#massive nationwide protests

[hedgehog-moss]

On the eve of planned nationwide demonstrations, I want to offer an overview of the ways the protests in France are being handled by the government so far (and if what you’ve heard is that this is over a 2 year increase in retirement age, please do take a minute to read this post to get a better idea of the context)

1. In Paris on March 21, a CRS (cop) threw a tear gas grenade in the air towards protesters (they’re supposed to throw them near the ground); the grenade landed and exploded on a protester’s head. (x)

2. Massive use of tear gas at every protest, on this vid from March 17 you can see the Place de la Concorde (largest public square in Paris) drowned in tear gas. (x)

3. In Paris on March 20, video of a CRS with a baton hitting protesters who are cowering against a wall (x)

4. CRS grabbing demonstrators in (illegal) chokeholds and dragging them by the neck (x)

5. In Strasbourg on March 21, police trapped about a hundred protesters in a narrow alleyway and tear gassed them from both ends of the alley so they couldn’t escape; an asthmatic person lost consciousness; people who lived there opened their doors and let the protesters enter their houses to get to safety. (x)

6. In Paris on March 20, a CRS shot a protester with an LBD riot gun (rubber bullets) and shouted at him “Pick up your balls now, fucker” (x) (an allusion to the several instances in recent years of protesters having testicle injuries from LBD guns - and non-protesters too, in 2015 a Muslim teenage boy lost a testicle after being shot by a cop with rubber bullets when he was shooting firecrackers in a park on July 14th / Bastille day). A few seconds later in the video another CRS tells the one who said that “careful there’s a camera”

7. In Paris on March 21, a group of 4 or 5 CRS who were dispersing demonstrators, threw a homeless man to the ground who had been shouting at them (hard to hear what he said, the first sentence is “How can you do this job?”), kicking him in the head while he was down and mocking him when he couldn’t get up, calling him a ‘fatso’ and ‘sack of shit’ (the woman you can hear at the end of the video is yelling at the CRS to help the guy get up and telling them “do you lack humanity to this point?”) (x)

8. That same day Macron gave a speech on TV in which he said “the crowd [= the protesters] has no legitimacy against the people, who express themselves through their elected representatives” even though he passed his reform without a vote from the elected representatives—and considering polls show the vast majority (>70%) of the country is against the reform, the “people” and the “crowd” are one and the same. Today (March 22) he gave another TV speech in which he compared what’s happening in France right now to the January 6 US capitol attack.

9. During today’s speech Macron also said “minimum-wage workers have never seen such an increase in purchasing power” which is a mad thing to say in the middle of a cost of living crisis, and he used the term ‘smicard’ in this sentence— the minimum wage in France is called the SMIC and smicard is a derogatory word for minimum-wage workers. He decried the “extreme, unregulated violence” of protesters but had nothing to say about the unregulated violence of his police forces, and instead stoked the fire with contemptuous language that angers people the day before a planned mass protest.

10. Hundreds of protesters (and even people who weren’t protesting but just nearby) have been arrested and taken into custody in “preventative arrests”; the vast majority were then released due to “absence of an offence.” Here’s a thread by a woman who was arrested in Paris along with 11 other women (one was a 17 year-old girl) for taking part in a peaceful protest. They spent 20 hours all in one cell, were only allowed to go to the toilet if they left the door open, were frisked and had their fingerprints and DNA samples taken. Also, in Nantes on March 14, four young women age 18-20 reported having been sexually assaulted by police during body searches while participating in a student protest.

And a thread by a 19-year-old Black student who spent 48 hours in custody last week along with 4 other people who were arrested in Paris as they were walking down the street. Lots of racist shit in this thread. He had already spent 14 hours in custody after a protest a couple of days before, and ended up being charged for refusing to have his DNA samples taken.

This article in Le Monde from yesterday (it’s in French and unfortunately paywalled) talks about people who took part in last week’s protests having been handcuffed and searched in their underwear then released free of charges the next day; a lawyer comments how this is clearly meant to discourage people from demonstrating. The article also mentions two 15 year old Austrian boys who were on a class trip to Paris and were rounded up with a group of demonstrators, so the Austrian embassy had to intervene. (Journalist mentions sarcastically “We don’t know if these high schoolers’ DNA samples were taken.”)

11. There are videos from various protests of journalists wearing the press armband being threatened, hit, or shoved to the ground by police. In Montpellier yesterday, a journalist took this photo as a CRS was pointing his rubber bullet gun at his head and another was running at him with his baton telling him “I don’t give a fuck about your press card” —the photographer managed to run away. (x)

This is all from the past ten days (and mostly from the past two days) and far from an exhaustive list, there's so much outrageous stuff happening (like the Minister of the Interior lying and saying participating in an undeclared demonstration is illegal, when it’s not) but it gives a good idea of what French democracy looks like under Macron. The above photo says it all really. And thank you to all the people who continue taking part in the protests and strikes.

#frpol #police violence #not sure what to tag this as #i know it's very far from the usual theme of this blog but people should know what a shitshow this country is rn #all the photos are from the tweets that i've linked

[anartificialsatellite]

Not to be extra political lately or anything but if I didn't specifically have Israeli friends and follow Israelis on social media, I would probably not know that there have been massive weekly protests against the right-wing Netanyahu government for going on seven straight months now, and there's a massive huge one happening right this second, so maybe you also don't know it.

#politics #i/p #sorry i try not to do politics too often here but #the difference between my timelines in kind of jarring

[elumish]

What's Going On With Roe v Wade (5/3/2022 - 2:45am EDT)

On the night of 5/2/2022, Politico released a leaked draft abortion opinion written by Justice Samuel Alito, a conservative justice on the Supreme Court, that would overturn Roe v. Wade--this was a majority opinion, meaning that, in a preliminary vote, at least 5 justices had voted for it.

What this means:

A majority of the Supreme Court (at least 5 of the 9 members) are currently voting on the side of overturning Roe v. Wade. Given that the conservatives have a super-majority (6 members) on the court, this is not a huge surprise. Justice Stephen Breyer is the one who will be voting on this, not Ketanji Jackson Brown. This will make no difference in the vote--they are both liberal votes.

If the result of this vote holds, Roe will be overturned. The New York Times covers what the end of Roe would mean (likely behind a paywall, you can likely get around that by using Incognito mode).

Someone leaked this opinion. That is very small compared to the massive impact of Roe potentially being overturned, but in the history of the Court it is a huge deal. Whoever did this is incredibly brave and will most likely lose their job and their career from this.

What this doesn't mean:

That the Supreme Court has released a decision. June is the last month of the Supreme Court's term, and it's when they release a lot of their decisions, especially the major ones. This was a leaked draft opinion.

That Roe has been overturned. Again, no decision has been released, and the vote is not final.

