Stephan: If you read SR regularly you know I have been following this trend for some years. This report is further confirmation of the declining fertility of men. This trend is not getting as much attention as it should, in my opinion, because coupled with a decreasing birthrate, it is going to be a major factor shaping our culture.
Dr. Tomer Avidor-Reiss, who teaches at the University of Toledo’s biological sciences department, knows a lot about fertility — not just because of his research, but for personal reasons, too.
“Infertility affected my family twice,” Avidor-Reiss told Salon by email. His parents, he recalled, had trouble conceiving because of RH incompatibility, a condition in which mother and fetus have incompatible blood; he was only born after his mother had already suffered a miscarriage. He and his wife, too, struggled to conceive after they were diagnosed with “unexplained infertility”; happily, they were able to conceive eventually with the aid of modern medicine.
If current studies are to be believed, Avidor-Reiss’ family plight may become more common. Birth rates are dropping, and not necessarily for positive reasons (such as women having more autonomy and choosing to delay starting families). There is growing evidence that plastic pollution is linked to dropping sperm counts, which at least in Western countries means the majority of men could reach infertility levels in mere decades if sperm counts continue to plummet linearly. Read the Full Article
Stephan: Just as I predicted the corruption and criminality of Trump and those who served him is going to dribble out over months, maybe years. ANd the picture it is painting is the sort of thing you see in fascist authoritarian countries. What is also clear is that he should have been found guilty in his first impeachment. Only the corruption of the Republican Senators, their commitment to power over national wellbeing allowed him to survive, and history will record that. I don't think Americans fully understand how badly Trump wounded American democracy, how close we came to losing the substance of democracy. And if we do not investigate this thoroughly and hold those who did this to account, it will happen again.
WASHINGTON — Former White House counsel Don McGahn was told by Apple last month that the Justice Department subpoenaed information about an account he owned in February 2018, two sources familiar with the matter told the New York Times.
At the time, Apple was barred by authorities from telling McGahn that it had sought this information. It is unclear what the DOJ was investigating or if McGahn was the primary target of the inquiry, the Times reported.
The revelation is the latest in a series of reports finding the Trump-era Justice Department monitored and pursued private information on journalists and Democratic lawmakers.
On Friday, DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz confirmed he would launch an investigation, adding his watchdog agency would look beyond subpoenas to “other legal authorities (used) to obtain communication records … in connection with recent investigations of alleged unauthorized disclosures of information to the media by government officials.”
Stephan: The linkage of White supremacist christofascism and the Republican Party is one of the most dangerous trends in the United States today. Here is its profile.
Republican Pennsylvania state Sen. Doug Mastriano Credit: Wikimedia
On May 9, the New Yorker published a feature story by Pulitzer winner Eliza Griswold about Pennsylvania state Sen. Doug Mastriano, who could well be the Republican nominee for governor next year, as a flagship example of the swelling power of Christian nationalism within today’s GOP. That’s an issue I focused on in a 2018 story largely driven by a paper called “Make America Christian Again,” co-authored by sociologist Andrew Whitehead. I described this phenomenon as “an Old Testament-based worldview fusing Christian and American identities, and sharpening the divide with those who are excluded from it,” and quoted from the paper:
Christian nationalism … draws its roots from “Old Testament” parallels between America and Israel, who was commanded to maintain cultural and blood purity, often through war, conquest, and separatism.
Despite the “Old Testament” slant, this version of Christianity has no room for Exodus 22:21: “You must not mistreat or oppress foreigners in any way. Remember, you […]
Stephan: I am no longer at all certain that democracy will survive in the United States. We have one party, the Republicans, and about a third of the voters, who are actively trying to convert the country to a faux-democracy that is actually a christofascist White supremacist authoritarian state. This is going to come down to every man and woman in the country taking a stand. Where do you stand? What are you willing to do to preserve democracy in the United States.
Credit: Shutterstock
For the first time in my life, I fear for my country. I am not sure that American democracy will survive. Oh, I think the form will survive, elections, a Congress, but the substance of fair elections, every citizen with the right to vote, and encouraged to do so, will be gone. America will be rigged as surely as Putin has rigged Russia, as surely as any South American dictatorship, the Soviet Union under Stalin, or Germany under Hitler. Democracies are not easy to maintain. The fact that the U.S. has done it for more than two centuries is historically amazing. And I am not alone in this thinking. One hundred of the leading scholars of American democracy, driven by this concern, issued the following statement on the first of June 2021:
“We, the undersigned, are scholars of democracy who have watched the recent deterioration of U.S. elections and liberal democracy with growing alarm. Specifically, we have watched with deep concern as Republican-led state legislatures across the country have in recent months proposed or implemented what […]
Stephan: I don't think the rational non-MAGA world really comprehends how diligently and aggressively the Trump MAGAs are working to subvert American democracy. These people and the Congress members who support them are traitors in my opinion, and what really worries me is that Biden and Merritt Garland don't seem to fully get this, and no one is being held personally responsible.
Jeff Sessions, William Barr, and Donald Trump for starters all need to be indicted tried, and if found guilty sent to prison, and the Justice Department has to clean house from the ground up. But even deeper than that we are no longer one country and we need to deal with the Great Schism Trend before we have a civil war. We are already in the cold civil war right now, in my opinion.
DEATH THREATS: Tricia Raffensperger – wife of Georgia’s top election official – provided Reuters with screen shots of menacing text messages she received recently.
Late on the night of April 24, the wife of Georgia’s top election official got a chilling text message: “You and your family will be killed very slowly.”
A week earlier, Tricia Raffensperger, wife of Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, had received another anonymous text: “We plan for the death of you and your family every day.”
That followed an April 5 text warning. A family member, the texter told her, was “going to have a very unfortunate incident.”
Those messages, which have not been previously reported, illustrate the continuing barrage of threats and intimidation against election officials and their families months after former U.S. President Donald Trump’s November election defeat. While reports of threats against Georgia officials emerged in the heated weeks after the voting, Reuters interviews with more than a dozen election workers and top officials – and a review of disturbing texts, voicemails and emails that they and their families received – reveal the previously hidden breadth and severity of the menacing tactics.
