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Month: March 2019

Team Trump keeps pushing deal to send nuclear tech to Saudis

Team Trump keeps pushing deal to send nuclear tech to Saudis

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The Daily Beast reports: The Trump administration is still actively working to make a deal to send U.S. nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia, according to two U.S. officials and two professional staffers at federal agencies with direct knowledge of those conversations. American energy businesses are still hoping to cash in on Riyadh’s push for energy diversification. “This could be a very big contract. This administration is all about contracts,” said Hussein Ibish, a resident scholar at the Arab Gulf States…

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Republican Party’s culture of bigotry, xenophobia, and racism extends from top to bottom

Republican Party’s culture of bigotry, xenophobia, and racism extends from top to bottom

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Donald Trump, grandson of a draft-dodging tax-evading immigrant, foments anti-immigrant hatred this weekend at CPAC 2019: Trump at #CPAC makes a racist comment targeting immigrant lawmakers. "We have people in Congress right now that hate our country… how did they do in their country? …Not so good. This is the POTUS speaking about US Reps. This IS their country. pic.twitter.com/TrVCD5eZ0K — Rantt Media (@RanttMedia) March 2, 2019 The Washington Post reports: Friday was a day meant to celebrate the Republican…

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The nightmare of sexual violence on the border in the shadows of the #MeToo movement

The nightmare of sexual violence on the border in the shadows of the #MeToo movement

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The New York Times reports: It was dark in the stash house where they kept her, the windows covered so no one could see inside. At first, the smugglers had her cook for the other migrants who had recently crossed illegally into the United States. Then they took her to a room upstairs, locked the door and began taking turns with her. It was the summer of 2014, and Melvin, a 36-year-old mother of three, had just completed the journey…

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The forgotten campaigns of racist terror targeting Latinos in the American West

The forgotten campaigns of racist terror targeting Latinos in the American West

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The New York Times reports: Arlinda Valencia was at a funeral when an uncle told her a bewildering family secret: An Anglo lynch mob had killed her great-grandfather. “A mixture of grief and shock overwhelmed me since this was the first I heard of this,” said Ms. Valencia, 66, the leader of a teachers’ union in El Paso. “The more I looked into it, the more stunned I was at how many Mexicans were lynched in this country.” Ms. Valencia…

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Trump administration remains silent about torture of U.S. citizen imprisoned in Saudi Arabia

Trump administration remains silent about torture of U.S. citizen imprisoned in Saudi Arabia

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The New York Times reports: A dual citizen of Saudi Arabia and the United States had been imprisoned in the Ritz Carlton in Riyadh for about a week when he heard a knock on his door. Guards dragged Walid Fitaihi, a Harvard-trained physician, to another room, according to a friend who took down the prisoner’s detailed account of his treatment. Dr. Fitaihi told the friend he was slapped, blindfolded, stripped to his underwear and bound to a chair. He was…

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Experts predict more neo-Nazi violence while Trump remains in office

Experts predict more neo-Nazi violence while Trump remains in office

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The Guardian reports: In the early summer of 2017, US coast guard lieutenant Christopher Hasson had an idea. He had been trying to figure out an effective way of killing billions of people – “almost every last person on Earth” – but found himself coming up against the daunting logistics of such a task. He suspected “a plague would be most successful”, but didn’t know how to get his hands on enough Spanish flu, botulism or anthrax. His idea, he…

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Smaller countries are becoming the healthiest

Smaller countries are becoming the healthiest

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Bloomberg reports: There’s more to life than money, and economists know it. As new assessments of global living standards proliferate, attempting to gauge how healthy, happy and successful humans are depending on where they live, a pattern is slowly emerging. While slight variations in data can throw up different winners, smaller countries are increasingly dominating the top of the lists while big countries with booming economies fall behind. A new analysis, the Global Wellness Index published by investment firm LetterOne,…

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John Dean: My appearance before Congress helped take down Nixon. Will the same thing happen to Trump?

John Dean: My appearance before Congress helped take down Nixon. Will the same thing happen to Trump?

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John Dean writes: There is one overarching similarity that Mr. Cohen and I share. He came to understand and reject Mr. Trump as I did Mr. Nixon. Mr. Nixon first called on me regarding Watergate some eight months after the arrests of his re-election committee operatives at the Watergate. We had 37 conversations, and when I felt I had his confidence, I tried but failed to get him to end the cover-up. The day I told Mr. Nixon there was…

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Two days in July: As Republicans convened in Cleveland, did Trump receive a heads-up about WikiLeaks?

Two days in July: As Republicans convened in Cleveland, did Trump receive a heads-up about WikiLeaks?

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The Washington Post reports: At 1:25 p.m. on July 17, 2016, an Alitalia jet carrying Donald Trump’s longtime fixer and attorney Michael Cohen landed in New York, bringing him home after eight days celebrating his 50th birthday in Capri and Rome. About 2 p.m. on July 20, a helicopter carrying Trump thumped down in a field in downtown Cleveland, delivering the presidential candidate in dramatic style to the Republican National Convention, already underway. Between those two days — while Trump…

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Michael Cohen’s road map for Democrats

Michael Cohen’s road map for Democrats

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Natasha Bertrand writes: The frenzy over the reportedly imminent release of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s final report—a rumor shot down within days by the Justice Department—had barely subsided when House Democrats announced that they’d snagged the witness of the year to testify in public: President Donald Trump’s former personal lawyer Michael Cohen. His appearance on Wednesday before the House Oversight Committee was a day-long spectacle that didn’t disappoint—Cohen testified that Trump had foreknowledge of WikiLeaks’ plans to release embarrassing Democratic…

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With climate science on the march, an isolated Trump hunkers down

With climate science on the march, an isolated Trump hunkers down

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The New York Times reports: New efforts by President Trump and his staff to question or undermine the established science of climate change have created a widening rift between the White House on one side, and scientific facts, government agencies, and some leading figures in the president’s own party on the other. The president’s senior advisers are exploring the idea of creating a panel aimed at questioning the National Climate Assessment. According to a White House memo, the group would…

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The traumatic lives of Facebook moderators in America

The traumatic lives of Facebook moderators in America

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The Verge reports: On May 3, 2017, Mark Zuckerberg announced the expansion of Facebook’s “community operations” team. The new employees, who would be added to 4,500 existing moderators, would be responsible for reviewing every piece of content reported for violating the company’s community standards. By the end of 2018, in response to criticism of the prevalence of violent and exploitative content on the social network, Facebook had more than 30,000 employees working on safety and security — about half of…

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Trump’s nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize was apparently forged. Twice

Trump’s nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize was apparently forged. Twice

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The New York Times reports: The protocol for nominating and choosing recipients of the Nobel Peace Prize is one of the world’s most scrutinized and secretive. A total of 329 candidates — 217 individuals and 112 organizations — are being considered for this year’s prize, which will be announced in October. The identities of the candidates are kept secret, and indeed, the Norwegian Nobel Committee, which awards the prizes, is forbidden from divulging any information about its deliberations for 50…

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