That this means that abortion will become illegal nationwide. You can look at the NYT explanation above, but in summary, there are 13 states with "trigger laws" which will make abortion illegal if/when Roe is overturned, and there is an estimate of somewhere between 24 and 26 states that will ban abortion if Roe is overturned.

That the majority of the country wants this. Based on basically every recent poll I can find, the majority of the country opposes overturning Roe, including many Republicans.

What's happening now:

The Women's March is calling for nationwide protests on 5/3/2022 at 5pm local time. (not sure if there's alt text on the image, but the tweet it's replying to links to the details)

As of 1:30am EDT people had gathered outside of the Supreme Court. Barricades have been up in front of the Court since a scientist self-immolated in front of the Court on 4/24/2022 to bring attention to climate change.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Shumer (D-NY) put out a statement condemning the draft opinion.

There will almost certainly be a huge amount of movement on this in the next few days and weeks, including a resources on what you can do to help support reproductive rights in the United States.

Some resources:

New York Times: Live reporting Women's March: Info on 5/3/2022 protests Planned Parenthood

#roe v wade #us politics #abortion

[hero-israel]

have you seen the news that Iranians are actually doing anti Hamas protesting and even expressing support for Israel? Gives me a little bit of hope (https://www.tumblr.com/castlead/732158568074199040/the-people-of-iran-are-so-fucking-brave-unlike)

Yes, this happens periodically and it's both inspiring and poignantly sad. We should not expect Iranians to be Zionists (uh, to put that mildly), but they also aren't stupid and they can plainly see how their murderously oppressive regime is prioritizing Palestine over their own lives and well-being. I lose count of how many times in the last 10-15 years there have been massive, nationwide riots throughout Iran aimed at toppling the dictatorship, always to be finally, gorily beaten back when the ayatollah sends his death squads to just machine-gun them all in the streets.

Before the ayatollah took over, Iran and Israel were allies. There were tourists, students, business deals. Iranians now over age 60 or so should remember that, may have told their children. But even if they hadn't, you often see cases of Iranians jeering down official displays of Palestinian flags, or performatively refusing to walk upon the Israeli flags that the regime stretches across the ground. This is not a love for Herzl or Jews, it is a rejection of diversions, of the symbols demanded by the tyrants who kill them in the streets. As the chants go: Taliban, Taliban, this is not Afghanistan / No Gaza, no Lebanon, my life for Iran.

It's especially tragic that there were giant anti-government protests throughout both Iran and Israel all year long. The world would be so much better if even one of those movements had truly won.

#iran #iranians #israel #judaism #jumblr

[texasobserver]

“Will Texas Cities Stay Silent on Gaza?” by Gus Bova, from the Texas Observer:

Last Thursday, a stream of Austinites poured into their city hall and packed the council meeting chamber—some carrying signs, some with hands painted red, and many sporting black-and-white keffiyehs, headscarves that serve as international symbols of solidarity with the Palestinian struggle.

The activists were there to push the city council to pass a resolution calling for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip. But since no such item was on the agenda that day, they’d simply booked all the slots in an open public comment period to make their case. 

“I am a Jewish mother; I am also the descendant of survivors of the Holocaust in Germany and the pogroms in Russia. I have been devastated every day watching this genocide unfold,” said Abigail Mallick, one of a series of Jewish speakers who addressed the council that day to oppose Israel’s recent military actions. “We must pass a ceasefire resolution. … We must join the growing chorus of voices saying ‘never again’—‘never again’ for anyone.” 

The testimony was part of a monthslong effort in Austin and other cities across Texas and the country to get local governments to weigh in on the tragedy unfolding across the world in Gaza, the 140-square-mile slice of Palestinian territory that abuts the Egyptian border and the Mediterranean Sea. Since October 7, when Hamas, the Palestinian militant group that governs Gaza, executed a horrific attack in southern Israel that left 1,200 dead and more than 200 kidnapped, Israel has retaliated by unleashing Hell on Earth for 2.2 million Gazans. As of late January, about 25,000 Palestinians have been killed with the majority being women and children, per the Gaza Health Ministry. A quarter of Gazans are starving, and nearly the entire population is displaced. 

South Africa has brought claims of genocide against Israel at the International Court of Justice; Israel denies the charges. Many scholars have warned for months of a possible genocide unfolding, though Israel’s defenders including the U.S. State Department dispute the claim.

Both Arab and Palestinian Americans are undercounted by the U.S. Census, according to the Arab American Institute, but Texas ranks among the top five states for both communities. The state’s biggest urban areas, especially Harris County and the Metroplex, all boast significant populations. 

The Texas Democratic Party was the first among all states to officially call for a ceasefire in Gaza; five of 13 Lone Star Dems in the U.S. House have also done so, in addition to the AFL-CIO central labor councils in San Antonio and Austin. Massive protests have been held across Texas cities, including one in November that was likely the largest demonstration at the state Capitol since the 2017 Women’s March. Nationwide, at least a couple dozen cities have passed ceasefire resolutions, including San Francisco, Atlanta, and Detroit. But, so far, Texas activists are running into brick walls with their municipal representatives as council members either stay silent or argue that endorsing a ceasefire would inflame divisions in their cities or that the issue is simply not a local matter.

At the Austin meeting last week, Council member Chito Vela told the pro-Palestine crowd that he personally supported a ceasefire and had signed an open letter to that effect. “However, I do not want this council to become embroiled in foreign policy matters,” he clarified. “These are far beyond our purview as a local government, and we have too many critical local issues that demand our attention.”

In November, Austin’s Human Rights Commission urged the city council to call for a ceasefire. Three council members issued a joint statement in December expressing their support, and activists believe these three would back a formal resolution. With a fourth member, they could force a vote, but—even in Texas’ most left-wing city—sufficient support remains elusive.

“Our city always was known for standing for human rights and for progressive values,” said Hatem Natsheh, a member of the recently formed Austin for Palestine Coalition and longtime local activist who was born in Palestine’s West Bank. “We need our leaders to stand with us and [against] these horrific crimes that happen to our community.”

Natsheh noted that the council has weighed in on foreign policy before with resolutions condemning ex-President Donald Trump’s Muslim ban and the 2003 Iraq invasion. He also observed that Mayor Kirk Watson, whose office did not respond to a request for comment, spoke at a pro-Israel event shortly after the October 7 attack. “We know that the City of Austin has no power over international issues, but we are not asking because of that,” Natsheh said. “We’re asking them to take a moral stand for humanity.”

Just down I-35, in San Antonio, pro-Palestine activists nearly secured a ceasefire vote earlier this month before a council member reversed course.

With three members supporting, which is enough to convene a special meeting in San Antonio, the Alamo City council was set to vote on a ceasefire resolution in either January or February. But earlier this month, Council Member Manny Pelaez withdrew his support, saying, “It became evident that this was causing more pain and anxiety than was originally intended.” Another council member, Jalen McKee-Rodriguez, called Pelaez’s decision “one of the weakest moves I’ve ever seen from any councilmember ever.” 

