President Donald Trump or that
of his opposition.
Control of state houses, the
US House of Representatives and the Senate are at stake. Political observers on
both sides of the spectrum are calling on people to go out and vote because
this could be the most important election in our lifetimes, if not in US
history.
On the national and state
levels, the Republican Party promotes policies that heighten racial and
economic injustice and entrench social division. Their regressive stance on a
variety of socioeconomic issues has served as a catalyst for the opposition -
mobilising women, people of colour, the youth, and others and making space for
dynamic, progressive candidates with bold alternative programmes to run
for office.
On the one hand, states such
as Republican-controlled North Carolina, ground zero for the war on voting
rights, have enacted strict voter suppression measures to bar
voters of colour from exercising their rights.
A federal court has ordered
state officials to redraw its illegally-drawn congressional districts,
which were designed to benefit Republican politicians. A restrictive voter ID
law in Wisconsin suppressed 200,000 black and Democratic voters in the state,
which Trump won by 22,748 votes.
On the other hand, voters
outraged by the current political climate are energised and poised to make
change - and make history. Three states will have the opportunity to elect
their first African American governors - a historic precedent.
In Maryland, civil rights
leader and former president of the National Association for the Advancement of
Colored People (NAACP), Ben Jealous, a Democrat, seeks to unseat
Republican incumbent Governor Larry Hogan with a progressive platform of
criminal justice reform, marijuana legalisation and a state-funded,
single-payer healthcare system.
Former Georgia state
representative and house minority leader Stacey Abrams is challenging
Republican Brian Kemp in her bid to become the nation's first black woman
governor. As Georgia secretary of state, Kemp, who enjoys Trump's support, has
purged 591,548 names from the state voter rolls, and is
accused in a lawsuit of failing to secure Georgia's voting system, exposing the
records of 6
million voters.
Parroting Trump's xenophobic
rhetoric, Kemp has vowed to use his Ford pick-up truck "just in case I
need to round up criminal illegals and take them home
myself".
In Florida, Tallahassee
Mayor Andrew Gillum won the Democratic primaries to become the
state's first African American gubernatorial nominee, mobilising support among
young people, liberals and progressives, and white, Latino and black voters.
Gillum promotes gun
control and a repeal of Florida's deadly "stand your ground" self-defence
law, a $15 minimum wage, Medicare for all, corporate tax increases to pay for
public education, and the abolishment of the Immigration and Customs
Enforcement.
The Republican, Trump-endorsed
governor candidate, Ron DeSantis, stirred controversy by using a racial
slur in reference to Gillum's politics.
This, as the current governor
Rick Scott - a climate-change denier and darling of the pro-gun lobby who made
Florida the "Gunshine State" due to its lax firearm laws -
runs for the US Senate. Scott has received Trump's blessing but attempted to
distance himself from the National Rifle Association (NRA) and from
the president, also pandering
to Latino voters with a Spanish-language ad conveying the
message that he is not Trump.
Latino voters, representing
the fastest growing segment of the US population, are poised to influence
elections in a number of states. In light of the deaths of nearly 3,000 people
last year in Puerto Rico due to government inaction following the
devastation of Hurricane Maria, mobilised and displaced Puerto Rican
voters in Florida, New York and New Jersey could tip the balance in the
midterms.
Meanwhile, the separation of
nearly 3,000 undocumented migrant children from their families due to
a white
supremacist "zero tolerance" policy at the Mexican
border, and the revocation of citizenship and passports of
Hispanic American citizens, are issues impacting Latinos in the border state of
Texas.
With its minority-white,
non-Latino population still under Republican control, Texas is about
to send its first two Latina legislators to Congress, Sylvia Garcia and
Veronica Escobar. Further, Democrat Beto O'Rourke could unseat
conservative Senator Ted Cruz.
Hailed as the Left's
answer to Trump, O'Rourke has attacked the US president for his immigration
policy and defended American football players who "take a knee" in
protest of police violence.
Amid the Islamophobic policies
of the Trump administration, including travel bans on people from Muslim countries, Congress
prepares to welcome its first Muslim-American women members - Rashida Tlaib , a daughter of Palestinian immigrants
from Michigan, and Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, a Somali-American who fled
the Somali civil war and lived in a Kenyan refugee camp.
The prospect of more inclusion
in Congress - and the presence of legislators such as these dynamic Muslim
women in a legislative body dominated by white
Christian men - is more than mere symbolism, and stands to
change the tenor and tone of Washington.
President Trump, facing a
Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation and fearing impeachment if the
Democrats take control of Congress, has suggested there will be violence if his
party loses the midterms. The Republican Party is also facing an internal crisis,
struggling with Trump's divisive politics.
The future of US governance
hangs in the balance as the US president wages assaults on the rule of
law and government institutions, on democratic norms, national
security and the media. A Democratic win at the upcoming midterm
elections could upset his bid for re-election in 2020.
Corporations Are Waging All-Out Class War
by Jim Hightower
America’s political history
has been written in the fierce narrative of war. Not our country’s many
military clashes with foreign nations, but our own unending war for democracy
in the United States.
Generation after generation of
moneyed elites have persisted in trying to take wealth and power from the
workaday majority and concentrate both in their own hands to establish a de
facto American aristocracy. Every time, the people have rebelled in organized
mass struggles against the monopolists and financial royalists, often literally
battling for a little more economic fairness, social justice, and equal
opportunity.
And now, the time of a new
democratic rebellion is upon us again, for We the People are suddenly in the
grip of a brutish level of monopolistic power.
Corporate concentration of
markets, profits, workplace decision-making, political influence, and our
nation’s total wealth is surpassing that of the infamous era of robber barons.
Apple, which just became the first U.S. corporation to reach a stock
value of $1 trillion, is now larger than Bank of America, Boeing, Disney,
Ford, Volkswagen, and 20 other brand-name giants combined.
In fact, just four tech
superpowers raked in half of this year’s stock price gains by the 500
largest corporations. Indeed, the recent gold rush of corporate mergers has
created mega-firms, shriveling competition in most industries — including
airlines, banks, drug companies, food, hospitals, hotels, law firms, media,
oil, etc.
The result of fewer and bigger
corporations is that those few attain overwhelming power over the rest of us.
They are able to control workers’ pay, crush unions, jack up prices, squeeze
out smaller businesses, dominate elections, weaken environmental projections,
and generally become even fewer, bigger, and more powerful.
They’re waging all out
corporate class war on the American people and on our democratic
ideals — and they’re winning.
Labor Day message from Democratic Socialists of America
https://www.facebook.com/demsocialists/
I hope you're enjoying the long weekend, and be sure to thank a worker!
No one – no banker, no boss, no landlord – handed us this “day off."
We celebrate Labor Day because brave workers organized and fought for their rights.
And the fight continues today.
The fight for all working people is no different than it was in 1882, when workers celebrated the first Labor Day.
The fight for all working people is no different than it was in 1882, when workers celebrated the first Labor Day.
The 19th century anti-worker, anti-immigrant beliefs still exist. And they're now armed with Twitter and trying to draw workers under the influence of anti-worker policies.
As a grassroots working class organization, DSA keeps organizing, educating, and agitating for a democratic socialist society that values all workers.
And we need your help.
https://www.dsausa.org/chapters/
https://www.dsausa.org/chapters/
Monday, September 3, 2018
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