The majority arrested were found to be LOCALS
For some critics, blaming outsiders is a way of distracting from protesters’ legitimate demands.
via Claims of “Outsiders” in Minneapolis Draw on Fraught History
Author: peterimrich
Voice of idiots (ODT)
“SAVE FOX NEWS.” It was a long letter, but the essence of it was restated in this post script, which read: P.S. The radical Left is trying to destroy Fox News and I need you to join me to fight back against the Left’s scheme today — before it’s too late. We cannot allow the radical Left to tear down and destroy Fox News — the only source of truth in our otherwise fake-news media.”
For God and Country, Save Fox News, the “Only Source of Truth” | The Smirking Chimp
Where State-Sponsored Murder happens people react (ODT)
via Jerusalem Demonstrations against Police Brutality after Autistic Palestinian Youth Shot to Death
Trump goes Hard Right-Wing Mass shootings and Domestic Terror is Right – Wing (ODT)
Fascism will be rushed and it won’t be pretty if you lean left. An excuse has to be found (ODT)
Poorer areas, especially places with a high black populace are the hardest hit. There is also a systemic attack on blacks and other minorities through the hard-right lens of the media. Narratives are shaped via deceptive and negative stereotypes. The black man is portrayed as a criminal and dangerous individual, even when he has done no wrong, and is merely standing up against injustice.
Compare the vastly different narratives to the white libertarians who invaded congress with semi automatic guns, versus the black protests against police brutality. The white libertarian militias were largely praised in the media for standing up to “state oppression,” while the black protesters were scorned and mocked as “dangerous thugs.” More reading here.
There is an underlying media bias of whites being “good” and blacks “bad.” This of course ties into the division needed in order for capitalism to continue to benefit the primarily wealthy white establishment and to neglect the needs and rights of black people and other marginalised minorities.
via The killing of America – » The Australian Independent Media Network
Despite Trump’s pledge of making America great again, the nation is badly off track and there is a haemorrhage of confidence in its future.
As bad as things are now, imagine what happens when the gravity of the looming economic crisis is evident. Americans from anarchists and socialists on the far left to far-right extremists have powerful incentives to get their pitchforks out and bring the system down.
via Tom Switzer: Donald Trump fans the flames of resentment and hatred
No Blame it’s “THEM” says Trump again (ODT)
- Many of the protesters overseas are speaking about institutional racism at the hands of police
- US embassies in Europe have been the site of solidarity protests
- Russia, China and Iran have taken the opportunity to criticise Washington over the unrest
You’d be forgiven if you hadn’t noticed. His verbal bombshells are louder than ever, but Donald J Trump is no longer president of the United States.
Policing in the US is not about enforcing law. It’s about enforcing white supremacy
By having no constructive response to any of the monumental crises now convulsing America, Trump has abdicated his office.He is not governing. He’s golfing, watching cable TV and tweeting.
The incapable incompetant leader Charlet Chaplin predicted he would arrive in America and he has (ODT)
When Trump was done reading his teleprompter remarks in an almost bored monotone, he turned around and left the lectern, his aides who had stood beside him only as props in tow, with reporters calling out for him to take questions. What had been announced as a “press conference” turned out only to be a brief statement, wasting the time of all the reporters who had waited for Trump as the day ticked by. Reporters were stunned, having expected the president to address the many other issues roiling the nation. Instead, he seemed laser-focused on an issue he’s trying to leverage for his re-election: demonizing China.
The world and country are in chaos and mourning, and it’s clear both could use some leadership. But as many pointed out, it was probably better that Trump left the press conference without taking questions — his interactions with reporters have rarely if ever made anything better or clearer. He probably would have just stoked tensions among various groups even further.
Trump is incapable of being a leader for the country or the world. And it seems at this point, he’s not even trying.
Donald Trump’s bloodthirsty threat to have protesters in Minneapolis shot by the military, issued in a tweet early Friday morning, prompted Twitter to restrict access to the president’s message, ruling that it violated the social network’s policy against “glorifying violence.”
via The Racist History Behind Trump’s Threat to Shoot Protesters
Will we stand with the protesters of Hong Kong? Crucially would Australia, among others, be able to keep talking to Beijing, to keep diplomatic channels open?
The coronavirus crisis has brought front-and-centre the question of how the world lives with an increasingly-powerful authoritarian China. We have already seen a descent into insult and threat — from both sides.
It has been called a new Cold War, perhaps so, but China is far more critical to the global economy and more interconnected with our lives than the Soviet Union was.
The China challenge also comes at a time when freedom and democracy is weaker in the West. The world was always heading to this moment.
via Hong Kong and China’s fate has been clear all along. Xi Jinping is seeing it through – ABC News
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Pregnant and jailed for $3.60 of meth, this mother’s baby lived and died behind bars
Cambodia’s little-known war on drugs has led to human rights abuses and severe overcrowding in prisons, sparking fears they could become incubators for COVID‑19.
via Cambodia’s drug war has seen prisoner numbers skyrocket during coronavirus pandemic – ABC News
In China, as around the world, the pandemic is calling for far-reaching social and economic change. The direction this will take is subject to fierce struggles; and the outcome will also depend on our reading of how societies have dealt with the COVID-19 outbreak and the lessons we draw from it. Instead of exceptionalizing and othering China, progressives around the world have to see beyond the logic of nationalism and recognize the interconnectedness of our fights. The enemy in this pandemic is not China but inequality and the logic of profit over people.
The coronavirus emergency has dramatised this. In the US, people have poured into state capitals to demonstrate against pandemic precautions derived from the advice of public health experts. Antivaxxers and conspiracy theorists have been front and centre at the events. Facebook has played a crucial role in allowing the anti-lockdown movement to organise at a local level. And frequently people are coming to state capitols from the same rural areas where newspapers have been supplanted by cable news and partisan websites.
