Stephan: The Republican Party has become a White supremacist christofascist cohort. And they are going to vote in large numbers. If you are voting and voting Democratic you are voting the the end of America as you grew up in it. It is that dire. People that tell you there is no point in voting are effectively voting for Trump and what he stands for. People who waste their vote on third parties are voting for Trump. People who whine about the Democrats are voting for Trump. We're past all that. We're down to the lick log, and it is the Democrats or the abyss. Vote for the the most compassionate life-affirming candidate, however thin that difference is. We can fix the Democratic Party afterwards.
Trump supporters
Credit: AP/Evan Vucci
Donald Trump’s combination of racism and authoritarianism, made repeatedly clear through his words and deeds, has not been disqualifying for his voters and most Republicans. Indeed it is central to his appeal and has lured tens of millions of Americans into his movement.
In an increasingly diverse and cosmopolitan America, this combination is like a dagger pointed at the heart of the country’s democracy. Whether our republic can survive changing racial demographics and white racial paranoia, and how much Donald Trump’s racist and authoritarian movement is really a deviation from America’s historic norms, is very much in question. It seems clear that white identity politics has helped the Republican Party maintain control over its voters and that a large number of white Americans value the privilege conferred on them by skin color more than they value democracy.
In an effort to address these questions and many others, I recently spoke with Steven Miller, a professor of political science at Clemson University, and Nicholas Davis, a research scientist at the Public Policy […]
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Samantha Raphelson , - npr
Stephan: When society has only one social priority, and that priority is profit over humanity, very ugly things happen. This is what has happened to San Francisco. "The contamination is ... much greater than communities in Brazil or Kenya or India," according to a researcher who specializes in this study.
A city sanitation worker gets to work in downtown San Francisco, which says it is expecting its street cleaning budget to be more than $70 million this coming fiscal year.
Credit: Ben Margot/AP
San Francisco’s streets are so filthy that at least one infectious disease expert has compared the city to some of the dirtiest slums in the world.
The NBC Bay Area Investigative Unit surveyed 153 blocks of the city in February, finding giant mounds of trash and food on the majority of streets. At least 100 discarded needles and more than 300 piles of human feces were also found in downtown San Francisco, according to the report.
San Francisco’s new mayor, London Breed, had proposed adding nearly $13 million to the city’s $65 million street cleaning budget over the next two years, according to NBC Bay Area.
“I will say there is more feces on the sidewalks than I’ve ever seen growing up here,” Breed told NBC Bay Area last month. “We have to make sure people who live here, [and] […]
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Thursday, August 2nd, 2018
Stephan: I am sure this will upset a number of readers, because we don't talk about these matters much but we cannot create a wellbeing oriented society unless we are willing to look at facts.
Donald Trump’s administration recently decided to give $12 billion to farmers hurt by the president’s trade war against the European Union, China and various other countries. These monies can be considered a form of welfare for white people in red state America who are among his most loyal supporters. Moreover, the racial disparity is made even clearer by the way that African-American and other nonwhite farmers have been victims of systemic discrimination by the United States Department of Agriculture. In 2010, the USDA and the Justice Department reached a $1.25 billion settlement with black farmers over a lawsuit alleging racial discrimination in USDA farm loan programs.
Welfare for white Americans is nothing new. In many ways, the United States was built on white welfare.
During the 18th and 19th centuries, free land was given to European settlers as the intended result of genocide and ethnic cleansing against Native Americans. As part of this same racist project, the stolen labor and lives of black human property is estimated to have been worth trillions of dollars. In […]
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Thursday, August 2nd, 2018
Tara Isabella Burton, - VOX
Stephan: This story may seem a bit arcane at first but I think it is a very big deal. The christofascists have been working for years to breach the firewall between church and state that the Founders put in place, and to make America "a Christian nation," by which they mean White supremacist christofascist. Dynamically this is little different than the Taliban, just better financed and more sophisticated.
In my opinion it will destroy America, at least as a democratic pluralistic society.
Jeff Sessions
Credit: NY Magazine
The Trump administration has consistently championed a narrow view of religious liberty in America. But the Justice Department’s latest religious liberty initiative may be the most far-reaching — and potentially troubling — one yet.
On Monday, Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced the creation of a “Religious Liberty Task Force” that will enforce a 2017 DOJ memo ordering federal agencies to take the broadest possible interpretation of “religious liberty” when enforcing federal laws. That memo, for example, prohibits the IRS from threatening the tax-exempt status of any religious organization that actively lobbied on behalf of a political candidate, which is not allowed under the Johnson Amendment.
In a bold speech delivered at the Justice Department’s Religious Liberty Summit, Sessions characterized the task force as a necessary step in facing down the prevailing forces of secularism. “A dangerous movement, undetected by many, is now challenging and eroding our great tradition of religious freedom,” he said, which “must be confronted and defeated.”
The task force will be […]
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Thursday, August 2nd, 2018
, - The Guardian (U.K.)/Agence France-Presse (France)
Stephan: No one will ever be able to say we weren't warned.
A huge colony of king penguins on the Île aux Cochons in 1982.
Credit: Henri Weimerskirch/AFP/Getty
The planet’s largest colony of king penguins has declined by nearly 90% in three decades, researchers have warned.
The last time scientists set foot on France’s remote Île aux Cochons – roughly half way between the tip of Africa and Antarctica – the island was blanketed by 2m of the penguins, which stand about a metre tall.
But recent satellite images and photos taken from helicopters show the population has collapsed, with barely 200,000 remaining, according to a study published in Antarctic Science.
Why the colony on Île aux Cochons has been so decimated remains a mystery.
“It is completely unexpected, and particularly significant since this colony represented nearly one third of the king penguins in the world,” said lead author Henri Weimerskirch, an ecologist at the Centre for Biological Studies in Chize, France, […]
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