https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yX4LoQpyovw
Monday, May 24, 2021
Progressives to Biden: 'You Are Making a Huge Mistake' by Weakening Infrastructure Proposal
"If Democrats learned anything from the past ten years, it has to be that negotiating against ourselves doesn't work," said one climate justice advocate.
Kenny Stancil, staff writer
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2021/05/21/progressives-biden-you-are-making-huge-mistake-weakening-infrastructure-proposal
Progressives called it a "huge mistake" Friday after the White House announced President Joe Biden had preemptively slashed his own infrastructure proposal by approximately $600 billion in order to appease Republicans and some corporate-friendly Democrats in the U.S. Senate.
"President Biden knows this is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to make real change, which is why he campaigned on a bold climate vision and began his administration with a historic Covid relief bill," said Ellen Sciales, press secretary for Sunrise Movement. "He can't follow that up by going small and selling out our multiracial, cross-class movement of working people to compromise with politicians who would rather ensure billionaires get tax cuts than make sure we get paid a living wage."
Biden's offer to downsize his American Jobs Plan, described by progressives as already inadequate, from $2.3 trillion to $1.7 trillion—including reduced investments in sorely needed broadband, among other projects—came just days after congressional Republicans missed the president's Tuesday deadline to provide him with their own counter-proposal.
Progressive critics argued that Biden's unprompted embrace of spending cuts is a political disaster that threatens to undermine the nation's attempt to recover from the pandemic-driven economic downturn and to confront the looming climate emergency.
"If the president continues down this path, how will he justify his choices to the workers, caregivers, climate refugees, and so many other members of our communities who need support to survive?" asked Kaniela Ing, climate justice campaign director at People's Action.
Arguing that "we need to Build Back Better, not Build Back in Bad Faith," Greenpeace USA climate campaigner Ashley Thomson emphasized the need to "build on and go bigger than the vision President Biden offered on the American Jobs Plan—not capitulate to bad-faith negotiations from Republicans that want us to compromise on justice, on climate, and on our futures."
"Millions of voters have given the Biden administration a mandate to be bold and tackle the interlocking crises facing our country—the continued fallout from Covid-19, racial injustice, economic inequality, and the worsening climate crisis," Thomson added. "Even more, our movement has given Washington the THRIVE Act, a blueprint for creating 15 million jobs while furthering racial and economic justice."
As Sciales noted: "Not a single Republican senator voted for the popular, much-needed Covid relief package and Democrats passed it anyway. That's the correct strategy. Democrats must take their power seriously and do what's needed with or without the GOP."
Rahna Epting, executive director of MoveOn, said in a statement that "Republicans are not a serious governing party and the Biden administration should stop treating them like one."
Earlier this week, several Democratic lawmakers advocated for quickly enacting a robust and comprehensive infrastructure package regardless of whether their right-wing colleagues approve of it."Since the moment Biden took office, Republicans have shown they are more interested in lying about the last election than in solving today's crises," Epting added.
"While bipartisan support is welcome, the pursuit of Republican votes cannot come at the expense of limiting the scope of popular investments," 60 House Democrats wrote in a letter addressed to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.)—whom Sciales earlier this month chastised for engaging in "performative negotiations" with the likes of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who has already vowed to oppose any spending proposals that include even modest tax hikes on the richest Americans and corporations.
In her statement Friday, Sciales said that "if Democrats learned anything from the past ten years, it has to be that negotiating against ourselves doesn't work."
"Let's not mince words: this is a demonstrable failure of a political strategy," she said of Biden's latest offer. "We can't repeat the same mistake and expect a different result."
"Our message to President Biden is simple: you are making a huge mistake," said Sciales. "Voters in 2022 and 2024 will not ask whether you were nice to Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W. Va.) and Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine); they will look to whether or not you dealt with the climate crisis and created millions of new union jobs when you had the chance."
'Terrible News': Tribune Shareholders Approve $633 Million Sale to Vulture Fund Alden Global
A union leader had urged the newspaper company's second-largest shareholder to vote "no," warning that "Alden ownership would be a disaster for Chicago, democracy, and society at large."
Jessica Corbett, staff writer
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2021/05/21/terrible-news-tribune-shareholders-approve-633-million-sale-vulture-fund-alden
Tribune Publishing shareholders on Friday approved "vulture" fund Alden Global Capital's $633 million bid to buy the Chicago-based newspaper chain—a development that sparked both confusion about how key ballots were recorded as well as outrage among journalists, union leaders, and readers alarmed over what the future may hold.
