20 June 20
David Sirota | Even in Safe Races, the Democratic Establishment Hates Progressive Candidates
David Sirota, Jacobin
Sirota writes: "The Democratic donor class does not want progressives anywhere near the levers of power - even in races where they could clearly win."
EXCERPT:
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David Sirota, Jacobin
Sirota writes: "The Democratic donor class does not want progressives anywhere near the levers of power - even in races where they could clearly win."
EXCERPT:
Democratic leaders’ heavy-handed behavior in Colorado seems to confirm those suspicions — and it could now jeopardize the entire effort to take back Congress from Donald Trump’s party.
A Winnable Senate Race for Almost Any Democrat
Colorado is now a Democratic stronghold — so much so that incumbent Republican senator Cory Gardner is Colorado’s only remaining statewide GOP elected official, and polls show he’s wildly unpopular. If Democrats put up literally any serviceable candidate, it’s a very good bet they will win back this seat that they lost six years ago in the national Republican wave of 2014.
This is a rare opportunity to put a real progressive in the Senate — or at least a lawmaker who would be as progressive as former Colorado Democratic senator Mark Udall, the liberal-leaning environmental champion who lost to Gardner. And that’s what the party has in former Colorado House speaker Andrew Romanoff.
He is a well-respected, grassroots-funded Democrat campaigning for Medicare for All and a Green New Deal. Though he has lost two tough races in the last decade, Romanoff is no political amateur: in 2004 — a terrible year for Democrats — he led Colorado Democrats’ successful effort to win the state legislature for the first time in thirty years. While being disowned by national party support and rejecting PAC money, he has scratched and clawed his way to raising a respectable $3 million. He has also scooped up endorsements from hundreds of current and former Colorado elected officials and won a decisive victory at the Democratic State Assembly. And he made waves earlier this year with an envelope-pushing ad rightly sounding the alarm about climate change.
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None of that has moved national party leaders to Romanoff’s campaign — and even if they won’t admit it, every politico in Colorado knows exactly why. It’s because Romanoff committed a sin considered unforgivable by Washington insiders: a decade ago he dared to run a progressive primary challenge against Michael Bennet, the former corporate raider who worked for right-wing billionaire Philip Anschutz, who helped Wall Street loot the Denver school system, and who then leveraged his connections to get himself appointed to the Senate without ever running in a single election.
Primarying an incumbent senator like Bennet is seen as a high crime among Washington Democrats — one that can never be forgiven, even a decade later. And so after Romanoff announced his candidacy, New York senator Chuck Schumer’s political machine — which had been run by Bennet in 2014 when Democrats got destroyed in Senate races — frantically sought out a corporate-approved alternative. The machine settled on trying to buy the Senate Democratic primary for John Hickenlooper after the former Democratic governor’s presidential campaign flamed out.
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William Barr. (photo: Joshua Roberts/Reuters)
Erica Orden, Kara Scannell and Evan Perez, CNN
Excerpt: "In a fast-escalating crisis Friday night, Attorney General William Barr tried to oust Geoffrey Berman, the powerful US attorney for the Southern District of New York who has investigated a number of associates of President Donald Trump, but Berman defied him by refusing to step down."
A late-night announcement
The timing of the move, announced after 9 p.m. ET, immediately raised questions about the circumstances regarding Berman's departure.
Any forced ouster of Berman is likely to draw scrutiny inside the US attorney's office and among career prosecutors. He has been the US attorney for Manhattan since 2018, and under his leadership, his office prosecuted Trump's former attorney Michael Cohen, is investigating top Trump confidante Rudy Giuliani and indicted the former New York mayor's associates Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman.
Tensions between the New York and Washington offices have grown with Berman and Barr butting heads over the handling of some cases, including the indictment of Turkish bank Halkbank.
Last fall, Justice Department officials discussed replacing Berman with Ed O'Callaghan, a senior official, but then prosecutors indicted the Giuliani associates, a move that appeared to extend Berman's tenure.
Trump and Barr have long taken issue with the office's handling of various cases, but people close to the office believe its string of extremely high-profile investigations -- including those of Cohen, Giuliani and Jeffrey Epstein -- may have deterred Justice officials from pushing out Berman because his exit would have been certain to cause an uproar and charges of political interference. For the last several months, however, largely due to the coronavirus pandemic, the office has had a relatively quiet period, and some believe Barr seized that opportunity to oust Berman.
Preet Bharara, a CNN senior legal analyst who was fired by Trump as US attorney for the Southern District shortly after Trump took office in 2017, told CNN's Don Lemon that the late-night announcement was a "highly irregular thing to do ... when there are all sorts of investigations swirling around."
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said the "late Friday night dismissal reeks of potential corruption of the legal process. What is angering President Trump? A previous action by this U.S. Attorney or one that is ongoing?"
