Stephan: I am old enough to remember America when abortions were illegal, and knew two women who almost died from kitchen abortions. One had been raped by her boss, the other was in college and had gotten drunk at a fraternity party and had sex, semi-consensually, with a boy she had just met.
The Republican male-dominant christofascists in state legislatures and Congress have been trying to overturn Roe vs Wade for decades and think the Supreme Court, thanks to Trump's appointments, will now rule in their favor overturning a woman's ability to control her own body. Here is a good appraisal as to what that would mean.
The Jackson Women’s Health Organization clinic in Jackson, Mississippi. The state’s only abortion clinic, it will be the subject of a Supreme Court case next term. Credit: AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis
If they are shrewd, the six antichoice justices on the Supreme Court will resist the urge to overturn Roe v. Wade when they decide next term on Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. At issue is a Mississippi law banning abortion after 15 weeks of gestation in explicit defiance of Roe, which protects abortion rights until around 24 weeks. Why hand the Democrats an issue that has worked well for them in purple states like Virginia? An attempt in 2012 to force women seeking abortions to have transvaginal ultrasounds backfired against Republicans so powerfully the state is now entirely under Democratic control.
Despite Roe, states where antichoicers are strong have succeeded in drastically limiting abortion access by passing measures that force clinics to close—six have only one—and heap up obstacles that keep women from accessing abortions in time. As it has done with voting rights, the court can effectively gut Roe while leaving it formally in place. In fact, it […]
Stephan: How humiliating this story is for America. Our neighbors don't want America's merchants of death spreading their poison in their country. I hope Mexico gets the full $10 billion they are asking for, and that it puts some of the death merchants out of business.
Credit: AFP
The Mexican government has sued some of the biggest US gun manufacturers, accusing them of fuelling bloodshed through reckless business practices.
The lawsuit alleges that the companies knew they were contributing to illegal arms trafficking, which has been linked to many deaths.
Officials say Mexico is seeking as much as $10bn (£7.2bn) in compensation, though any amount would be decided by the court.
The companies have not yet commented.
They include Smith & Wesson and Barrett Firearms, among others. The BBC has contacted both companies for comment.
The lawsuit was filed on Wednesday in the US state of Massachusetts.
It says the Mexican government took the action “to put an end to the massive damage that the [companies] cause by actively facilitating the unlawful trafficking of their guns to drug cartels and other criminals in Mexico”.
The gun manufacturers “are conscious of the fact that their products are trafficked and used in illicit activities against the civilian population and authorities of Mexico”, the Foreign Ministry said in a document related to the lawsuit.
Mexico said the companies had used “marketing strategies to promote weapons […]
Stephan: If you have travelled outside of the U.S. in Asia or Europe you have probably had some experience with passenger rail travel in those countries. Trains, are modern, comfortable, set-up for internet, and travel at a couple hundred miles per hour. In contrast in the U.S. you probably haven't traveled on a train, because passenger rail travel in this country is a remnant of the 1950s and earlier, perhaps before you were born. Except for Amtrak's Acela, the one high speed rail service in the U.S. passenger trains are limited to 59 mph and freight trains to 49 mph on track without block signal systems. Can this be changed? This article lays out some of the problems.
The Missouri River Runner Amtrak train traveling alongside a freight train in Kansas City, Mo., in June. Credit: Charlie Riedel/Associated Press
WASHINGTON — More than a decade ago, Hurricane Katrina washed away many of the railroad tracks that line the Gulf Coast, leaving the region without a regular route to carry passengers.
Now, Amtrak is trying to restore service in the area, but the effort has stalled after bitter clashes with freight rail companies, which control most of the tracks the agency uses outside the Northeast. At the heart of the rancor is the meaning of a law governing which side has priority over use of the tracks and when, a longstanding battle that has spilled into the courts and onto social media. The outcome, experts say, has broader implications for Amtrak’s future.
The conflict underscores a persistent challenge for Amtrak. Although the infrastructure deal the Biden administration reached with a bipartisan group of senators last week would help fulfill the agency’s elusive goal of expanding across the nation, one of the biggest obstacles would be negotiating […]
Stephan: It is an article of faith, and an example of the inherent nastiness of Republicans, that they chose to cut off critical funding for poor people thinking it would force them to seek some kind of job and go back to work. Well, like most things Republicans believe that is crap. and here we have the hard data proving that point.
Workers lined up at an employment development office in Calexico, California. Credit: Wikimedia Commons
Governors in half the states across the country opted to withdraw from enhanced federal unemployment benefits believing it would incentivize a return to work. However, new data suggests that isn’t the case.
The company’s analysis breaks down the difference between states that ended and federally enhanced unemployment compared to the states that kept the incentive in place. UKG’s analysis indicates: “Specifically, in states that ended benefits, shifts grew 2.2% from May through July; they grew 4.1% in the others that kept federal aid intact.”
Dave Gilbertson, UKG’s vice president, has noted that the analysis further proves that […]
Jane Mayer, Chief Washington Correspondent - The New Yorker
Stephan: Jane Mayer, long recognized as a notably good investigative correspondent, and person of high integrity, has done an excellent job here telling us the hidden story behind Trump's Big Lie. All of this is only possible because the Supreme Court in Citizen's United legalized bribery. They don't call it that of course, but that is what it is, and what they did. This is a truly disgusting story, and another proof of the anti-democracy strategy of the MAGATs
Bill Gates, a Republican official in Arizona, is appalled by his party’s “national effort to delegitimize the election system.” Credit: Stephen Ross Goldstein/The New Yorker
It was tempting to dismiss the show unfolding inside the Dream City Church in Phoenix, Arizona, as an unintended comedy. One night in June, a few hundred people gathered for the première of “The Deep Rig,” a film financed by the multimillionaire founder of Overstock.com, Patrick Byrne, who is a vocal supporter of former President Donald Trump. Styled as a documentary, the movie asserts that the 2020 Presidential election was stolen by supporters of Joe Biden, including by Antifa members who chatted about their sinister plot on a conference call. The evening’s program featured live appearances by Byrne and a local QAnon conspiracist, BabyQ, who claimed to be receiving messages from his future self. They were joined by the film’s director, who had previously made an exposé contending that the real perpetrators of 9/11 were space aliens.
But the event, for all its absurdities, had a dark surprise: “The Deep Rig” repeatedly quotes Doug Logan, the […]