The New York-based hedge fund, which critics have called "the face of bloodless strip-mining of American newspapers and their communities," plans to take the company private and will become the second-largest newspaper owner in the United States, after Gannett, if the deal closes, which is expected by the end of June. Alden was already the largest shareholder, holding about a third of the company's stock.
"This is terrible news for the Chicago Tribune and all our sister newspapers. It's also terrible news for the communities these papers cover and, I'd argue, for the country," humor columnist Rex Huppke said in a series of tweets. "I'm going to take a moment to feel angry, disappointed, and a bit scared. Then I'm going to do exactly what my colleagues here in Chicago, and my colleagues in Baltimore and New York and Hartford and Orlando and in newsrooms across the country, will do: get back to work."
Tribune Publishing's other outlets include The Baltimore Sun; the Hartford Courant; the Orlando Sentinel; the South Florida Sun Sentinel; the New York Daily News; the Capital Gazette in Annapolis, Maryland; The Morning Call in Allentown, Pennsylvania; the Daily Press in Newport News, Virginia; and The Virginian-Pilot in Norfolk, Virginia.
In a joint statement Friday, unions representing newsroom staff across the newspaper chain blasted the shareholder vote and vowed to keep fighting for media workers.
"Today, Tribune Publishing shareholders voted to put profit and greed over local news in our country," the statement said. "While we are saddened by the turn of events, we know that our work over the past year—to build allies in the community and to raise awareness about Alden—is not in vain. Those allies will support us as we fight against Alden to protect local news and the cuts that they will inevitably try to make."
Last weekend, hundreds of NewsGuild members rallied in Annapolis, Chicago, Hartford, Orlando, and Virginia Beach against Alden's attempt to purchase Tribune Publishing.
"A takeover by Alden Global Capital is a threat to the work that our journalists do for our community," Ella Wood of UNITE HERE Local 737 warned at the Orlando rally. "Without your work, our stories do not get told."
Jim Friedlich, the chief executive of the Lenfest Institute for Journalism, a nonprofit that owns The Philadelphia Inquirer, tweeted that Friday was "a very bad day for local news," expressing concern about what the hedge fund will do the newspapers.
"Alden's playbook is pretty straightforward: Buy low, cut deeper," Friedlich explained to the New York Times. "There's little reason to believe that Alden will approach full ownership of Tribune any differently than they have their other news properties."
NPR's David Folkenflik reported Friday that "Alden's founder, Randall Smith, sits on Tribune's board, as do two other directors with close ties to Alden. Smith's protΓ©gΓ©, Heath Freeman, oversees Alden's previous newspaper holdings and is the fund's president. Both men keep low public profiles."
In a statement after the shareholder meeting, Freeman confirmed the outcome of the vote and said that "the purchase of Tribune reaffirms our commitment to the newspaper industry and our focus on getting publications to a place where they can operate sustainably over the long term."
Approval of the sale required the votes of at least two-thirds of shares not owned by Alden. Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong owns about a 24% stake in Tribune Publishing, making him the company's second-largest shareholder. His spokesperson said Friday that he abstained from voting, which caused widespread confusion.
Although an official abstention would have counted as an "no" vote, killing the proposed sale, the Chicago Tribune reported that company officials confirmed the proxy ballots registered to Soon-Shiong were submitted without the "abstain" box checked, so they were counted as "yes" votes.
Gregory Pratt, a city hall reporter and president of Chicago Tribune Guild, tweeted early Friday afternoon that "this is what we call a fluid situation—and a total nightmare," while Jon Schleuss, president of the NewsGuild, told the Associated Press, "We're digging into this question right now."
Schleuss later said that Tribune Publishing pointed to the Chicago Tribune's report "as providing the best clarification."
In a series of updates on Twitter, NPR's Folkenflik said that sources told him Soon-Shiong—who also owns the Los Angeles Times and The San Diego Union-Tribune—chose not to vote on the Alden-Tribune deal and "the sale was the result he intended."
Soon-Shiong's spokesperson said in a statement Friday that "for the past several years, Tribune Publishing has been a passive investment, as he has remained focused on the leadership roles he holds across his companies."