In late December, a group of Jewish leaders in San Antonio had written city council arguing that the resolution, “while well-intentioned, is morally wrong and will further endanger members of the local Jewish community.” Following Pelaez’s reversal, Mayor Ron Nirenberg penned a memo stating the special meeting was scrapped. In it, Nirenberg suggested the vote would have “exacerbate[d] trauma,” adding that “Wading into a complex and volatile international environment with an incomplete understanding could prove to be reckless.”

The ceasefire push has been led in part by San Antonio for Justice in Palestine (SAJP), a Palestinian-led group that existed prior to October 7 but has been revitalized in the last few months. The group works alongside others including the local chapter of Jewish Voice for Peace, which has coalesced pro-Palestine Jews across the country. “The call is coming straight from Gaza, straight from Palestine … that we need to do everything within our power to make calls for a ceasefire,” said Sara Masoud, a Palestinian SAJP core member and health science professor with family in the West Bank. She noted that the council in 2022 passed a resolution calling for a ceasefire in Ukraine and also contradicted Nirenberg, saying a “call for a ceasefire actually reduces trauma because it speaks on behalf of peace.” 

Masoud said her group and allies will keep working to find a third supporter to replace Pelaez.

In Dallas, council members approved a resolution on October 11 stating that the city “stands with Israel in its fight against Hamas.” Since then, as the death toll in Gaza has soared, Dallasites have repeatedly turned out to push the body to consider a ceasefire resolution. “It’s a city issue in that countless Palestinians here in Dallas have been affected by it, have lost family members,” said Sumayyah El-Heet, a Palestinian organizer with the Dallas chapter of the Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM). El-Heet said she knew of Dallasites who are mourning dozens of family members killed in Gaza. 

Dallas Council member Adam Bazaldua has authored a ceasefire resolution. Depending on the procedure used, Bazaldua told the Texas Observer, he needs either two or four additional supporters to trigger a vote. He said he has little patience for the argument that the matter is not a local issue or that it would distract from municipal business.

“I personally cannot stand that pushback on any particular item,” Bazaldua said, “because if we were elected and not expected to be able to walk and chew gum at the same time, then I don’t know why the hell we were elected.”

Down I-45, Houston has seen months of large pro-Palestine demonstrations and other events. The Bayou City has one of the largest Arab-American populations in the nation. While some council members have voiced support for a ceasefire, ex-Mayor Sylvester Turner—who left office at the beginning of this month—has said Houston City Council simply does not do resolutions of this sort. In an email, spokesperson Mary Benton told the Observer that Houston “does not have a history of issuing resolutions regarding global conflicts” or other issues beyond city administrative business, though she said she hadn’t yet discussed the matter with now-Mayor John Whitmire.

“Houston holds one of the largest Palestinian and Arab communities in the country right now; we have Houstonians who were trapped in Gaza for months,” said Fouad Salah, an organizer with the Houston chapter of PYM, which has been pushing city council unsuccessfully to take a stand on the issue. “We have Houstonians—I mean, myself, I have family, God rest their souls—who have been murdered in Gaza. … To be clear, a lack of calling for a ceasefire is an endorsement of the genocide of our people.”

#Texas #Palestine #Gaza #Ceasefire #Austin #Dallas #Houston #San Antonio #activism #protest

[sharpened--edges]

On May 30th, 2020, thousands of people descended on downtown Chicago for a raucous daytime march. The gathering was part of a nationwide crescendo of rebellion that began in Minneapolis five days prior in response to the police murder of George Floyd. After being cooped up for months amid the uncertainty of the Covid pandemic, fearful of everyone as a potential carrier of disease, we had been set free by the images of Minneapolis’s Third Precinct aflame. Hitting the streets that day was something akin to a religious experience. From the onset it was clear that the crowd would not follow the shopworn “peaceful” Black Lives Matter protest script. I watched with glee as teenagers scurried through the crowd graffitiing every conceivable surface with anti-cop slogans like ACAB and Fuck 12, alongside their own confrontational reappropriation of “Black Lives Matter,” a long stalled out movement which many of them were too young to have participated in. An American flag was summarily lowered and burned, and after some spirited debate involving sentimental locals, the Chicago flag was similarly put to the torch. Chicago Police cars were attacked, their windows smashed with the skateboards preferred by many young people, or whatever else people could get their hands on. Multiple CPD cars were set on fire. The cops themselves were outmaneuvered by a massive crowd swarming a sprawling downtown grid, and formed defensive lines unprotected from behind, wantonly swinging clubs and deploying pepper spray with no clear purpose save perhaps their proximity to particularly valuable sites of potential looting. […] By the standards of the summer of 2020, this was not a particularly remarkable turn of events. Cops were outflanked and overrun in cities across the United States all summer. They were confounded by the ferocity of the riots, the abuse rained down on them by even the so-called peaceful protesters, and perhaps most shockingly, the people whom they ordinarily harass and intimidate with impunity defending themselves—and even going on the attack. Perhaps some cops were surprised by the realization that tens of millions of Americans hate their guts and want them to quit their jobs or else just die. If they were honest with themselves, though, they’d admit this was all a long time coming. The biggest surprise of the George Floyd Rebellion is how long it took to arrive.

Jarrod Shanahan, “Every Fire Needs a Little Bit of Help,” Endnotes, 2022.

#jarrod shanahan

[femmesandhoney]

Genuinely asking why are Americans all talk and no action. Like theres sooooo many ppl just complaining about wages,health-care but then yall aren't protesting or doing anything?????? Like in my country we complain but we also protest. Why aren't the most affected states doing anything fr

this question involves a lot of components you might not even care about but sure okay ill try

a lot of americans are very apathetic to our institutions and/or think the institutions are fine as they are. a lot of right leaning and conservative americans legitimately think anything that minutely resembles a social safety net is socialist commie bullshit and oh why can't everyone just work hard and pick themselves up by their bootstraps. then theres a general american climate of people just not caring about politics, local or national, for various reasons. people often do not pay much attention unless its big buzz event stuff, often pointed out for them by their party.

a lot of people are sick of seeing nothing getting done (generally) in our government, but also people who are tuned in may get burntout from how obviously lobbied to hell everything is. a lot of stuff that gets passed often goes against a lot of american citizens wants or interests. you can see how over time the american public gets apathetic to this.

also notable, you act like we do not protest anything ever, which just isn't true. social movements often come in waves with peaks occuring when prominent events happen. theres always political movement and protests in the states when big shit happens, but there's gonna always be less activity for stuff thats gruelingly slow to change and doesn't really have "large" events attached to it, such as healthcare or minimum wage. not saying no one is fighting for those things as i type this, but most americans usually cannot agree on the best ways to solve these things. these issues are actually nastily hardliner issues that protesting would be...interesting for sure. i think most people think protests wouldn't change many minds and thats likely why we don't see more of it tbh. everyone is set in their red or blue corner.

