2020-06-15: News Headlines

_____ (2020-06-14). On Contact: Analysis Of George Floyd Protests. popularresistance.org On the show today, Chris Hedges discusses the George Floyd protests erupting in over 140 American cities with Glen Ford, executive editor of Black Agenda Report. | "And the black misleadership class seems to be more upset and angry about this than the white misleadership class. Sometimes it's funny. Activists have coined the term 'coopaganda,' to describe these funny gestures by cops and other authority figures to be kneeling. A gesture of submission to the demands but of course it's a diversion, a distraction designed to soften people attitude toward the rulers. And it shouldn't fool anyone.

Matthew Ehret-Kump (2020-06-14). Collapse of the British Empire, The Round Table Movement, Canada's Untold History. globalresearch.ca This article was originally published by Matthew Ehret on The Canadian Patriot in November 2018. | Canada's struggle for existence as a sovereign nation has been caught between two opposing views of mankind represented by the British and American System of …

Staff (2020-06-14). The Movement to Uplift Black Lives and Defund Police Can No Longer Be Ignored. truthout.org On May 25, 2020, the nation ignited after a bystander posted a horrific video of Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin kneeling on George Floyd's neck for over eight minutes. | Now the movement to uplift Black lives, and to defund and dismantle police departments where officers disproportionately kill and brutalize African-American men and women, has grown to a point where it can no longer be ignored. | We'll hear from activists in Minneapolis, mourners in Houston, and we'll go to our archiv…

Mahmut Geldi (2020-06-13). Lebanese Protesters Set Central Bank on Fire. anti-empire.com Demonstrators in Lebanon attempted to occupy the central bank in the capital Thursday after the country's currency sank to a record low against the US dollar. | As a result of the nation's economic crisis, the dollar rose to 6,000 Lebanese pounds from 4,000 in the last two days, prompting protesters to take to the streets in Beirut and many other cities. | twitter.com/BasedPoland/status/127152377… | They blocked roads to traffic with garbage containers and burning tires. | Forcing their way into the central bank on Hamra Street, they had to withdraw when security forces intervened. | Security for…

Marcus Weisgerber (2020-06-13). Pentagon Starts Bailing Out Defense Firms. anti-empire.com The Pentagon has begun to bail out U.S. companies that have seen large parts of their business dry up amid the coronavirus pandemic, in a bid to make sure they can still build weapons. | On Wednesday, officials announced that five mid-tier defense companies had received a total of $135 million to "help sustain defense-critical workforce capabilities in body armor, aircraft manufacturing, and shipbuilding," according to a Defense Department

_____ (2020-06-13). New Study: US Empire Is Falling But Will Not Fall Quietly. popularresistance.org Where will the next war occur? Who will fight in it? Why will it occur? How will it be fought? This brief summarizes a series of reports that sought to answer these questions—looking out from now until 2030. The reports took the approach of examining these questions through the lenses of several trends—geopolitical, economic, environmental, legal, informational, and military—that will shape the contours of conflict. | Military history is littered with mistaken predictions about the future of warfare that have left forecasters militarily unprepared—sometimes disastrously so—for the co…

Staff (2020-06-13). Police Have Long History of Responding to Black Movements by Playing the Victim. truthout.org The protests across the country in response to the police killing of George Floyd have led to significant pressure on mayors and city councils. One of the most important demands has been for the defunding of police departments. | Activists in Minneapolis succeeded in getting the University of Minnesota and the public school system to

Alan Macleod (2020-06-12). Project Venezuela: Right-Wing Activists Push Wikipedia to Blacklist MintPress, other Alternative Media. mintpressnews.com Still unable to convince a sufficient number of their countryfolk to support them, the Venezuelan opposition has turned their efforts towards convincing an international audience — primarily Americans — to support their cause. Part of that is spending inordinate amounts of time online, arguing in English on social media, creating Now, a…

