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When I began Schwartzreport my purpose was to produce an entirely fact-based daily publication in favor of the earth, the inter-connectedness and interdependence of all life, democracy, equality for all, liberty, and things that are life-affirming. Also, to warn my readers about actions, events, and trends that threaten those values. Our country now stands at a crossroads, indeed, the world stands at a crossroads where those values are very much at risk and it is up to each of us who care about wellbeing to do what we can to defend those principles. I want to thank all of you who have contributed to SR, particularly those of you who have scheduled an ongoing monthly contribution. It makes a big difference and is much appreciated. It is one thing to put in the hours each day and to do the work for free, but another to have to cover the rising out-of-pocket costs. For those of you who haven’t done so, but read SR regularly, I ask that you consider supporting it.
The corruption and lack of ethics of the Supreme Court, the dysfunction and corruption of the House of Representatives, the silence and lack of positive work by the Senate, the inability of the Biden administration to make a positive impression, particularly its disastrous policies concerning the Israeli genocide going on in Gaza, as well as the Great Schism Trend splitting the nation into two countries has reached such a crisis level that young voters, the next generation of the country see, as this article is headlined, “A dying empire led by bad people.” If Biden and the Democrats do not wake up to this reality and win the Presidency and a majority in both the Senate and the House, I am not at all confident that the United States will be a democracy by 2025.
Young voters overwhelmingly believe that almost all politicians are corrupt and that the country will end up worse off than when they were born, according to new polling from Democratic firm Blueprint obtained exclusively by Semafor.
The sour mood points to potential trouble for Joe Biden, who is struggling with Gen Z and younger Millennials in polls compared with 2020, and needs to convince them he can be relied on to improve their lives.
As part of the online poll of 943 18-30-year-old registered voters, Blueprint asked participants to respond to a series of questions about the American political system: 49% agreed to some extent that elections in the country don’t represent people like them; 51% agreed to some extent that the political system in the US “doesn’t work for people like me;” and 64% backed the statement that “America is in decline.” A whopping 65% agreed either strongly or somewhat that “nearly all politicians are corrupt, and make money from their political power” — only 7% disagreed.
“I think these statements blow me away, the scale of these numbers with […]
The christofascist MAGAt Republicans of Texas are so profoundly altering female healthcare that Texas is becoming another country compared with any of the Blue states. There is also a growing secession movement in the state. Depending on how the November national election turns out, and who the people of Texas vote for at the state level, I think secession may become a very real issue, and if I were a woman I wouldn’t live in Texas. It would be too dangerous. I also think you are going to see a major OB/GYN migration out of the state, which will affect all women even when it has nothing to do with pregnancy.
Texas State Capitol. Credit: Visit Austin
The Republican Party of Texas is considering a platform that appears to endorse the death penalty for abortion providers and patients.
Texas delegates voted on a 2024 platform at the state’s GOP Convention on Saturday and aim to tally the votes by Wednesday to finalize their platform for the coming year. The proposal called for new legislation to solidify fetal personhood ideology into law, define abortion care as homicide and criminalize in vitro fertilization, first reported by feminist writer Jessica Valenti.
The 50-page document also includes a slew of other far-right ideas such as proclaiming that gender-affirming care is “child abuse,” requirements that Christianity and the Bible be taught in public schools, and clarifies that Texas “retains the right to secede from the United States.”
The platform is seen as more of a wish list than a binding document, but it’s a critical reflection of how far right the Texas Republican Party has moved in recent years.
The GOP platform calls for an “equal protection of the […]
This is the damage one single traitor can do to the United States, or any other country, using the internet and AI. Human culture is changing fundamentally because nothing is being done to regulate to regulate these technologies. This is a trend that is being ignored at the peril of human culture.
The Kremlin Credit: Wikipedia
A dozen years ago, John Mark Dougan, a former deputy sheriff in Palm Beach County, Fla., sent voters an email posing as a county commissioner, urging them to oppose the re-election of the county’s sheriff.
He later masqueraded online as a Russian tech worker with a pseudonym, BadVolf, to leak confidential information in violation of state law, fooling officials in Florida who thought they were dealing with a foreigner.
He also posed as a fictional New York City heiress he called Jessica, tricking an adviser to the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office into divulging improper conduct by the department.
“And boy, did he ever spill ALL of the beans,” Mr. Dougan said in a written response to questions for this article, in which he confirmed his role in these episodes.
Those subterfuges in the United States, it turned out, were only a prelude to a more prominent and potentially more ominous campaign of deception he has been conducting […]
This article, and the study upon which it is based, are examples of the kind of thinking that needs to inform our entire society. New technologies, new versions of old technologies. That needs to become our priority as a society if we are going to maintain our culture in the coming climate change era.
Concept photo of a long row of refrigerated boxes filled with fruits and vegetables, depicting a modern supermarket interior. Credit: Nicole Smith
A new study by researchers at University of Michigan (UMichigan) has concluded that almost half of food waste globally — roughly 620 million metric tons — could be saved by food supply chains being fully refrigerated.
Each year, approximately a third of worldwide food production goes to waste, a press release from UMichigan said. Meanwhile, according to the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization, roughly 800 million people go hungry.
By fully refrigerating food supply chains — creating “cold chains” — greenhouse gas emissions related to food waste would be reduced by 41 percent globally, the study said.