continuing with the party talk, americans often put the responsibilities of those issues on their representatives, not ourselves. our job is "vote". its their job to go fight for those issues in congress. and i already stated americans are quite lenient about how much they pay attention to their local or national politics in the first place, so you can easily see the downsides to this. "put pressure on ur reps!" you say, well yeah duh, but that would require a majority to care or pay attention to their reps enough to do that. again, i think a lot of americans have a dejected attitude towards government and politics and very little interest in personal civic engagement. the reasons why to that particular element are outside the scope of your question though, but i think it helps explain why you don't see massive nationwide protests for all of our hardliner issues. not to mention protests occur more often at a local or state level rather than national since state interests can vary from national on most issues, making it difficult for outsiders to see the actual social protests or movements occuring within states, so i wouldn't ever say we do not do anything ever. theres lots of active and wonderful politically engagement americans nationwide.

also this is a tangent but you ask why states most affected don't do more and its likely, depending on the issue, a lack of time, energy, and resources. people who are struggling to live and go about their daily lives will find less time, energy, and resources to invest into going out and physically protesting shit. i think thats kind of obvious. and in a country with very little traditions of strong protest culture such as in, say, France, and one that also has strong cultural values of individualism, capitalism, and classical liberalism to a point, well, it all very much explains a lot about what americans prioritize or actually see as a problem or threat.

[pannaginip]

ABS-CBN on Twitter @ABSCBNNews:

JUST IN: PISTON, Manibela and other groups will hold a series of nationwide transport strikes starting this Monday, April 15.

They said this will be massive, with pickets and caravans lasting up until April 30, the deadline for consolidation.

via Jervis Manahan

2024 Apr. 11

ABS-CBN: Marcos says April 30 deadline for PUV consolidation is final

The PUVMP was launched in 2017 to improve the country's chaotic public transport system. But it has been repeatedly delayed due to protests and the COVID-19 pandemic.

Jeepney operators are required to join a cooperative, which would have two to three years to replace their fleet with modern vehicles that are safer and less polluting.

But drivers opposed to the phaseout argue that joining a cooperative and buying a new vehicle will bury them in debt and they will not be able to earn enough money to survive.

Under the new scheme, drivers will be required to work a fixed schedule, instead of the current system, which allows them to work for as long, and often, as they want.

(One of the biggest problems is colorum operation and there are so many of them - I didn't expect that 30 percent of those plying their routes are colorum. So, I will now forward the problem to the DILG Secretary because the police will enforce that and make sure that the franchise is correct, all your groups and other transport groups are included in the cooperative, TODAs all recognize those who will operate.) [Marcos said.]

According to Mar Valbuena, president of transport group Manibela, they will be holding another transport strike before the end of the month.

He also lamented that their group was excluded from Wednesday’s town hall meeting, which showed to them that the government is not interested in listening to their side.

Valbuena said Manibela and other groups allied with them will be holding a press conference on Thursday.

Jeepneys -- initially made from leftover US jeeps after World War II -- are a national symbol in the Philippines, and serve as the backbone of the country's transport system.

They provide rides for millions of people across the country for as little as P13.

2024 Apr. 10

#no to jeepney phaseout #no to puv phaseout #philippines #public transportation #cost of living

[cryptids]

There's been a ton of nationwide protests going on here the past week with riots and police tear gassing people etc. And a huge march is going on in the city rn as I'm typing this, bc like the entire country is angry about our corrupt ass government and president handing over a mining contract to a Canadian company (First Quantum) for a massive copper mine that will completely fuck the environment and wildlife in the entire region.

And tbh the mine on its own is already bad enough (copper mining in particular leaks a ton of poison into the environment, let alone on this scale) but it really does feel like a final straw bc everyone is just beyond fed up of the corruption and the amount of money that gets stolen, and this is another case where they're trying to say the income from the mine will improve the cost of living crisis here but we all know the population will never see a penny (like always) bc the president and other people in power only want to make money for themselves. And then companies like this from wealthy countries will come in just to take resources and they don't give a shit bc its not their land or water supply being damaged irreparably.

#🐊 #ANYWAY........ #its been a lot having covid this past week and being out of it with a bad fever with all this happening plus #the whole situation in palestine and global politics in general rn #but at the same time ive also been seeing so much solidarity and people who do care....... that means something too

[mariacallous]

WASHINGTON (JTA) — As the High Holidays near, Rabbi Mara Nathan doesn’t expect the recent wave of fake bomb threats directed at synagogues to significantly change the way she and her congregation worship together. 

After all, her synagogue will already have its usual, extensive array of security measures in place: from bomb-sniffing dogs and security checks for each attendee to coordination with the local police department and FBI office. But she said emotions were running high as news reports piled up about synagogues evacuated after facing threats, often while livestreaming services. 

“I think we’re on high alert,” said Nathan, the senior rabbi at San Antonio’s Temple Beth-El, a Reform congregation, “maybe a little more than usual.”

Nathan’s approach underscores how synagogues across the country have responded to the reports of rising antisemitism in recent years, and how a recent wave of nearly 50 spurious bomb threats is affecting — and not affecting — their procedures. The bomb threats, which have led to the evacuation of congregations from California to Florida, come after many synagogues have adopted a posture of readiness following the 2018 Pittsburgh synagogue shooting and other violent antisemitic incidents. 

“Law enforcement and the synagogues have to respond to it because you don’t ever know when it’s actually going to be the real thing,” said Evan Bernstein, the CEO of the Community Security Service, which trains volunteers to patrol their synagogues. “When multiple things like this happen, people become numb and maybe won’t respond in the same way if, God forbid, something is legitimate.” 

That reality was laid out at a briefing on Capitol Hill Tuesday focused on securing Jewish institutions during the High Holidays, which begin with Rosh Hashanah on Friday night. The briefing focused on the false bomb threat incidents, which security consultants predicted would continue because they lead to significant disruption with minimal effort. 

“The increase in the bomb threats and the swatting incidents are designed to get a law enforcement response,”  Michael Masters, CEO of the Secure Community Network, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, using a term that refers to making prank calls in order to generate a police response. “They’re designed to create fear, they’re designed to create confusion.”

Leaders of the Secure Community Network, which coordinates security for Jewish institutions nationwide, told members of Congress and their staffers at the hearing that the bomb threats have become a popular tool for extremists. SCN and its partner organization, the Jewish Federations of North America, organized the 90-minute briefing. 

“They actually targeted a livestreaming of the service so that they can witness the police coming in and disrupting the service during this swatting session,” said Kerry Sleeper, a former FBI assistant director who is now a senior adviser to Masters’ group, referring to a bomb threat during services in July at Beth Israel Congregation in Ann Arbor, Michigan. 