Andre Vltchek (2020-06-12). It is all About Race: Awful Hypocrisy to Say it is Not! dissidentvoice.org While I am following closely various discussions on Western mass media and social media, simultaneously engaging in several direct exchanges, one overwhelming leitmotif that I see is clearly emerging: "What is happening in the United States (and the UK, France and other parts of Western Empire) is not really about the race. Let us protest …

Shimbun Akahata (2020-06-12). Activists in Japan join the global Black Lives Matter movement. peoplesworld.org TOKYO—In response to the Black Lives Matter movement spreading from the United States to the rest of the world, several rounds of anti-racism demonstrations in Tokyo and Osaka have seen massive turnout—even in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic. On June 7, the chant "Black Lives Matter" echoed throughout downtown Osaka City. The rally was …

Kyle Mizokami (2020-06-12). US Bombers Are So Ridiculously Expensive Air Force Forced to Make Up for Low Numbers by Planning Cargo Planes for Combat. anti-empire.com Editor's note: A decent article but which does not explain the background of why the Air Force is experimenting with using cargo planes in this way. Despite having a massive budget the hardware the service orders from the defense industry is so ridiculously expensive the stable just isn't large enough. That is also the reason the ancient but reliable B-52s are still kept in service (and indeed form the backbone of the nuclear and heavy bomber force) and will outlive far newer but overly-complicated and troubled machines like the B-1 from the corporate handout era: Curious taxpayers might wonder why we need the Lon…

RT (2020-06-12). Starbucks roasted & faces boycott by Black Lives Matter activists for reminding employees that dress code matters too. rt.com Celebrities and activists are calling for a boycott on Starbucks after the company reminded its employees that wearing accessories, even in support of the noble Black Lives Matter cause, is still a violation of its dress code. | According to an internal memo obtained by Buzzfeed, Starbucks doesn't want employees donning any Black Lives Matter attire — pins, buttons, t-shirts, etc. — part of a sweeping ban on any accessory related to a "political, religious, or personal issue." For BLM in particular, the company observed that there are people who "misconstrue" the movement and the sight of such items…

RT (2020-06-12). Starbucks bows to online roasting and 'cancel' calls, changes dress code to declare 'Black Lives Matter'. rt.com Starbucks overrode its long-standing dress code and pledged to sponsor 'Black Lives Matter' merchandise after celebrities and activists threatened to 'cancel' the coffee chain for its perceived lack of wokeness. | The company announced on Friday it would sponsor 250,000 'BLM' shirts for its employees and allow buttons supporting the cause, reversing course after just one day of social media brigading. | The shirts are intended to "demonstrate our allyship and show we stand together in unity," the executives wrote in a letter on Friday, titled 'Standing together against racial injustice'. | Black Lives Matter.

David P. Goldman (2020-06-12). Trump's Chip Ban Gives Huawei and South Korea an Enormous Incentive to Strike a Grand Bargain. anti-empire.com A US ban on foreign companies' sales of chips to Huawei Technologies if American equipment or software is involved will undermine America's already-weakened position in the global semiconductor equipment market, industry sources say. | Chip fabricators will remove American equipment from production lines in order to maintain market share in China, the world's largest purchaser of semiconductors. | Samsung, the world's biggest fabricator of memory as well as logic chips after Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation, already has set up a small production line for top-of-the-line 7-nanometer chips using only…

Schiff Gold (2020-06-12). Another Month Another Trillion Added to US National Debt. anti-empire.com On Tuesday, the national debt pushed above $26 trillion. | Just 35 days ago, the debt eclipsed $25 trillion. And 28 days before that, the national debt stood at a mere $24 million. | Meanwhile, the federal government just set a record for the biggest budget deficit in any fiscal year — with four months left to go. | May's budget shortfall came in at a staggering $398.8 billion, pushing the fiscal 2020 deficit to $1.88 trillion, according to the The previous budget defici…