“I was surprised to find the scale of our opportunity for reducing food loss and waste globally,” said Aaron Friedman-Heiman, the study’s lead author and a master’s student at UMichigan’s School for Environment and Sustainability, in the press release. “Approximately half of the roughly 1.3 billion tons of food that goes to waste […]
The military-industrial complex empowered by thoughtless unconscious American officials in Washington has condemned tens of thousands of individuals, mostly women and children to horrific detentions that gone on year after year because no one in media reports on it and no one in Congress or the Executive branch seems to give a damn about what is happening. It is horrifying, and this report gives us a small window into this reality.
A member of the Kurdish security forces stands guard as women and children fill water containers at the Al-Hol camp in Syria’s northeastern Al-Hasakah Governorate, on October 10, 2023. Credit: Delil Souleiman / AFP / Getty
On May 7, the United States repatriated 11 U.S. citizens, including five children, and one foreign-born minor. They had been detained in northeast Syria, where around 56,000 Syrian and foreign prisoners from the U.S.-led coalition’s decade-long war with the Islamic State remain held by U.S.-backed armed groups, including the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).
This was the “largest single repatriation of U.S. citizens from northeast Syria to date,” according to the U.S. State Department, bringing the total number of U.S. citizens repatriated to 51. A reported 25 remain. One of the May 7 repatriated U.S. citizens was arrested upon her arrival at New York’s JFK airport and detained “under allegations that she had been trained in the use of firearms by militants in Syria.”
It appears that Americans are slowly, very slowly, awakening to what the carbon energy industries have done to wreck the earth’s matrix of life and destroy the environment. As the article about the first national poll reports, “Asked if fossil fuel companies “should be held legally accountable for their contributions to climate change”, 62% of voters said yes, suggesting majority support for the existing civil lawsuits against oil companies. That included 84% of Democrats, 59% of Independents and 40% of Republicans.” What I want you to notice particularly though is where the MAGAt cult stands in relation to independents and Democrats. I think of this as semi-good news.
Two-thirds of Democrats and one-third of Republicans said they would support criminal charges against big oil for climate change-caused deaths. Credit: Barry Lewis /In Pictures / Getty
As US communities take big oil to court for allegedly deceiving the public about the climate crisis, polling shared with the Guardian shows that a majority of voters support the litigation, while almost half would back an even more aggressive legal strategy of filing criminal charges.
The poll, which comes as the world’s first-ever criminal climate lawsuit was brought in France last week, could shed light on how, if filed, similar US cases might be viewed by a jury.
The 40 existing US lawsuits against major oil companies, filed by cities and states, are based on civil charges such as tort law and racketeering protections. But last year, the consumer advocacy non-profit Public Citizen proposed also filing criminal charges – most notably, homicide – against the companies.
Big oil, the argument goes, knew pollution from the use of fossil fuels could have lethal consequences and yet still fought to delay climate action, which could be considered grounds for charges of […]
JOSH GERSTEIN and ZACH MONTELLARO, Staff Writers - Politico
Stephan:
Anyone with an IQ higher than the measurement of their waist who is even minimally enlightened about what has been going on in South Carolina knows the redistricting carried out by the MAGAt Republican legislature was racially based. But, of course, the corrupt MAGAt cabal that dominates the Supreme Court did what they were supposed to do and gave the finger to American democracy and sided with the MAGAt legislature.
In the decision Thursday, the MAGAt Supreme Court sided with the MAGAt state government. | Credit: Francis Chung / Politico
The Supreme Court on Thursday rejected a challenge to a South Carolina congressional redistricting plan that civil rights groups had described as an unconstitutional racial gerrymander.
In a 6-3 ruling divided along conservative-liberal lines, the high court said the challengers had failed to show that the state legislature was motivated by race when it moved thousands of Black voters out of the state’s 1st Congressional District. Instead, Justice Samuel Alito suggested in his majority opinion, the legislature was merely seeking to make the seat safer for Republicans — a goal that does not violate the Constitution.
The Charleston-area district had become a swing seat in the previous decade, changing parties in 2018 and 2020. GOP Rep. Nancy Mace now holds the seat.
After the 2020 census, the Republican-controlled state legislature drew new lines that moved many Black voters into the district long held by the prominent Black Democratic Rep. Jim Clyburn.
CHARISMA MADARANG, Contributing Writer - Rolling Stone
Stephan:
The actual truth about the Alitos’ behavior about the flags they flew is beginning to come out. What is clear to me is that Samuel Alito should not be on the Supreme Court, and it is a measure of how dysfunctional our highest court and our Congress have become that nothing is happening to deal with any of this. You saw in the previous story what is happening as a result of this dysfunctionality.
Associate Justice Samuel Alito Credit: Alex Wong / Getty
After reports that an upside-down American flag had flown outside the residence of Supreme Court Justice Sam Alito during the period surrounding Jan. 6, 2021, the conservative justice blamed the flag’s placement on his wife Martha-Ann — claiming her actions were a result of a clash over a neighbor’s anti-Trump yard sign and a verbal insult.
Now, the Alito’s neighbors — Emily Baden and her then-boyfriend, now husband — are disputing the Alitos’ version of events, according to the New York Times, which reviewed text messages and a police call to corroborate the claims. According to the Badens, Martha-Ann instigated the weeks-long conflict and at one point, spat at their car as they drove by the Alito’s home.
Per the Times, the couple had placed signs on their yard that read “Trump Is a Fascist” and “You Are Complicit” shortly after the Jan. 6 insurrection. Emily told the publication that the […]