(The Ann Arbor synagogue has for years been the target of anti-Israel and antisemitic protesters. Courts have rejected attempts by some of the congregants to stop the protests.)

“Here’s one my fren [sic] did yesterday,” said a message on Telegram, a social platform popular with extremists, which was attached to a video of a rabbi conducting services. “It’s funni [sic] bc when we swat them they have to shut down the synagogue for the day.”

One long-term result extremists are hoping for would be to inhibit Jewish expression, Sleeper said. “The question has to be obviously, do you have the comfort, the security to enter into a house of worship after there’s been a bomb threat or the threat of a shooting?” he said.

Masters said that ahead of the High Holidays, when sanctuaries see their highest attendance of the year, synagogues need to review security procedures in order to avoid panic if a threat is received.

He described methods that could head off panicked reactions during High Holiday services, including making contact with the local police department, reviewing an orderly evacuation plan and ensuring that police have officials in place to report whether an attack is indeed underway.

“In many jurisdictions, law enforcement is very proactive about sending someone to the synagogue, or at least doing a drive-by so … they know whether something or not is happening,” he said. “Having a point of contact at the synagogue that the law enforcement knows who they’re supposed to find, so they can do a coordinated response.”

The briefing also focused on a proposed increase of federal grants to protect synagogues and other religious institutions. The 18-year old program has grown exponentially in recent years as threats against Jewish and other institutions have increased, and there is an effort underway to raise funding from $250 million last year to $360 million.

“It is truly indispensable to the physical security of churches, synagogues, mosques, and all other faith based places of gatherings across the country,” Eric Fingerhut, CEO of the Jewish Federations of North America, said at the briefing. “There’s not a security camera or secure door that isn’t in some way costly and needing the help and support of these resources.”

Fingerhut added that Jewish federations have collectively spent hundreds of millions of dollars to enhance security for local institutions. 

Sen. Chris Murphy, the Connecticut Democrat, said the briefing exhibited “the panoply of efforts we need to undertake in order to decrease the risk of physical harm to those who are in Jewish communities, for those who are showing up in synagogues, Jewish day schools.”

Increased preparedness due to the bomb threats is one of a few ways synagogues across the country are girding up ahead of the High Holidays. In New York City, the Community Security Initiative, which helps coordinate security for local institutions, is funding the purchase of one new patrol car each and other resources for four Jewish civilian security patrol groups that operate in heavily Orthodox neighborhoods in Brooklyn, where a rash of street-level incidents have added to safety concerns. Last week, Bernstein’s Community Security Service launched a partnership with the Orthodox Union, an umbrella group with hundreds of member synagogues nationwide.

The bomb threats have reverberated across the country. At the Chicago Loop Synagogue, president Lee Zoldan told JTA that local law enforcement — with whom Zoldan said the synagogue has a “very good relationship” — often keeps a presence in front of the building, which is located in downtown Chicago.

Zoldan said law enforcement officers are aware of the recent wave of bomb threats and that the synagogue has shared its holiday schedule so that police know when people will be in the building. In addition, a few months ago the synagogue purchased a metal detector, and is considering asking worshippers to be screened upon entrance for the High Holidays. Zoldan said the measure was a response to the rise of antisemitism in the United States, rather than any specific threat.

“Anything we can do to enhance security, we are going to do,” she added.

[screamingatkyle]

I haven't really heard anyone talk about this yet so I wanted to share. The Queer Youth Assembly is organizing a nationwide (US) protest for queer youth autonomy on Friday, March 31. There has been a massive amount of transphobia and homophobia recently, including an alarming number of laws restricting the rights of queer people, especially queer youth. Please get involved if you are at all able. Their website has more information regarding the specific demands as well as the locations & times of the individual marches. Thank you for reading this and PLEASE help spread this!

#trans #transgender #lgbtq #lgbt #lgbtq+ #nonbinary #queer #queer community #politics #us politics #protest

[republicansaredomesticterrorists]

The ultra-MAGAts are finally turning on the “Log Cabin Republikkkans”. LGBT Republikkkans who vote their pocket book, putting their own personal wealth and lust for power before their community and their own personal safety. MAGA is a Frankenstein monster breaking free from its masters and going on a rampage crushing all before it. Log Cabin Republikkkans are just more useful idiots that were used and now are being discarded. There’s no place in the MAGA dream society for anyone that is not straight, white, Protestant, and non-immigrant.

If the MAGA crowd seize power in ‘22 and ‘24 all the useful idiots will be purged. Then they will turn on the rest of us and it will be like Nazi Germany. Armed militias will be everywhere terrorizing non-whites, Catholics, Muslims, Jews, immigrants, the LGBT, progressives, the educated, the press, the urban population, etc. Police will execute us in the streets and their will be no recourse in the courts.

There’s a high probability the Republikkkans will gain both houses of Congress in this year’s midterms. It historically happens. There’s also a high probability they will take the White House in ‘24 and once voter suppression is imposed nationwide we will never see power again. The media is bashing Biden and the Dems like there’s no tomorrow blaming them for everything.

We all know the price gouging by big oil is a deliberate move to tank the economy and sink Biden so all but hardcore Dems will vote Republikkkan. Under the Republikkkans big business will be virtually unregulated and we will be reduced to serfdom. The country will experience massive wealth inequality like Brazil and will become virtually unlivable.

Vote blue in ‘22 and again in ‘24. It’s do or die.

[kp777]

By Asher Lehrer-Small

The Guardian

May 1, 2023

The defining experience of Jordan Zamora-Garcia’s high school career – a hands-on group project in civics class that spurred a new city ordinance in his Austin suburb – would now violate Texas law.

Since Texas lawmakers in 2021 passed a ban on lessons teaching that any one group is “inherently racist, sexist or oppressive”, a little-noticed provision of that legislation has triggered a massive fallout for civics education across the state.

Tucked into page 8 is a stipulation outlawing all assignments involving “direct communication” between students and their federal, state or local officials – short-circuiting the training young Texans receive to participate in democracy itself.

Zamora-Garcia’s 2017 project to add student advisers to the city council, and others like it involving research and meetings with elected representatives, would stand in direct violation.

Since 2021, 18 states have passed laws restricting teachings on race and gender. But Texas is the only one nationwide to suppress students’ interactions with elected officials in class projects, according to researchers at the free expression advocacy group Pen America.

Practically overnight, a growing movement to engage Texas students in real-world civics lessons evaporated. Teachers canceled time-honored assignments, districts reversed expansion plans with a celebrated civics education provider and a bill promoting student civics projects that received bipartisan support in 2019 was suddenly dead in the water.

“By the time we got to 2021, civics was the latest weapon in the culture wars,” state representative James Talarico, sponsor of that now defunct bill, said.

