Hard Pass

The victories were a clear rebuke of Trump’s politics, but also a referendum on the Democratic party’s own centrism that is complicit in the violence of masked men hunting immigrants, the funding of a genocide and the denial of healthcare to citizens of the world’s wealthiest country.

…Hakeem Jeffries, who is running for speaker of the House, will not commit to holding a vote on abolishing ICE. He opposes Medicare for All. He has said he will not hold Trump accountable for the human rights violations committed, portraying it as a question of “getting even” rather than achieving justice where it was denied. Chuck Schumer, who holds similar positions, has an extraordinarily low approval rating – yet plans to run for majority leader in the Senate. Electeds are questioning whether these men should hold these roles.

But the dissent must also come from us, as it has been. We need to demand an end to the fast violence of guns on our streets trained on our neighbors, bombs dropped from the sky and the slow violence of people dying because their healthcare was denied or their food stamps were cut.

We need to organize, and mobilize, to demand the multi-racial democracy we were promised – not a playground for the rich to get richer on the time and labor and lives of the poor.

Poorer schools are being lured into spending their limited funds on "AI" tech in the face of chronic understaffing.

Crow babies have your back

Cross-geposted von: https://lemmy.world/post/54146464

https://archive.ph/9R4M9

Kelly Holley-Bockelmann was one of the top astrophysicists in the country until President Trump’s policies affected every part of her work.

Archived copy of the article — missing video

After slashing funding for programs that documented atrocities and protected human rights abroad, President Donald Trump’s State Department is now granting one of its first new human rights awards to a controversial South African organization that promotes the disputed notion that white farmers are a violently targeted, persecuted group, according to multiple sources knowledgeable about the funding.

I was in the disabilities program, but now I write endless, long reports, so this one hits a bit close to home.

More than one way to the top I guess...

Still, having come to power promising to restore affordability, the new crop of Democrats are soon to discover that there is not much they can do over the next couple of years to alleviate angry voters’ stress over pricey gas and groceries, exorbitant mortgages and unaffordable healthcare.

Democrats would do well to recall that the affordability strains that helped deliver them to power are not dissimilar to those that delivered the presidency to Trump two years ago. And they could again quickly become their enemy.

I've been asked to write a (hopefully short) opposition paper on datacentres to circulate among councillors and other activists here in the UK to help oppose them. I have a whole lot of notes already in mind from what I've been reading over the years, but it would certainly help to have specific cases to reference when speaking to various pro-datacentre arguments. I'm going to be doing my own research of course, but any pointers would be greatly appreciated.

For example, if you have knowledge of cases where datacentres have been erected with negative outcomes like diminished water quality or massive energy price hikes, I would really appreciate it if you could share some links to news sources.

I've heard for example that often these are pitched as "closed loop" but then they're installed using the cheaper "open loop" model, but I don't know of specific cases. If you do, please share. If you have evidence of other dodgy stuff done in support of these things, I want to hear that too.

I think I have the societal damage angle covered, as well as the distinction between "AI" datacentres and traditional ones, but any official stats about the number of actual (permanent vs. temporary) jobs produced would be good too.

As I said, I'll be doing my own research here, but I figure some of you may want to contribute in your own way. Local-level opposition is where a lot of these projects go to die, and at the moment, I'm getting the distinct impression that many local councillors are lacking basic understanding of the subject matter.

The public option sounds like a step toward universal health care, but it’s really a delay tactic. The latest versions would force public plans to mimic private insurers, while the fight over the arcane details buys the industry another decade or two.

...

The difference between a vampire and a bad health care policy idea is that vampires jump out of their coffins and drink blood at sunset. Undead health care proposals emerge from think tank closets and suck the life out of useful ideas when the sun rises on a national health care debate. As public fury at exploding costs and deadly corporate claims denials boils over into historic Democratic election gains, can someone please find a wooden stake for the public option?

Improved and expanded Medicare for All would give everyone full coverage at much lower cost than the combined private premiums, taxes, and out-of-pocket payments that are eating up family income today. But it violates a cardinal rule of federal politics: never do anything that causes corporations or the ultrawealthy any pain.

Instead, corporate Democrats wanting to be seen “doing something” about the imploding US health care system have long peddled a vague public option notion because it sounds like the marriage of a big noncorporate vision (it’s public!) with competition and freedom of choice (it’s an option!). Liberal nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and pundits revived its rotting corpse in response to pro–Medicare for All candidates’ primary victories and Tuesday night’s stunning results.

It’s a perfect nonsolution to our three-headed crisis of health care cost, access, and quality. Nobody knows what a “public option” is because there’s no common definition and nothing like it has ever been seen in the wild, so it can be anything weaselly politicians want it to be. It needs to be put out of our misery.

...

The worst thing about public optionism is enduring smug lectures that Medicare for All is a political fantasy that could never happen from people promoting a vague, unworkable idea now enjoying its twenty-third year of politically viable nonexistence. Yet The American Prospect casually assumes that a series of essential Medicare for All elements against which the industry will fight like rabid dogs can easily be grafted onto a public option.

Health care is a public good. Pretending that having government act like a health insurance corporation will do anything useful is absurd. Let’s kill this putrefying political monster right now.

President Donald Trump's political supporters have long been described as cult-like, from their willingness to change their ideology based on Trump's whims to their reflexive distrust of established experts. In light of the Republican leader's politically devastating losses in the 2026 midterm elections, these same true believers are now angry at every voter who did not stand by their man, at least according to a recent in-depth study.

"Last week we assembled a focus group of Republicans who voted for President Trump in both 2020 and 2024, and who, except for some local elections, voted straight-ticket Republican in this year’s midterms," wrote polling expert Sarah Longwell in The Bulwark on Sunday.

"In my conversation with these voters, one thing became abundantly clear in their cacophony of cope: They were not blaming Trump," Longwell added. "Instead, they were blaming the GOP candidates on the ticket for being terrible. They were blaming social media for pushing Trump Derangement Syndrome. And they were blaming their fellow Americans, who they insisted were just too brainwashed and emotional to just hold their noses and vote for the terrible candidates that Republicans offered them."

I already sent it to my group chats and encourage you to do the same.

Some of the worst people in the country. I was raised evangelical, even the folks I know who were decent on an interpersonal level would never consider voting for anyone other than Republicans.