When I read this report two things stood out in my mind. First, the grotesque wealth inequality in the United States, and the ability of rich individuals and corporations to use their wealth to shape society to their needs and wants. Second, America is now defined by a complete lack of ethics. Colleges and congress members take the money and promote things they know to be crap, because, well because they want the money. We are a society with only one social priority, greed and profit. We believe greed is good.
The lecturer looked, and sounded, the part. Sporting a pale blue shirt and Princeton University ID badge, he had his own office on campus, a short stroll from the room where several dozen students were gathered to hear him confidently talk about the challenges in moving away from fossil fuels.
Tim Barckholtz is not a Princeton professor, however. He is a senior scientific adviser at ExxonMobil, the oil giant that has done so much to both perpetuate and downplay the climate crisis. Barckholtz, an affable figure who has fronted adverts for Exxon touting its emissions reduction research, spent around six months sitting in and contributing to lectures and research groups, based in his own office space at the elite university.
In September, with the university poised to cut its extensive ties with certain fossil-fuel companies including Exxon, Barckholtz even taught a class of engineering students on “negative emissions technologies”, during which, over pizza and soda, he criticized the divestment decision, warned that the transition away from oil and gas will be “very difficult” and that the unfolding climate emergency was “not our fault”.
Randi Weingarten, President of the American Federation of Teachers, AFL-CIO. - Common Dreams
Stephan:
The Republican Party is trying to dismantle public education. Why? I think because the strategy of the Republicans who are a declining minority party is to turn American citizens into compliant peasants indoctrinated not educated, who can be controlled by stimulating their angers, fears, and resentments. Basically, what Putin is doing in Russia, and Kim Jong-un has done in North Korea.
Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, speaks during a protest near the office of Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) to ask him to work on gun-safety legislation on June 03, 2022 in Miami, Florida. Following the latest mass shootings some activists across the country are asking their politicians to enact commonsense gun laws. Credit: Joe Raedle / Getty
The following are the prepared remarks by American Federation of Teachers president Randi Weingarten delivered on Tuesday, March 28, 2023 at the National Press Club.
I. THE PROMISE AND PURPOSE OF PUBLIC EDUCATION
Today, we once again grieve for families shattered by senseless gun violence. Please join me in a moment of silence for the lives lost at the Covenant School in Nashville, and for all victims of gun violence.
Today we renew our call for commonsense gun safety legislation including a ban on assault weapons. This is an epidemic that our great nation must solve.
There’s a saying: You don’t have to love everything about someone to love them. I’m sure my wife doesn’t love everything about me, but she […]
One of the defining features of MAGAt world is its severe sexual dysfunctionality. MAGAts are obsessed in a very sick way with the LGBTQ community. I think a large part of this has to do with gender equality, which is creating a society where White men are not by default the controllers and leaders. Indeed, what is the Incel movement, but angry aggrieved men, the vast majority of whom are White men, who can't get laid, because they are so off-putting no woman will give them, or be compelled to give them, the time of day and they resent it.
MAGAt Republican Lauren Boebert walks to the House Chamber at the U.S. Capitol Building Credit: Nathan Howard / Getty
On Friday, House Republicans passed the so-called “Parents Bill of Rights Act,” which would force educators to misgender trans students and out them to their parents.
HR 5 — which Democrats have dubbed the “Politics Over Parents Act” — was introduced by Republican Rep. Julia Letlow. The amendments that would force educators to out trans children were proposed by Rep. Lauren Boebert (R), and would require schools to notify parents if their child is using restrooms that don’t align with the sex they were assigned at birth.
House members voted 213-208 for passage of the bill, with all Democrats and five Republicans voting against the legislation.
“The backers of this bill claim to be advancing it on behalf of parents, but when you actually listen to […]
MAGAt Republican Tim Burchett speaks for his party, and the corporate death merchants who make the weapons that have already killed 10,009 people and wounded another 7,568 in the United States in the first 88 days of the year (unless there are more gun deaths between when I write this on Tuesday and you read it on Wednesday). And what do the Republicans in Congress have to say about this, "We’re not gonna fix it, Congress can’t do anything to stop gun violence."
MAGAt Republican Representative. Tim Burchett (R-TN) Credit: Kevin Dietsch / Getty
U.S. Rep. Tim Burchett (R-TN) says there’s nothing the 535 elected officials in the House and Senate can do to reduce gun violence and gun deaths.
“We’re not gonna fix it,” Congressman Burchett said on the steps of the Capitol.
“I don’t see any role that we could do other than mess things up, honestly,” he said in response to Monday’s school mass shooting in Nashville, where three nine-year olds and three adults were shot to death by a shooter with two AR-15 style assault rifles and a handgun.
Instead of Congress enacting stricter gun laws, background checks, and a ban on assault weapons, Congressman Burchett said, “you’ve got to change people’s hearts,” as he called for a Christian revival.
“As a Christian, we talk about the church. I’ve said this many times, I think we really need a revival in this country.”
Monday’s shooting at the Covenant Presbyterian Elementary School was the 130th mass shooting this year in America, bringing the death toll […]
MAGAt Republican House Majority leader Steve Scalise
The official line from House Republicans on Monday’s mass shooting at a private Christian elementary school in Nashville is to encourage prayer and making schools “safer,” but “taking guns away is not the answer.”
GOP Majority Leader Steve Scalise of Louisiana, the second-most powerful Republican in the U.S. House of Representatives, on Tuesday encouraged prayer, waiting for more facts, and looking into mental health option, despite his record of voting against them. Six people, including three nine-year olds and three adults, were shot to death after a shooter shot through the doors of Covenant Presbyterian Elementary School.
“The first thing in any kind of tragedy I do is I pray,” Scalise told a reporter Tuesday when asked if there’s anything Congress can do to reduce gun violence and deaths. “I pray for the victims. I pray for their families.”