Texas does require high schoolers to take a semester of government and a semester of economics, and is one of 38 states nationwide that mandates at least a semester of civics. But students told the 74 the courses typically rely on book learning and memorization, without hands-on lessons in civic participation.

“Students are now banned from advocating for something like a stop sign in front of their school,” Talarico said.

Civics in retreat

The sections of the 2021 law limiting civic engagement pull directly from model legislation authored by the conservative scholar Stanley Kurtz, whose extensive writings seek to link an approach called “action civics” – what he calls “woke civics” – with leftist activism.

Kurtz argues the practice is a form of political “indoctrination” under the “deceptively soothing” heading of “civics”, a cause long celebrated on both the right andthe left.

The action civics model was popularized by the nonprofit Generation Citizen and is used in more than a thousand classrooms across at least eight states. It teaches students about government by having them pick a local issue, research it and present their findings to officials.

The central philosophy is that “students learn civics best by doing civics”, Generation Citizen policy director Andrew Wilkes said.

Generation Citizen’s method has been studied by several academic researchers who found participants experienced boosted civic knowledge and improvements in related academic areas like history and English.

Kurtz, however, contends the projects “tilt overwhelmingly to the left”.

“Political protest and lobbying ought to be done by students outside of school hours, independently of any class projects or grades,” he said in an email to the 74.

Civics experts, however, argued otherwise.

Representative Steve Toth and Senator Bryan Hughes, the GOP lawmakers who sponsored the 2021 Texas classroom censorship legislation, did not respond to requests for comment.

The 74 reviewed more than three dozen action civics projects in Texas from before the 2021 legislation and found that the vast majority dealt with hyperlocal, nonpartisan issues.

Students most often took up causes like bullying, youth vaping, movie nights in the park or bringing back student newspapers. A handful in Austin and nearby Elgin could be considered progressive, including projects dealing with gun control or school admissions prioritizing diversity, topics educators said students selected based on their own interests.

Under the 2021 law, student participants in all of those projects now must avoid contact with elected officials. The restrictions have resulted in initiatives more contained to schools themselves like advocacy for less-crowded hallways or longer lunch periods, educators said.

It’s an effort to “tamp down the next generation of leaders”, said Armando Orduña, the Houston executive director of Latinos for Education.

Though some project-based civics lessons in Texas continue with a paired-down scope, others have disappeared altogether.

One school district north of Dallas decided “out of an abundance of caution” to reverse years of precedent and stop offering course credit to students involved in a well-regarded national civic engagement program, the Texas Tribune first reported.

And Generation Citizen, too, has seen its footprint in Texas dwindle.

After a 2017 launch in the state, the organization underwent several years of steady growth, with more than a half-dozen districts using its programming or curricula.

Austin schools expanded their contract with the nonprofit to $58,000, according to records the 74 obtained from the district through a freedom of information request. And Dallas said it wanted to bring Generation Citizen programming to every high schooler in its 153,000-student district, former regional director Meredith Stefos Norris said.

Then came the 2021 legislative session and “everything got turned upside down”, said Megan Brandon, Generation Citizen’s current Texas program director. It thwarted their organization’s efforts and districts backed out of partnerships.

The organization now primarily works with just three Texas districts, including an updated contract with Austin schools for $3,000 – a tiny sliver of the sum from a few years prior.

Brandon, a former social studies teacher herself, grieves for the youth in her state. Her students in Bastrop outside Austin, most of whom did not have parents who attended college, never had access to civic engagement opportunities before her class, she said.

“Students in Texas need civics more than students in many other states,” she said. “It feels like we’re going backwards in time.”

‘It made me feel important’

Zamora-Garcia, Brandon’s former student whose youth representation quest changed a city ordinance, said the experience, now inaccessible to Texas students, had a profound impact on his academic career.

Mabel Zhu, who took the same class two years later, said the experience was “life-changing”, igniting her passion for civic engagement for years to come.

After the class, she began working with local nonprofits and served as the youth adviser on the Bastrop city council. She collaborated with the Cultural Arts Board to put up a mural that will define her city’s downtown space for years to come. A waving flag on the painting proclaims: “The future is ours!”

“Without [the class], I wouldn’t have been able to make such an impact within my community,” Zhu said.

But now, Tufts’s Kawashima-Ginsberg says, the new law may result in a generation of Texans growing up with a stunted sense of citizenship.

“It’s going to really damage their idea of what democracy is,” she said.

This report was first published by the 74, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news site covering education in America

#civics #woke #high school #republicans #anti democracy

[newstfionline]

Tuesday, January 31, 2023

California Has More Than 100 Gun Laws. Why Don’t They Stop More Mass Shootings? (NYT) California bans guns for domestic violence offenders. It bans them for people deemed a danger to others or themselves. There is a ban on large-capacity magazines, and a ban on noise-muffling silencers. Semiautomatic guns of the sort colloquially known as “assault weapons” are, famously, banned. More than 100 gun laws—the most of any state—are on the books in California. They have saved lives, policymakers say: Californians have among the lowest rates of gun death in the United States. Yet this month, those laws failed to stop the massacres of at least 19 people in back-to-back mass shootings. The tragedies in Monterey Park and Half Moon Bay have confounded Americans who regard California as a best-case bastion of gun safety in a nation awash with firearms. Inside the state, gun rights proponents say the shootings show that California’s strategy is a failure. Gun safety groups, meanwhile, have already begun mobilizing for more laws and better enforcement.

Peru’s protest ‘deactivators’ run toward tear gas to stop it (AP) When police fire tear gas at protesters demanding the resignation of Peruvian President Dina Boluarte, most run away. A few, though, run toward the gas canisters as quickly as possible—to neutralize them. These are the “deactivators.” Donning gas masks, safety goggles and thick gloves, these volunteers grab the hot canisters and toss them inside large plastic bottles filled with a mixture of water, baking soda and vinegar. The deactivators made their debut in Peru street protests in 2020, inspired by protesters in Hong Kong who in 2019 unveiled new strategies to counteract the eye-stinging, breath-stealing effects of tear gas. With protesters in Lima facing a nearly daily fusillade of tear gas, more people have joined the ranks of deactivators trying to shield them and keep the demonstrations going.

France braces for major transport woes from pension strikes (AP) France’s national rail operator is recommending that passengers stay home Tuesday to avoid strikes over pensions that are expected to cause major transport woes but largely spare high-speed links to Britain, Belgium and the Netherlands. Labor unions that mobilized massive street protests in an initial salvo of nationwide strikes earlier this month are hoping for similar success Tuesday to maintain pressure on government plans to raise France’s retirement age. Positions are hardening on both sides as lawmakers begin debating the planned change. France’s prime minister, Elisabeth Borne, insisted this weekend that her government’s intention to raise the retirement age from 62 to 64 is “no longer negotiable.” Opponents in parliament and labor leaders are determined to prove her wrong.