This perfect informational storm has driven the US slightly mad. Its effects have been fractal. Shattered local news ecosystems have made local communities easy prey for ideologues and grifters; at the same time, a polarised national media landscape makes any resolution of the country’s abiding problems difficult to envision.
Now the storm is settling in over Australia.
No matter what Donald Trump does, or says Fox News is right there to support him, get angry for him, apologize for him, reinterpret his meaning for him, and lie for him.
via Fox News Goes Berserk Over Twitter Flagging Trump’s Violent Tweet | Crooks and Liars
If it wasn’t so tragic, it would be laughable: the political brigands in North America and Europe are fuming, spitting and rolling their eyes upwards towards the ceiling. They are pointing fingers in all directions, shouting incoherently “China!”, “Russia!”, “Venezuela and Cuba!”, “Iran!”; “You, You, YOU!”.
China and Russia are quietly building a new world, which includes brand new infrastructure, factories and entire neighborhoods for the people. Hospitals are being constructed, and so are universities, parks, concert halls and public transportation networks. Both countries are doing all this quickly and noiselessly, and with great determination. And despite sanctions and embargos, they never shout back at the salivating, angry mouths of the Western gurus of brainwashing.
My ancestors came to Australia as prisoners, and some almost certainly would have played some role in the genocide against the people who’d been living here for more than 65,000 years before them. And now I live in a society that is dominated by whiteness, and I’ve benefited from that. I’ve never had cause to fear for my life in the presence of a police officer, in fact I’ve never hesitated to call them if I’ve needed their help. I had an easy youth because my parents came from the race that has been favored by generations of white supremacist policies in Australia. Media I consumed growing up consistently featured people who were the same color as me, consistently feeding me through my formative years the message that I can accomplish anything I want in life. I’ve gotten jobs because I understand the subtleties of white culture enough to know how to speak and dress for different interviews, and because I had many white contacts (it’s not what you know, it’s who you know). There are people who pay attention to my words today who wouldn’t give them as much respect if they appeared next to a profile picture with dark skin. There are many other advantages I’ve had that I can’t even know about, since I’ve never lived a day in brown skin.
Reopening doesn’t mean that the threat has passed. It could worsen. We don’t know how the virus will mutate or whether reopening will give its spread a second wind. Studies, for what they are worth, report that there are already a number of mutations of the virus. Given the lack of information and understanding and the many agendas operating, caution is the only responsible course.
via The Fear Is Real, Not Orchestrated, by Paul Craig Roberts – The Unz Review
Background: Trump as Liar in Chief
Trump posted a Tweet stating that mail-in ballots will be ‘substantially fraudulent’. Two points here: first there is no evidence that mail-in ballots are any more or less fraudulent than in-person voting. Second, the last time an election used mail-in ballots for a special election, the Republican won. It truly is remarkable how quickly Trump can utterly contradict himself. Vote by mail is totally fraudulent but the Republican won. Amazing. This is analogous to his 2016 claims that the electoral college was a disaster for democracy – when it looked like he would lose.
Australia needs a strong post-secondary education system. Vocational education and training is under-resourced and ideologically damaged. The starting points for reform need to be with its curriculum and connection with upper secondary education. Employers, employee organisations, and educators together with government need to work cooperatively so that our education sector can contribute to efforts to transition our economy. Policy warriors and slogans are unhelpful.
via JobMaker: sloganeering won’t fix a VET system gouged by profiteers – Michael West
Biggest ever has been accomplished by this LNP, Biggest budget error. Biggest turnaround, what next? (ODT)
Finally they have turned on Sky After Dark (OD)
ASIO says it has detected an increase in extremist activity online during the coronavirus lockdown period
Officers say there has also been a rise in “anti-China” and “anti-migration” sentiment in communities
Peter Dutton introduced a bill to allow ASIO to question 14-year-old suspects of extremist involvement
Spies kept busy by increase in suspicious internet activity during coronavirus lockdown – ABC News
and
Rio Tinto blasting of 46,000-year-old Aboriginal sites compared to Islamic State’s destruction in Palmyra
The Pulitzer-winning cartoonist Nick Anderson has described Donald Trump as an “adolescent wannabe authoritarian”, after the US president’s re-election campaign failed to pull one of Anderson’s cartoons mocking Trump’s inaccurate suggestion that injecting disinfectant could protect against Covid-19.
A victory over Trump and the GOP in November does not translate by itself into the kind of change we need. Nor does it provide any guarantee that advocates of a racist authoritarian state cannot roar back down the road. But only by preventing a Trump second term can the immediate threat Trumpism poses be averted. Only a Left that brings its determination and its vision of structural change to the fight that millions believe is priority number one — beating Trump — can come out of 2020 with sufficient strength and alliances to drive further toward our long-range goals.
“Those excessive practices have been again and again shown to disproportionately impact racial and language minority communities.”
Judicial Watch, which focuses on the courts and is funded primarily by large grants from conservative foundations, is suing Pennsylvania’s chief election official, along with county legislators and election officials in three of the state’s six counties with the most registered voters. Pennsylvania was critical to Donald Trump’s win in 2016. He won by less than 1 percentage point, losing only 11 counties, including the three suburban Philadelphia counties being sued by Judicial Watch. It was the first time Pennsylvania went red since 1988. Democrats almost certainly need to win the state — where former Vice President Joe Biden was born, and where his campaign is headquartered — to take back the White House.
via Right-Wing Group Aims to Purge 800,000 Voters in Pennsylvania
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