Earlier this week, Pratt wrote in an open letter to Soon-Shiong that "the newspapers in Tribune Publishing need your help." Advocating for a 'no' vote, the union leader warned that "Alden ownership would be a disaster for Chicago, democracy, and society at large."
"He should have taken a stand as a civic leader in journalism," Pratt told the New York Times on Friday. "He had a responsibility, in my opinion, to vote 'no,' but at the bare minimum he had a responsibility to take a firm stance one way or the other instead of punt."
Schleuss was also critical, saying in a lengthy statement that "voting in favor of selling to Alden represents a short-sighted view of the value of the company, and an utter disregard for the value of quality news coverage."
"I am disturbed and upset. Yet, I cannot help but be optimistic," Schleuss added. "We will continue to fight back. Our fight is a righteous one. We are fighting for our democracy."
Dennis Prager does NOT CARE about DYING KIDS! (Prager CHALLENGES John Oliver to a Debate!!)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g2h4Eic4qw4
'An Absolute Nightmare': Video Shows Tennessee Officers Taunted Hogtied Man Before He Died
"You shouldn't be able to breathe," one officer replied to William Jennette's plea moments before the man's death at the Marshall County Jail in Lewisburg last May.
by
Brett Wilkins, staff writer
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2021/05/21/absolute-nightmare-video-shows-tennessee-officers-taunted-hogtied-man-he-died
Justice advocates on Friday condemned officers at a Tennessee county jail for taunting a hogtied man moments before his death after a local news station published video of the incident.
"There's approximately a three-minute, 43-second period after officers have applied handcuffs where they keep the individual in the prone position, and that's not acceptable."
—Seth Stoughton,
use-of-force expert
William Jennette—a 48-year-old white father of five—died on May 6, 2020 at the Marshall County Jail in Lewisburg, Tennessee after a group of officers from multiple law enforcement agencies restrained him and kneeled on his back for several minutes while he screamed for help, WTVF reports.
Video obtained by the Nashville station shows Jennette—who was arrested for alleged public intoxication, indecent exposure, and resisting arrest—yelling, "Help, they're going to kill me!"
One officer is heard commanding Jennette to "stay down, you stupid son of a bitch."
The video also shows Jennette repeatedly pleading with officers that he could not breathe.
"You shouldn't be able to breathe, you stupid bastard," an officer identified in a lawsuit as Kendra Burton replies.
At least two officers in the video say that Jennette bit them.
At one point in the video an officer sounds a note of caution, telling his colleagues: "Easy, easy—remember asphyxiation, guys."
To which another officer responds, "That's why I'm not on his lungs."
Jennette's last words were, "I'm good."
"No, you ain't good," an officer replies.
An autopsy (pdf) performed by the Marshall County Medical Examiner's Office ruled Jennette's death a homicide, listing the cause as "acute combined drug intoxication"—he had methamphetamine in his system—with asphyxia as a "contributory cause of death."
Despite that finding, a grand jury decided not to indict any of the officers.
Sherrilyn Ifill of the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund called the video "an absolute nightmare," tweeting: "Grand jury refuses to indict any. That's how it usually happens."
Chris Vanderveen, director of reporting at KUSA in Denver, tweeted that this is the 121st prone police restraint death he has logged.
One of Jennette's daughters, Dominque Jennette, filed a lawsuit (pdf) this February against Marshall County, the city of Lewisburg, and several of the officers involved. The suit alleges the officers' "savage beating" and "suffocation" of Jennette caused his death, and constitute a "deprivation of civil rights" under the Fourteenth Amendment.
"That just breaks my heart because he was someone worth knowing," his daughter told WTVF. "That's just something that really sticks with me, how scared he must have been and how alone he must have felt."
Dominique Jennette said she believes the officers "should have been more aware."
"They should have been trained properly, and they weren't," she added.
Seth Stoughton, a law professor and former police officer, told WTVF that the video shows "the exact opposite of what generally accepted training has taught officers for the last 25 years."
"When the handcuffs came on, they should have rotated the guy to his side," asserted Stoughton. "There's approximately a three-minute, 43-second period after officers have applied handcuffs where they keep the individual in the prone position, and that's not acceptable."
The video's release came one day after the Associated Press published footage it obtained of Louisiana state troopers stunning, punching, kicking, choking, and dragging 49-year-old Ronald Greene, who died during a May 2019 arrest following a high-speed chase.
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