Russia’s Convict Fighters Are Heading Home (NYT) He was released from a Russian prison and thrown into battle in Ukraine with a promise of freedom, redemption and money. Now, Andrei Yastrebov, who was among tens of thousands of convict soldiers, is part of a return from the battlefield with potentially serious implications for Russian society. Mr. Yastrebov, 22, who had been serving time for theft, returned home a changed man. “We all feel like he is in some sort of hypnosis, like he is a different person,” said a relative of his, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals. “He is without any emotions.” President Vladimir V. Putin’s decision to allow a mercenary group to recruit Russian convicts in support of his flagging war effort marks a watershed in his 23-year rule, say human rights activists and legal experts. The policy circumvents Russian legal precedent and, by returning some brutalized criminals to their homes with pardons, risks triggering greater violence throughout society. Since July, around 40,000 inmates have joined the Russian forces, according to Western intelligence agencies, the Ukrainian government and a prisoners’ rights association, Russia Behind Bars, which combines reports from informers across Russian jails. Ukraine claims that nearly 30,000 have deserted or been killed or wounded, although that number could not be independently verified.

Biden says no F-16s for Ukraine as Russia claims gains (Reuters) The United States will not provide the F-16 fighter jets that Ukraine has sought in its fight against Russia, President Joe Biden said on Monday, as Russian forces claimed a series of incremental gains in the country's east. Ukraine planned to push for Western fourth-generation fighter jets such as the F-16 after securing supplies of main battle tanks last week, an adviser to Ukraine's defence minister said on Friday. Asked if the United States would provide the jets, Biden told reporters at the White House, "No." The hundreds of modern tanks and armoured vehicles pledged to Ukraine by Western countries in recent weeks for a counteroffensive to recapture territory are months away from delivery. This leaves Kyiv to fight through the winter in what both sides have described as a meat grinder of relentless attritional warfare.

Winter has come for Afghanistan (Washington Post) For much of the past year, the West’s policymakers and analysts were possessed by one haunting question: How bad will Europe’s winter be? The prospect of a deep cold spell as European governments rationed gas supplies conjured images of a bleak winter from Lviv to London, with industry going dark and pensioners scavenging for firewood. The worst did not come to pass. But consider another part of the world that has receded from the West’s attention over the course of the Ukraine conflict. Afghanistan is currently in the grips of its worst winter in more than a decade. Temperatures recently plunged to below minus-34 degrees Celsius (minus-29.2 degrees Fahrenheit). Officials in the local Taliban government said the cold has been lethal, leading to more than 160 deaths over the span of about two weeks, and killing more than 70,000 livestock. The dismal conditions have struck a society ill-equipped to cope.

Suicide bomber kills 88, wounds over 150 at mosque in NW Pakistan (AP) A suicide bomber struck Monday inside a mosque in the northwestern Pakistani city of Peshawar, killing at least 88 people and wounding more than 150 worshippers, officials said. Most of the casualties were policemen and police officers as the targeted mosque is located within a sprawling compound, which also serves as the city’s police headquarters. No one immediately claimed responsibility for the bombing, said Saddique Khan, a senior police official in Peshawar, but the Pakistani Taliban have been blamed in similar suicide attacks in the past.

Iran says drone strike targeted military complex amid ongoing shadow war (Washington Post) Iran said a drone strike lightly damaged a defense ministry complex in the central city of Isfahan on Saturday, an attack that reverberated across capitals as tensions with the West and Israel mount over Tehran’s advancing nuclear program, arms supply for Russia’s war in Ukraine and lethal crackdown on months-long anti-government protests. Iran’s Ministry of Defense said that three drones struck around 11:30 p.m. local time Saturday, according to a statement carried by the IRNA state news agency, in an attack that caused “minor damage to the roof of a workshop.” There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the Saturday strike. But Israel has a history of conducting attacks on Iranian nuclear program facilities as part of an ongoing shadow war between the two regional rivals, a campaign that appears to have escalated following the U.S. withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal in 2018, three years into the landmark agreement. One U.S. official, speaking on the condition of anonymity said the strike appeared to be the work of the Israeli military.

Russian embassy says North Korea lifted lockdown in capital (AP) Russia’s embassy in North Korea says the country has eased stringent epidemic controls in capital Pyongyang that were placed during the past five days to slow the spread of respiratory illnesses. North Korea has not officially acknowledged a lockdown in Pyongyang or a re-emergence of COVID-19 after leader Kim Jong Un declared a widely disputed victory over the coronavirus in August, but the Russian embassy’s Facebook posts have provided rare glimpses into the secretive country’s infectious disease controls. Last week, the embassy said that North Korean health authorities required diplomatic missions to keep their employees indoors and also measure their temperatures four times a day and report the results to a hospital in Pyongyang. It said the North Korean measures were in response to an increase in “flu and other respiratory diseases,” but it didn’t mention the spread of COVID-19 or restrictions imposed on regular citizens.

Radioactive needle in a haystack: Tiny capsule lost in rural Australia (Washington Post) Emergency officials in Western Australia warned that a tiny radioactive capsule was on the loose, with a harried hunt underway along a lengthy stretch of highway for what was essentially a toxic needle in a haystack. The Department of Fire and Emergency Services in Western Australia, a largely rural state that makes up the western third of the country, issued a hazardous materials warning Saturday evening, cautioning that the radioactive capsule had been lost while it was being transported from a mine near the town of Newman to a suburb near Perth, the state’s most populous city. The capsule—which is less than a third of an inch long—went missing somewhere along the more than 800-mile stretch of road between Newman and Perth, the department said. It contains cesium-137, a radioactive material used in gauges for mining, one of the main industries in resource-rich Western Australia. Despite its size, the capsule is dangerous, the department warned. “Exposure to this substance could cause radiation burns or radiation sickness,” it said, cautioning people not to touch it or move it if they come across it. Anyone who sees the capsule should stay at least five meters (16 feet) away from it and report it, the department said.

Palestinian Man Fatally Shot as Violence Continues in Israel (NYT) A Palestinian man was fatally shot outside an Israeli settlement in the West Bank and Israeli settlers carried out nearly 150 attacks against Palestinians and their properties across the region, according to reports on Sunday by Palestinian state media and the Israeli Army. Sunday’s violence was the latest to grip the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Jerusalem since Thursday, in a series of raids and attacks that have left more than 20 people dead. Palestinian officials said that across the West Bank on Saturday night and into early Sunday, Israeli settlers had carried out 144 attacks against Palestinian civilians or their properties. One official, Ghassan Daghlas, told Wafa that settlers had hurled stones at more than 100 motorists and vehicles and had set fire to six vehicles in a wave of violence. At least 22 Palestinian-owned shops were attacked and at least one Palestinian home near the city of Ramallah was set on fire by settlers, Palestinian media reported.