Marko Marjanoviƒá (2020-06-12). Great! Louisville Passes Law to Ban No-Knock Warrants. Now Can We Have the Same for Afghanistan? anti-empire.com Louisville All 26 members of the Louisville Metro Council voted on Thursday to pass a ban on no-knock warrants, a measure known as The unanimously passed ordinance, which still needs to be approved by the mayor, bans any search warrant that does not re…

Tom Odula (2020-06-12). Tanzania Pioneers a Far Cheaper, Less Superstitious and Far More Rational 'Cure' for COVID Than Lockdowns. anti-empire.com Editor's note: Instead of 3 months of ruinous, masochistic, and superstitious lockdowns that the West opted for, Tanzania opted for 3 days of prayers. Both worked about as well except Tanzania's cure was far less costly in livelihoods and lives. Well done Magufuli! Brilliant! | Related:
| Tanzania's president is again claiming the country is free of the coronavirus because of the power of prayer – s…

Mike "Mish" Shedlock (2020-06-12). Congressional Budget Office: Will Take the US 10 Years to Catch Up to Where It Would Have Been Without Lockdowns. anti-empire.com Editor's note: My personal hunch is that this is hugely optimistic. I think 3 months lost, are 3 months lost forever. It's a tall order to presume eventual convergence with where we would have been on any timescale. That said, even a convergence after a decade is still terrible news, especially when you consider how irrational and pointless the lockdowns were. |
| Please consider a CBO Key Points | CBO projects that over the 2020—2030…

_____ (2020-06-12). Court of Human Rights Deals Major Blow To Israel's War On Palestine Solidarity. popularresistance.org The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ruled unanimously that the French highest court's 2015 criminal conviction of activists with the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement advocating nonviolent boycotts of Israeli goods violated article 10 (freedom of expression) of the European Convention on Human Rights. | Reacting to the breaking news, Rita Ahmad from the Palestinian-led BDS movement said: | This momentous court ruling is a decisive victory for freedom of expression, for human rights defenders, and for the BDS movement for Palestinian freedom, justice and equality. It confirms a 2016 European U…

Peoples Dispatch (2020-06-12). Europe's top human rights court overturns French conviction of BDS activists. peoplesdispatch.org A French court had convicted 11 BDS activists for 'incitement to economic discrimination' after they organized a boycott protest against Israel outside a supermarket in France during the Israeli invasion of Gaza in 2009-10…

en.mehrnews (2020-06-12). Iran, Iraq discuss expansion of healthcare cooperation. en.mehrnews.com TEHRAN, Jun. 12 (MNA) — Iran's Ambassador to Iraq Iraj Msjedi and Iraqi Health Minister Hassan Mohammed al-Tamimi stressed the need for promoting cooperation in the health sector.

Kanya Bennett (2020-06-12). Congress Can Lead the Charge on Divesting From Law Enforcement. aclu.org As a former Hill staffer, I know how the sausage gets made: the backroom deals, the pet projects, and the extreme partisanship. Our current moment requires far more than the ego, moderation, and compromise that is typically reflected in federal legislation. This country's recognition — finally — of the devastation and destruction that comes from the over-policing and over-criminalization of Black bodies and communities warrants real, meaningful change. The acknowledgment that Black Lives Matter — finally — demands bold and visionary leadership at the national level., , That audacious vi…

_____ (2020-06-12). Calls To Eliminate School Police Intensify Amid Protests. popularresistance.org Amid calls to defund municipal police in the wake of George Floyd's killing by Minneapolis police, two Oakland Unified school board members are pushing to eliminate the district's police force. | This is an acceleration of a demand that dates back nine years, when activists began calling on the district to dissolve its police department after a black student was shot and killed by a district police sergeant. | The proposal by board members Roseann Torres and Shanthi Gonzales says the district would call on Oakland City Police in emergencies. It has the support of the teachers' union. It's unclear if the resolutio…

