“One more time, maybe the last, Joe Biden stared through sunglasses and angrily delivered a speech written to be uplifting. ‘The Amazon is the lungs of the world!’ he barked at the G-20 summit in Brazil, before loping off with an unsmiling half-wave, like a man leaving a restaurant with lousy service. The President of the United States disappeared into trees. Aides said the jungle exeunt was planned, but who knew? In an all-time awkward moment Monday, G-20 leaders waited and finally took a group photo without Biden, absent for ‘logistical reasons.’ It was like taking a holiday portrait at the mall without Santa. When Biden reappeared the next day, a reporter shouted, ‘Mr. President, why did you change your mind on Ukraine shooting long-range missiles?’ Biden said nothing, so other heads of state to speak for him.” (11/21/24)
“‘I can do a lot of damage with a little phone,’ Justin Kanew proclaimed when the Nashville Scene ran a cover story on him last fall. The line was so buzzy that the alt-weekly used it as the subheading for the piece, which chronicled Kanew’s time turning his news site, The Tennessee Holler, into a must-read publication for those on a diet of lowest-common-denominator lefty pablum. But, as The Holler’s October 18th coverage of the plans for a Christmas parade in Cookeville, TN, proved, Kanew can do just as much damage without his favorite device. According to the Holler’s Instagram, ‘The city’s Christmas parade is requiring parade participants to sign a ‘Statement of Faith’ including a belief in the Bible, Jesus, only man-woman marriage, anti-abortion & anti-trans statements.'” (11/21/24)
Source: Caitlin Johnstone, Rogue Journalist
by Caitlin Johnstone
“One of the very few good things coming out of the relentless nightmare happening in Gaza is that at long last the western world is getting a clear look at Israel. The real Israel. Not the Israel they teach you about in school. Not ‘the only democracy in the middle east,’ where Jews were given safe haven after their victimization at the hands of the Nazis and managed to create a thriving society despite existing in a sea of savage enemies bent on their destruction. Not that Israel. The real one. Arguably the most racist society on earth, whose existence has depended on nonstop violence, theft, tyranny and abuse since its very inception.” (11/21/24)
“It’s official now. America’s closest ally, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the one accorded more than 50 standing ovations in Congress just months ago, is under indictment by the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity and war crimes. America must take note: the U.S. Government is complicit in Netanyahu’s war crimes and has fully partnered in Netanyahu’s violent rampage across the Middle East. For 30 years the Israel Lobby has induced the U.S. to fight wars on Israel’s behalf designed to prevent the emergence of a Palestinian State. Netanyahu, who first came to power in 1996, and has been prime minister for 17 years since then, has been the main cheerleader for U.S.-backed wars in the Middle East. The result has been a disaster for the U.S. and a bloody catastrophe not only for the Palestinian people but for the entire Middle East.” (11/21/24)
“The first priority of the Trump administration’s new attorney general and FBI director will be to dismantle the ideological weaponization of the DOJ and FBI that has crushed the best people, forced the rest into silence and betrayed the American people. There are few better examples of how this malign machine works than the case of senior FBI Supervisory Agent Zach Schoffstall, who was forced out of the FBI after 16 years of exemplary service because he refused to go along with a trumped-up domestic-terrorism prosecution.” (11/20/24)
“If the Democratic National Committee is trying to find a new leader proficient at alienating Black voters, it couldn’t do better than Rahm Emanuel. Emanuel has indicated in recent days that he’s interested in the job. If he goes for it at the party’s upcoming meeting, much of the old Democratic guard is likely to back him, setting up an intra-party brawl. Last week, David Axelrod served as a digital advance man for his former Obama White House colleague, posting that ‘Dems need a strong and strategic party leader, with broad experience in comms, fundraising, and winning elections’, while touting Emanuel as just the man for the job: ‘Dude knows how to fight and win!'” (11/21/24)
“In early November, one of the most revered spiritual leaders in the Middle East, the Shiite cleric Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, issued a rare guidance to his home country, Iraq. It came soon after reports that neighboring Iran might use militias under its control in Iraq to rain missiles and drones on Israel. His advice? That the Iraqi people, especially their ‘informed elites’, must exercise more ‘competence and integrity’ in governance and improve the rule of law in fighting corruption. His most specific message, however, was that any arms in Iraq – notably those of the Iran-backed Islamic Resistance in Iraq – must be held exclusively under the authority of the elected government in Baghdad. Iraqis still have ‘a long path’ ahead to achieve all of this, stated Mr. al-Sistani, who has long been a proponent of civic peace and secular democracy. ‘May God help them in this endeavor’.” (11/21/24)
“The recent proposal to require federal employees to return to the office full-time has sparked debate about how best to streamline government operations while ensuring effective public service. Vivek Ramaswamy, the entrepreneur and head of the new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), has argued that mandating in-office attendance could encourage voluntary departures among federal workers, potentially reducing what he sees as bureaucratic inefficiencies. … Ramaswamy believes a return-to-office mandate would lead to about 550,000 resignations, potentially saving $27.5 billion annually. However, these numbers fail to account for the high costs of recruiting and training replacements, the loss of institutional knowledge, and the operational delays that would result from a sudden mass exodus of skilled employees.” (11/21/24)
“My inbox is full of lament (and encouragement). My Instagram feed is full of anger and ‘the arc of the moral universe bends slow but… ‘ My Facebook brims with exhortations to focus on the positive, on what we can control, on the next fight. I live in a poor Democratic stronghold in southeastern Connecticut. Kamala Harris won our state by more than 200,000 votes. Our seven paltry electoral votes went blue. Here, Jill Stein got a lot more votes than Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., but nowhere near enough to swing the Nutmeg State red. I didn’t plant a Harris/Walz sign on my front walk. I didn’t knock on doors in Pennsylvania. I didn’t give any money in response to the desperate and constant text messages I received from Kamala Harris, Tim Walz, and dozens of other Democratic pen pals. I also never figured out how to stop those texts from crowding onto my phone.” (11/21/24)
“The U.N. nuclear watchdog’s board on Thursday condemned Iran for failing to cooperate fully with the agency, the second time it has done so in just five months. The International Atomic Energy Agency also called on Tehran to provide answers in a long-running investigation into uranium particles found at two locations that Tehran has failed to declare as nuclear sites. Nineteen members of the IAEA board voted for the resolution, while Russia, China and Burkina Faso opposed it, and 12 abstained and one did not vote, according to diplomats who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe the outcome of the closed-doors vote. The resolution was put forward by France, Germany and Britain, supported by the United States. It comes at a critical time, ahead of Donald Trump’s return to the White House.” (11/21/24)