#headlines #news

[beardedmrbean]

Sri Lanka's embattled government declared a nationwide state of emergency on Wednesday in a bid to contain massive protests that continued after the country's president, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, fled to the Maldives. Protesters stormed the homes of both the president and the prime minister over the weekend, demanding that both leaders step down. Sri Lankans blame their government for a dire, months-long economic crisis that has left many struggling to afford basic necessities.

Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, who has taken over as acting president of the country, imposed the emergency order in a bid to wrest back control of the capital city amid the huge protests. But his declaration served only to refocus the demonstrators' anger at him, and his office became an epicenter of the protests on Wednesday.

How an economic crisis led to political chaos in Sri Lanka

Police imposed an indefinite curfew in one province and a nationwide curfew until 5:00 a.m. Sri Lanka sits just off India's southeast coast and is home to about 22 million people.

Wickremesinghe delivered a televised address to the nation on Wednesday, saying security measures had been stepped up and that he'd ordered the military to do whatever was necessary to restore order.

"We must end this fascist threat to democracy," he said. "We can't allow the destruction of state property. The president's office, the president's secretariat and the prime minister's official residence must be returned to proper custody."

"We can't allow fascists to take over. Some mainstream politicians, too, seem to be supporting these extremists. That is why I declared a nationwide emergency and a curfew," Wickremesinghe said.

The prime minister's office said earlier this week that President Rajapaksa would resign on Wednesday to clear the way for a "peaceful transition of power."

But instead of resigning he fled to the Maldives, fueling the anger on the streets.

The Speaker of the Sri Lankan Parliament, Mahinda Yapa Abeywardenam, said Rajapaksa had informed him in a telephone call that he would still resign as promised, but it was unclear if the move was still coming Wednesday — or whether it would do anything to quell the protesters' rage.

The president flew to the Maldives aboard a military aircraft with his wife and two bodyguards, according to the French news agency AFP.

As soon as word of his escape got out on Wednesday, thousands of protesters mobbed Wickremesinghe's office. Seemingly keen to avoid a repeat of the dramatic scenes that played out over the weekend when protesters occupied the president's opulent residence, Sri Lankan security forces fired tear gas at the protesters as they chanted "Go home Ranil! Go home Gota!" referring to the leaders.

Eventually the protesters made it into the building and appeared on its balconies with their fists and phones raised in triumph.

On Saturday, thousands of protesters stormed Rajapaksa's official residence, ransacking parts of it, but also lounging in its luxurious bedrooms, gym, and swimming pool. Families, many with small children, came to soak up the atmosphere and pose for photos in the ornate grounds in what looked like a victory parade for the popular uprising. But the leaders they've protested to force out of power were still both technically holding their offices on Wednesday.

Since the protests erupted late last week, those taking part have demanded the immediate resignations of both the president and the prime minister. The prime minister has said he will only leave his post once a new government is in place.

According to Sri Lanka's constitution, the prime minister takes over as acting president if the president resigns or is incapacitated. The country's lawmakers have held several meetings this week to try to elect a new president, but there has been no consensus.

In the power vacuum, the anger that's built for months over food, medicine and fuel shortages and skyrocketing prices has continued to mount.

Sri Lankans have faced long power cuts this summer and been forced to spend hours in lines at gas stations to buy less than a gallon of fuel. The country's cash reserves are running extremely low, forcing Sri Lanka to default on its massive foreign debt of $51 billion as it's been unable to make interest payments on its loans.

The government blamed the COVID-19 pandemic for sapping the country of its vital tourism income, but economists say there are other factors behind the economic crisis, including political corruption and economic mismanagement.

The government has been in talks with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to secure a $3 billion bailout package, but the timing of that remained unclear Wednesday.

Meanwhile, some Sri Lankans living in the Maldives staged a protest demanding that the Maldivian government send Rajapaksa back home to face the music. But Sri Lankan news outlet the Daily Mirror reported, quoting unnamed sources, that Rajapaksa would instead fly to Singapore later on Wednesday.

#nunyas news

[reasonandempathy]

Colombian Presidential Election - 2022

Colombia is holding it's 2nd round of voting for its Presidential Election today (Sunday June 19th), after the first round of voting in May failed to elect find a candidate with 50%+1 of the vote.

The vote today is between Gustavo Petro of Humane Colombia vs Rodolfo Hernández, an independent and political outsider. As a breakdown from the Washington Post:

Petro, a 62-year-old senator and former mayor of Bogotá, promises to transform one of the most unequal societies in Latin America. He proposes redistributive policies such as free higher education and a universal public health-care system. He says he would raise taxes on the 4,000 wealthiest Colombians while establishing a minimum wage for single mothers. He plans to end new oil exploration and move the country toward renewable energy.

Petro’s candidacy has galvanized communities that have often felt forgotten, including the young, poor, rural, Afro-Colombian and Indigenous. Many of his supporters have been hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic, in a country where half the population doesn’t have enough to eat and 40 percent are living in poverty.

His campaign has tapped into the desperation and anger of those who took to the streets last year in massive nationwide protests.

Meanwhile:

Hernández offers an alternative that appeals to both anti-Duque and anti-Petro voters. But his policies are vague, and he lacks the alliances, caucus in Congress and campaign structure that Petro has built over his years in politics, Botero said. “He’s a much bigger question mark,” she added.

A wealthy engineer and construction magnate, Hernández has pledged to root out government corruption, cut costs and reduce the national deficit. He opposes fracking and suggests boosting infrastructure in rural areas. The foul-mouthed 77-year-old has mostly refused to participate in debates and public rallies, but he has gained a following through quirky TikTok videos

Despite his campaign promise to "root out government corruption", Hernández was suspended from being the Mayor of Bucaramanga for slapping a city councilman in the face and he's facing charges for improper (corrupt) distribution of governmental contracts.

Probably worse is him saying he's "a great fan of German thinker Adolf Hitler". He later "corrected" himself by saying he meant to say Albert Einstein, I think it's clear to see my impression of that apology, based on his behavior, corruption, and the opinion of people I know connected to Colombia.

For more local information, from The Bogota Post:

[it is] a presidential race between a divisive former guerrilla and a 77-year-old Tik Tokking construction magnate with no clear agenda who refuses to engage in political debate. Petro successfully consolidated left-wing political forces – and some centrists too – behind his campaign for change and scored well in the first round. Meanwhile, a bickering centre-right split itself between various establishment candidates who polled badly. Then there was an anti-establishment former mayor, construction magnate and social media star standing on an anti-corruption platform and drawing in voters via homespun Facebook videos and Tik Tok. Septuagenarian engineer Rodolfo Hernández is now unifying right-wing voters and on track to defeat Petro according to current polls which put the ingeniero at 52% and the former M-19 guerrilla at 45%.

If you're in Colombia, please go vote. You can find instructions on how to vote if you live abroad here.

#original content #colombia #politics #Petro #Rodolfo Hernández