Source: Caitlin Johnstone, Rogue Journalist
by Caitlin Johnstone
“When we’re kids we play cops and robbers, and watch cartoons about evil criminals being stopped by virtuous crime fighters. Then when we mature we learn that all the most evil people are operating within the laws of our nation, and nobody ever sends them to jail. Ask a child to draw a Bad Guy and they’ll probably draw a bank robber, a thief, a supervillain, or somebody breaking the law in some way, because that’s what young people are trained to believe wickedness looks like in their world. They won’t usually draw a politician, a billionaire, a media mogul, a tech plutocrat, a warmonger, or any of the rich and powerful people who are causing the real suffering in our world. The ones who impose laws upon our society ensuring the continuation of poverty, inequality, war, oppression and tyranny. ” (03/31/26)
“I’m writing this piece well into President Donald Trump’s new war with Iran, which, with the help of Israel, has already killed more than 2,000 civilians, including 175 schoolgirls and staff; displaced some 3.2 million people; and is costing the American taxpayer at least one billion dollars a day. All of which is tragically reminiscent of the last time a Republican president led the U.S. into a war on a river of lies and greed. I’m thinking, of course, about George W. Bush and the invasion of Iraq in 2003. Weapons that don’t exist. Threats to this country that aren’t real. Liberation for a people that the U.S. will never win over. Freedom for women about whom nobody in power cares a jot. A war that will bring total victory in only a few days or weeks. All this we heard in 2003, and all this we are hearing again now.” (03/31/26)
“A Scottish man, described as a senior figure in an international crime syndicate, was arrested shortly after landing on the resort island of Bali, authorities in Indonesia said Tuesday. The 45-year-old, identified as Steven Lyons, was taken into custody by immigration officers at Ngurah Rai International Airport on Saturday on arrival from Singapore, according to Untung Widiyatmoko, head of Indonesia’s branch of Interpol. The immigration system had flagged him as the subject of an Interpol Red Notice issued at Spain’s request. A Red Notice is an alert issued by Interpol at the request of a member country for police worldwide to arrest a suspect for extradition. Lyons, who is wanted in Spain and the United Kingdom in connection with organized crime, drug trafficking and money laundering, will be extradited to Spain on Wednesday, Widiyatmoko told reporters in Denpasar, the provincial capital of Bali.” (03/31/26)
“The US and Israeli war has, from its very beginning, violated both US domestic and international law. The legal consequences go beyond specific violations. Washington and Tel Aviv’s breaches of the United Nations Charter and other legal frameworks also undermine the very foundations of the rule of law. Even while international legal institutions too often lack sufficient capacity to enforce their decisions, they still provide a crucial framework for protest, for pressure on individual governments, and for the hope of a future world where the rule of law is paramount. Now, however, that future is in more danger than any other time in recent memory. Right now, Iranian civilians are paying the highest price. But the collapse of the rule of law makes the future more dangerous for everyone else, too.” (03/31/26)
“An analysis from the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosive (ATF) could not conclusively connect a bullet fragment recovered during Charlie Kirk’s autopsy to the rifle found near the scene of the rightwing political activist’s killing – and the FBI is running additional tests, lawyers for Kirk’s accused murderer said in recent court filings. In the court filings, Tyler Robinson’s defense team also asked for a delay to a preliminary hearing scheduled in May, saying they need time to review the bullet analysis as well as an enormous amount of other material that could contribute to the suspect’s defense. …The defense said in its motion that it may try to use the analysis to clear Robinson of blame during the preliminary hearing while prosecutors aim to show they have enough evidence against him to proceed with a trial.” (03/31/26)
“The numbers from No Kings protests made a big splash. Roughly 8 million people declared their opposition to the present administration this past weekend in over 3100 cities and towns across the nation. But in the long run the impact of quality will be greater than quantity. Beyond the splash, the values expressed in the protests will continue to ripple through our collective consciousness. Here are some of those ripples that will spread out and energize resistance efforts in the weeks, months, and years ahead. Harmony and Equality: Those who showed up on the streets joined as one, all equal, no person better or more entitled than the other. Their participation loudly reaffirmed cherished democratic values as expressed in the First Amendment and human values anchored in the world’s religions.” (03/31/26)
“The founder of a Texas megachurch who pleaded guilty to sexually abusing a child in the 1980s was released Tuesday after serving six months in an Oklahoma jail. Robert Preston Morris, 64, was released just after midnight, said Osage County Sheriff’s Capt. Matt Clark. Morris pleaded guilty last year to five counts of lewd or indecent acts with a child as part of a plea agreement under which he received a 10-year suspended sentence with the first six months to be served in the Osage County Jail. … Morris was the senior pastor of Gateway Church in the Dallas-Fort Worth suburb of Southlake, where he led one of the nation’s largest megachurches until June 2024 when — faced with the victim’s allegations — he resigned. He was indicted last year by an Oklahoma grand jury.” (03/31/26)
“The Chinese government is set to ban people from storing the cremated remains of their loved ones in empty apartments instead of paying for expensive cemetery plots. The new law will put an end to ‘bone ash apartments,’ which have risen in popularity as spaces in cemeteries remain scarce. Low property prices in the country mean that for many, it is more affordable to entomb the ashes of relatives in an empty apartment than pay for funeral costs. The legislation prohibits the use of residential properties ‘specifically for the placement of ashes’ as well as the burial of remains outside of cemeteries and areas where ecological burial is legal. Bone ash apartments are empty properties which are turned into ritual halls by family members of the deceased. Their loved one’s ashes are placed inside and the space turned into an ancestral shrine.” (03/31/26)
Source: The American Prospect
by David Dayen & Maureen Tkacik
“For 14 years, the Abu Dhabi Investment Council (ADIC) remained silent about John Raymond’s woefully underperforming Houston private equity firm Energy & Minerals Group (EMG). The $330 billion sovereign wealth fund’s leadership made no public pronouncements when Raymond, son of the iconic Exxon chief executive who masterminded the merger with Mobil, agreed to invest some $3 billion in the new venture of extravagant fracking mogul Aubrey McClendon, who’d just been forced out of the company he’d founded for looting corporate coffers …. They raised no alarm bells when McClendon and his new company American Energy Partners were sued a few years later for stealing trade secrets, or when the next year he was indicted for orchestrating a vast bid-rigging conspiracy, or when following his spectacular death the day after the indictment by driving 75 miles per hour into an overpass wall, EMG’s investments were themselves set ablaze.” (03/31/26)
“A Russian tanker docked Tuesday at the Cuban port of Matanzas laden with 730,000 barrels of oil, marking the first time in three months that an oil tanker reached the island. The administration of U.S. President Donald Trump had allowed the Anatoly Kolodkin to proceed despite an ongoing U.S. energy blockade. Cubans including Energy and Mines Minister Vicente de la O Levy cheered the ship’s arrival. A shortage of petroleum has exacerbated a deep economic crisis that has left the population mired in long blackouts and facing a severe shortage of food and medicine. … Experts say the anticipated shipment could produce about 180,000 barrels of diesel, enough to feed Cuba’s daily demand for nine or 10 days.” (03/31/26)