House Judiciary Chairman Jerry Nadler, a New York Democrat, said "America is right to expect the worst of Bill Barr, who has repeatedly interfered in criminal investigations on Trump's behalf," adding that he would invite Berman to testify.
Activists rallying to defend DACA in Washington, D.C. (photo: Andrew Stefan/RSN)
How DREAMers Defeated Trump: Supreme Court DACA Win Shows "Sustained Pressure of Activism" Works
Democracy Now!
Excerpt: "'What moved Chief Justice Roberts in our case was the stories,' says Cortes, who is a DACA recipient himself."
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Democracy Now!
Excerpt: "'What moved Chief Justice Roberts in our case was the stories,' says Cortes, who is a DACA recipient himself."
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As States Struggle With Vote-by-Mail, "Many Thousands, if Not Millions" of Ballots Could Go Uncounted in November
Richard Salame, The Intercept
Salame writes: "Maria Fallon Romo grew up in a family that talked politics at the dinner table. At 53, the North Dakota special education teacher has been an active voter for about 30 years and, until recently, had never experienced a problem casting her ballot."
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Richard Salame, The Intercept
Salame writes: "Maria Fallon Romo grew up in a family that talked politics at the dinner table. At 53, the North Dakota special education teacher has been an active voter for about 30 years and, until recently, had never experienced a problem casting her ballot."
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Protesters have toppled the only statue of a Confederate general in the U.S. capital. (photo: AP)
Associated Press
Excerpt: "Protesters toppled the only statue of a Confederate general in the nation's capital and set it on fire on Juneteenth, the day marking the end of slavery in the US, amid continuing anti-racism demonstrations after the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis."
Cheering demonstrators jumped up and down as the 11-foot (3.4-meter) statue of Albert Pike – wrapped with chains – wobbled on its high granite pedestal before falling backward, landing in a pile of dust. Protesters then set a bonfire and stood around it in a circle as the statue burned, chanting, “No justice, no peace, no racist police”.
Eyewitness accounts and videos posted on social media indicated police were on the scene but did not intervene. The president, Donald Trump, quickly tweeted about the toppling, calling out DC mayor Muriel Bowser and writing: “The DC police are not doing their job as they watched a statue be ripped down and burn. These people should be immediately arrested. A disgrace to our country.”
Jubilant protesters read out Trump’s tweet over a bullhorn and cheered. After the statue fell, most protesters returned peacefully to Lafayette park near the White House.
The Pike statue has been a source of controversy over the years. The former Confederate general was also a longtime influential leader of the Freemasons, who revere Pike and who paid for the statue. Pike’s body is interred at the DC headquarters of the Scottish Rite of Freemasonry, which also contains a small museum in his honor.
The statue, dedicated in 1901, was located in Judiciary Square about half a mile from the US Capitol. It was built at the request of Masons who successfully lobbied Congress to grant them land for the statue as long as Pike would be depicted in civilian – not military – clothing.
Racial tensions in the country reached boiling point and spilled into the streets after Floyd’s killing late last month. Video showed a white police officer pressing his knee against Floyd’s neck for nearly eight minutes as the handcuffed black man said: “I can’t breathe.” The officer, Derek Chauvin, has been charged with murder.
Civil rights activists and some local government officials in DC had campaigned for years to get the statue taken down but needed the federal government’s approval to do so.
“Ever since 1992, members of the DC council have been calling on the federal government to remove the statue of Confederate Albert Pike (a federal memorial on federal land). We unanimously renewed our call to Congress to remove it in 2017,” the DC council tweeted Friday.
A proposed resolution calling for the removal of the statue referred to Pike as a “chief founder of the post-civil war Ku Klux Klan.” The Klan connection is a frequent accusation from Pike’s critics and one which the Masons dispute.
The Waorani currently number around 5,000 in three provinces of the Amazon. (photo: Adobe Stock)
Ecuador's Waorani People Win Another Victory Against Government
teleSUR
Excerpt: "Indigenous Waorani People of Ecuador's Amazon won Wednesday in an Ecuadorean court precautionary measures requiring the government to take urgent actions against the spread of the new coronavirus in Waorani territory, NGO Amazon Frontlines has reported."
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teleSUR
Excerpt: "Indigenous Waorani People of Ecuador's Amazon won Wednesday in an Ecuadorean court precautionary measures requiring the government to take urgent actions against the spread of the new coronavirus in Waorani territory, NGO Amazon Frontlines has reported."
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A new environmental health investigation finds compelling evidence that links global climate change to negative pregnancy outcomes across the country. (photo: Getty Images)
Climate Change Linked to Serious Pregnancy Risks, 'Landmark' Study Finds
Wyatte Grantham-Philips, USA TODAY
Grantham-Philips writes: "An environmental health investigation published Thursday in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) finds compelling evidence that links global climate change to negative pregnancy outcomes across the country."
