“For the past century, the agendas of the Democratic Party were predictable. They professed concern for working Americans and supported blue-collar unions. Unemployment insurance, a 40-hour work week, disability insurance, and Social Security were their trademarks — often rapidly achieved by growing government bureaucracies and continually raising taxes. Still, many Democrats were socially conservative. By the 1970s, Democrats still deplored antisemitism. Party officials had rejected their own segregationists to champion civil rights. Presidents like Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, and John F. Kennedy all supported strong defense and military deterrence. All that is now passe. The only vestigial Democrat left in Congress is Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman, himself roundly despised by Democrat leaders. Today, supporting Israel and calling for campuses to stop their institutionalized antisemitism is Democratic political suicide.” (05/07/26)
“Three women with links to the jihadist Islamic State (IS) group have been arrested on returning home to Australia following years in detention in Syria. All are Australian citizens. Police said they arrested two of them – Kawsar Abbas, 53, and Zeinab Ahmed, 31 – on arrival in Melbourne. Janai Safar, 32, was arrested after landing in Sydney. A fourth woman in the party, which includes nine children, was not arrested. The group are the subject of heated political debate in Australia, with the government saying it would give them no help to return. The children – thought to be aged from about six to their mid-teens – are to get psychological support and be assessed for possible radicalisation. Australia is one of a number of countries grappling with how to deal with the return of citizens – and their children – from Syria after the so-called Islamic State caliphate was destroyed in 2019.” (05/07/26)
“In 1919 Rosa Luxemburg, the revolutionary, was murdered in Berlin. Her killers bludgeoned her with rifle blows and tossed her into the waters of a canal. Along the way, she lost a shoe. Some hand picked it up, that shoe dropped in the mud. Rosa longed for a world where justice would not be sacrificed in the name of freedom, nor freedom sacrificed in the name of justice. Every day, some hand picks up that banner. Dropped in the mud, like the shoe. The peons on the farms of Argentina’s Patagonia went out on strike against stunted wages and overgrown workdays, and the army took charge of restoring order. Executions are grueling. On this night in 1922, soldiers exhausted from so much killing went to the bordello at the port of San Julián for their well-deserved reward. But the five women who worked there closed the door in their faces and chased them away, screaming, ‘You murderers! Murderers, get out of here!'” (05/07/26)
“Seven children and two women abducted by gunmen at an orphanage last month in the north-central region of Nigeria have been rescued by troops, the country’s army said on Wednesday. Authorities in Kogi state said gunmen attacked an Islamic orphanage that was operating illegally and abducted 23 pupils in an ‘isolated area’ of Lokoja, capital of Kogi State, on April 26. Fifteen of those abducted were immediately rescued. The troops intercepted and recovered the victims within a forest area in the state, army spokesman Hassan Abdullahi said in a statement. ‘The rescued victims comprised five boys, two girls, and two adult females, believed to be the wives of the proprietor of the orphanage,’ Abdullahi said. No group has yet claimed responsibility for the attack. Armed groups attack schools and abduct students because they are seen as strategic in drawing attention and exacting huge ransoms, according to analysts.” (05/07/26)
“The Rev. Jesse Jackson died February 17 at age 84. In 1984 and 1988, the civil rights activist ran for the Democratic presidential nomination, becoming the first Black man to wage a major national campaign for the White House. In his 1988 speech at the Democratic National Convention, Jackson emphasized, ’Politics can be a moral arena where people come together to find a common ground.’ Salim Muwakkil, in coverage for In These Times, made a similar assessment, writing that while many of Jackson’s followers ’are more comfortable agitating or deriding conventional political wisdom’, Jackson ’managed to harmonize most of those discordant notes.’ Almost 40 years later, as once-outsider politicians like Zohran Mamdani — now the first Muslim mayor of New York City — attempt to carve out space within the political mainstream, we return to Muwakkil’s words on the costs and opportunities of movement institutionalization and ‘“political maturity.'” (05/07/26)
“Regulators no longer have to worry that Spirit Airlines might upset the air-travel market by merging with the wrong competitor. The now-defunct airline made poor business decisions and had to cope with tough circumstances. But if its demise were an Agatha Christie mystery, the fingerprints of Joe Biden’s antitrust officials would be all over the crime scene. These zealots fought a proposed deal between JetBlue and Spirit, and congratulated themselves on a 2024 court victory that doomed Spirit to likely oblivion. This was wanton economic destruction masquerading as antitrust enforcement. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), who never met an antitrust action she didn’t like, exemplifies the perversity.” (05/05/26)
Source: Caitlin Johnstone, Rogue Journalist
by Caitlin Johnstone
“Caitlin and Tim discuss art, AI, consciousness, propaganda, spiritual awakening and more while Caitlin paints a portrait of Marco ‘the Gorey Gusano’ Rubio.” (05/06/26)
“A massive ‘megatsunami’ wave created when part of an Alaskan mountain crumbled into the sea is the second tallest ever recorded – and a reminder of the risks posed by melting glaciers, say scientists. Last summer a giant wave swept through a remote fjord in southeast Alaska leaving destruction in its wake. The event went largely unreported at the time, but a new scientific analysis shows it was caused by a massive landslide. An incredible 64 million cubic metres of rock – the equivalent of 24 Great Pyramids – splashed into the water below. The sheer power of that amount of rock plunging into the fjord in under a minute created a gigantic wave almost 500 metres tall. Only the time it happened – in the early hours of the morning – prevented tourist cruise ships being caught up in the devastation, say the researchers.” (05/06/26)
“In the week since the Supreme Court barred gerrymandering of districts intentionally based on race, many state legislatures have been busy debating how to redraw electoral maps. Some lawmakers have offered non-race-based ideas – including proportional representation – to ensure all disadvantaged voters have a voice. Such ideas, however, might first entail a dialogue, both across the aisle and across races. In Alabama, one legislator, Rep. Curtis Travis, offered a different kind of dialogue Monday.'” (05/05/26)
“The FBI has raided the office of a powerful Virginia Democratic lawmaker and ally of Gov. Abigail Spanberger as part of a federal corruption and illegal marijuana sale probe, Fox News has learned. Longtime state Sen. L. Louise Lucas, a major power broker in Virginia politics who stumped for Spanberger on the campaign trail in 2025, is now at the center of a major FBI corruption probe, according to federal law enforcement sources. Agents executed court-authorized criminal search warrants at Lucas’ office in Portsmouth, Virginia, Wednesday, according to federal law enforcement sources. The FBI simultaneously carried out a SWAT-team search of a nearby cannabis dispensary co-owned by Lucas. At least three people were detained during the raids. The state senator arrived at her office as the raids were being conducted. She told Fox News that she had no idea what the FBI agents were doing at her office.” (05/06/26)
