“Hard work, passion, virtue and true grit earmark the American heartland. Anecdotes, generation-spanning farm families and crop innovations speak volumes. They are all children of agriculture. Farming teaches faith in God, food cultivation, animal husbandry, the value of love, the richness of relationships and the growth of character. Farming offers time for reflection — an Aristotelian balance between nourishing and strengthening the physical body and deepening and improving our souls. From my earliest days, the farm was my classroom and nature was my teacher. I learned to treasure my parents, a work ethic, discipline and sacrifice. A diminishing number of Americans are denied that chance today. Engaging in routine daily farm tasks and providing care for the animals instilled accountability and highlighted the precariousness of life, illustrating how it can be either abruptly lost or extinguished over time.” (04/18/24)
“Haiti has descended into chaos. It’s had no president or parliament — and no elections either –for eight long years. Its unelected prime minister Ariel Henry resigned recently when gang violence at the airport in Port-au-Prince made it impossible for him to return to the country after a trip to Guyana. Haiti is the poorest country in the region, its riches leached out by colonial overlords, American occupying forces, corporate predators, and home-grown autocrats. As if that weren’t enough, it’s also suffered an almost Biblical succession of plagues in recent years. A coup deposed its first democratically elected leader, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, not once but twice — in 1991 and again in 2004. An earthquake in 2010 killed hundreds of thousands, leaving 1.5 million Haitians homeless, out of a population of less than 10 million. In the wake of that earthquake, nearly a million people contracted cholera, the worst outbreak in history, courtesy of a contingent of U.N. peacekeepers.” (04/18/24)
“Operations at Dubai International Airport remain severely disrupted after heavy rains battered the United Arab Emirates and neighbouring countries. The storm pounded the UAE on Tuesday, flooding roads and the sections of the busy international airport. Flash floods have now killed 20 people in Oman and one in the UAE. Some inbound flights resumed on Thursday, but on the whole Dubai International Airport, a major travel hub, is struggling to function. Many air passengers have told the BBC of scenes of ‘chaos’ at the world’s second-busiest airport, with people unable to travel on their booked flights. Other ‘very anxious’ and disoriented passengers, some travelling with young children, have posted on social media saying that despite confirmed bookings, their tickets are not being processed, because ‘check-in/bag drop/passport control [are] not open.'” (04/18/24)
Source: Caitlin Johnstone, Rogue Journalist
by Caitlin Johnstone
“Israel’s allowed to bomb an Iranian consulate, but Iran’s not allowed to strike back. The US is allowed to surround China with war machinery, but it would be World War Three if China ever tried to militarily encircle the US. NATO is allowed to expand to Russia’s doorstep and amass proxy forces on its border, but the last time Moscow placed a credible military threat anywhere near the United States, the US responded so aggressively that the world almost ended. The ‘rules-based international order’ that the US-centralized power structure purports to uphold just means an order in which the US makes up the rules and nations had better obey them. It means rules for thee but not for me.” (04/18/24)
“In March 2023, a group of House Republicans launched a new Anti-Woke Caucus to ‘root out all far-left political programs from the federal government’ — including those focused on ensuring diversity, equity, and inclusion, or DEI, in both hiring and workplace practices. The group wants to ‘protect taxpayer’s [sic] from being forced to fund woke and divisive ideologies.’ Rep. Jim Banks (R-Ind.) chairs the caucus, which has 26 members, half of whom are also members of the far-right, obstructionist House Freedom Caucus. The major difference between the two special interest groups is that the more radical Freedom Caucus seeks to completely change the direction and approach of the House GOP, which it believes is too accommodating to Democrats and the few moderate Republicans still in office.” (04/18/24)
“An incredible thing happened this week. A whopping 2.45 million people watched the WNBA draft Monday, as University of Iowa shooting sensation Caitlin Clark — dressed in head-to-toe Prada, the only time the label has ever dressed an athlete for a basketball draft — was selected first overall by the Indiana Fever. Last year, an audience of 500,000 tuned in — that’s nearly a 500% increase in viewers. And they all seemed shocked to learn the truth about WNBA salaries, especially rookie ones. Despite her captivating play, astounding range and marketing prowess, Clark will only earn $338,056 over four years: $76,535 annually. … ‘For somebody who is now the face of women’s basketball, it seemed kind of ridiculous,’ Hoda Kotb said on the ‘Today’ show, adding that it was ‘disturbing’ and ‘like picking at an old scab for many women.'” (04/18/24)
“The US and UK have imposed a new wave of sanctions against Iran, following its drone attack on Israel. Washington targeted 16 people and two entities that produce engines for the drones. The UK Foreign Office imposed a travel ban and asset freeze on seven individuals and six entities, including those involved in drone and missile programmes. Both countries already have hundreds of sanctions in place against Iran. The latest move follows Israel’s call for support from the international community after Iran’s direct assault on Saturday, involving more than 300 missiles and drones fired from Iran, Iraq, Syria and Yemen. Almost all were downed by Israel and its allies. Tehran has maintained the attack was in retaliation for a presumed Israeli air strike on its consulate in Syria on 1 April, in which 13 people were killed.” (04/18/24)
“A Russian scientist who worked on hypersonic technologies was handed a seven-year jail sentence on Thursday for treason after he was accused of passing state secrets to foreign nationals. A representative for St Petersburg’s court system said Alexander Kuranov, 76, would be sent to a high-security prison and fined 100,000 roubles ($1,000). At the time of his arrest in 2021, Kuranov was the general director of St Petersburg-based Hypersonics Systems Research Facility, where he oversaw work on a new version of a Soviet-era hypersonic aircraft dubbed Ayaks. President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly said that Russia is a world leader in hypersonic missiles – cutting-edge weapons capable of carrying payloads at up to 10 times the speed of sound to punch through air-defence systems.” (04/18/24)
“Sometimes a potentially seismic shift in the law is masked by opaque and technical legalese. So it was last week, when a federal court of appeals in Washington struggled to decide whether a nongovernmental organization that seeks to improve democratic elections was sufficiently injured—making it eligible for so-called standing to sue—to have its day in court to enforce a never-used provision of the Constitution. The 435 seats in the House of Representatives are apportioned among the states according to their population as determined by the decennial census. If the NGO is successful, some of those apportioned seats could be taken away from states that prevent citizens from exercising their right to vote. But though this possibility has been outlined in the Constitution for 156 years, most everything about this case, which attempts to actually utilize it, is uncertain.” (04/18/24)
“Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar’s daughter, Isra Hirsi, revealed Thursday she has been suspended from Barnard College over her involvement in anti-Israel protests on Columbia University’s campus. ‘I’m an organizer with CU Apartheid Divest @ColumbiaSJP, in my 3 years at @BarnardCollege I have never been reprimanded or received any disciplinary warnings,’ the 21-year-old wrote on X. ‘I just received notice that I am 1 of 3 students suspended for standing in solidarity with Palestinians facing a genocide.’ Hirsi and the two other students – identified as Maryam Iqbal and Soph Dinu — received notice of their suspension from Barnard Dean, Leslie Grinage, first thing Thursday morning, the Apartheid Divest said in a statement.” (04/18/24)