Wyatte Grantham-Philips, USA TODAY
Grantham-Philips writes: "An environmental health investigation published Thursday in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) finds compelling evidence that links global climate change to negative pregnancy outcomes across the country."
n environmental health investigation published Thursday in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) finds compelling evidence that links global climate change to negative pregnancy outcomes across the country.
The review analyzed 68 U.S. studies dating back to 2007 – which included over 32 million births.
84 percent of the births showed a statistically significant association between increased air pollution and heat exposure (related to climate change) and serious risks for pregnancy – specifically preterm birth, low birth weight, and stillbirth.
“We spend so much time trying to reduce complications in obstetrics and improve outcomes, that to me this is a landmark study," said Dr. Jeanne Conry, MD, PhD, past president of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG), current CEO/founder of the Environmental Health Leadership Foundation, and president-elect of the International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetrics.
“[The investigation shows] that there is a clear association of prenatal exposure of air pollutants and health outcomes – children’s health outcomes...Here, we’re saying, the air we breathe affects deliveries," said Conry, who was not an author of this new research.
Preterm birth and low birth weight can also increase a child's risk for future health and developmental problems.
“The more you dig, you could really say there’s a whole generation of children being born like ‘pre-polluted,’" said Dr. Nathaniel DeNicola, MD, MSHP, the senior author of the study, an obstetrician/gynecologist, and Environmental Health Expert for ACOG.
"[As OB-GYNs] we have an obligation to look at where our field can have an impact.”
Both Conry and DeNicola stress the importance of recognizing that one of the greatest consequences of climate change is its association with human health.
"Who’s the image of climate change? For a while it’s been the polar bear – the polar bear on a floating iceberg. More recently, it’s kind of become the super-storm – and maybe the TV journalists blowing in the wind in those super-storms," DeNicola said.
"[But] really the image of climate change and its effects should be human health – kids and pregnant women being affected right now.”
The lead author of the study, Dr. Bruce Bekkar, MD, a retired obstetrician and current full-time climate activist, agrees. He also describes why their research in this particular study focused exclusively on the U.S.:
"We purposely excluded papers that had any sort of population in them that were other than US domestic, because we want people to understand the impact of this story," he said. "It may well be worse in other places, but you can’t step away from the findings of our story and say, ‘It’s happening somewhere else.’ It’s literally all around us all over the country right now.”
The subpopulations found in the investigation to have highest risk included minority groups, especially Black mothers, and well as individuals with asthma.
Conry explains how under-served women who do outdoor labor, or live in a "desert in the cities," for example, are strongly impacted.
“Black and Hispanic women who are working in the farms or in the fields...they’ve got heat and air pollution, so they’re particularly vulnerable," she said.
As environments and living conditions across the world, and even the country, vary, the importance of education is stressed.
”We hope [women and families] realize that this is a risk factor for them that they need to engage with," said Bekkar. "And that means asking their [health care providers] ways specifically that they can address it, because these effects vary so widely in terms of time of year, and location geographically.”
ACOG finds climate change to be an urgent concern to women's health, as well as a major public health challenge worldwide – something the organization reaffirmed in April 2018.
"Climate change has a disproportionate effect on global women’s health, as it broadens existing gender-based health disparities," ACOG wrote in a position statement.
"We ask that government and public health agencies take steps to ensure the protection of women’s health services and human rights."
And although Conry feels that even more research could be done, she stresses that that doesn't need to halt change.
"We don’t have to wait for all the research to take place to be able to take a strong stance on climate change, on air pollution, on the quality of life," she said. "I think that’s what ACOG stands for – we’re saying, prioritize health and the environment, and we call for reproductive and environmental justice.”
In terms of policy, Conry urges the U.S. to re-join, and be a leader, of the Paris Climate Agreement. She also suggests that more regulations may be necessary – whether that be changing air standards, or improving working conditions.
“Global health should be a guiding light," said Conry, "so when we say that we’ve got a crisis, we need to address it as the global emergency it is."
Bekkar, DeNicola and Conry explain the need for all parties – the medical community, policymakers, and families themselves across the country – to learn more and act, in order to help combat these serious consequences.
“We spend, as obstetricians, so much time counseling pregnant women about all these precautions," said DeNicola. "But there’s only so much [pregnant women] can do, they realistically cannot control the temperature outside or the air pollution that they encounter, and so, beyond the individual actions...the real solutions are system solutions, and primarily those are controlled by policymakers.”
Both DeNicola and Bekkar also believe that they can already see some change, but it's an ongoing process.
“I think it’s a time, right now, in society where we’re being reminded that we’re not just independent, we’re all connected...all of those sort of micro-decisions make a significant impact on the exposures that people face," said Bekkar. "All of these exposures are at the hands of elected officials, so, come November, no one should vote for anybody that doesn’t stand up against the climate crisis and want to do something about it right now."
"As we’ve so vividly been shown around the world in the past couple of months, when you stop burning fossil fuels so much, when traffic drops off and airplanes fly less and things like that – nature rebounds...and that has a direct impact on people's health."
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