_____ (2020-06-12). Statues In The US and Around The World Are Being Beheaded And Torn Down. popularresistance.org "Monuments and statues in the US and around the world that are dedicated to controversial historical figures with legacies of slavery and racism have become the target of demonstrations during the #BlackLivesMatter protests. In several cases, the statues have even been toppled by activists taking matters into their owns hands. | "At a demonstration in Richmond, Virginia, on Tuesday night, a 93-year-old statue of Christopher Columbus was brought down, set on fire, and thrown into a lake as bystanders chanted 'Tear it down.' Left in place where the statue had previously stood was a cardboard sign with the words 'Co…

Staff (2020-06-12). Klobuchar Worked With Law Enforcement Group to Increase Police Budgets. truthout.org This article was produced by As activists around the country work to defund police departments, the Democratic Party's presumptive presidential nominee is considering a senator who worked to boost police department budg…

Patrick Lang (2020-06-12). Milley Apologized for Trump? He Must Go (Trump Has Lost Control of the Pentagon). anti-empire.com Gen. Mark Milley, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff also said that he was "outraged" by the killing of George Floyd and added that the protests it sparked spoke to "centuries of injustice tow…

RT (2020-06-11). Soros & Steyer exposed as backers of 'paramilitary' left-wing group in undercover Project Veritas VIDEO. rt.com As part of its series of undercover videos exposing left-wing organizations like Antifa, Project Veritas released footage claiming to show far-left Democrat activists bragging about George Soros funding and political connections. | Tom Steyer — who unsuccessfully campaigned for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination for 2020 — and liberal financier George Soros are both named as financial contributors in the new clip on Refuse Fascism, an organization dedicated to removing President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence from office. | Andy Zee, national organizer for the group, mentions…

RT (2020-06-11). European Court of Human Rights backs BDS activists convicted in France, orders Paris to pay €101,000 in compensation. rt.com The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has ruled that France violated the rights of 11 pro-Palestinian activists when it convicted them for campaigning against Israeli goods, and has ordered the government to pay damages. | The criminal conviction against the activists with the global Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement "had no relevant and sufficient grounds," the ECHR

MBNJSD (2020-06-11). Defund the Police, Defund the Military. dissidentvoice.org Defund the police, defund the military (Credit: CODEPINK) On June 1, President Trump threatened to deploy active-duty U.S. military forces against peaceful Black Lives Matter protesters in cities across America. Trump and state governors eventually deployed at least 17,000 National Guard troops across the country. In the nation's capital, Trump deployed nine Blackhawk assault helicopters, …

Pien Huang (2020-06-11). WHO Believes That Mass Protests Are Important Even in a 'Pandemic' Provided They're More Popular Than WHO. anti-empire.com In the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, the World Health Organization took time at its daily press conference to address another pressing issue: the wave of protests against police violence and racial injustice. The demonstrations began in the U.S. when George Floyd died on May 25 after a police officer had pressed a knee into his neck for 8 minutes and 46 seconds while detaining him in Minneapolis. | The protests are now spreading around the world to Europe, Africa and other regions. | "WHO fully supports equality and the global movement against racism. We reject discrimination of all kinds," said WHO director…

CJ Hopkins (2020-06-11). Everything Was Ready for a Color-Revolution Coup Against Trump but He Refused to Bite. anti-empire.com So, the GloboCap-Resistance Unfortunately for the Resistance, Trum…

Robert Halfon (2020-06-11). Children More Likely to Be Hit by Lightning Than Die of Coronavirus, Oxford-Cambridge Analysis Finds. anti-empire.com School children under the age of 15 are more likely to be hit by lightning than die from coronavirus, new figures suggest, amid Scientists from the universities of Cambridge and Oxford have called for "rational debate" based on the "tiny" risk to children and have suggested that it might be better for youngsters to be exposed to the virus early so they are protected in later life when…

Armstrong Economics (2020-06-11). Country Formerly Known as Spain Decides to Institute a Permanent COVID Dystopia, Flog Itself to Death. anti-empire.com FROM A READER IN SPAIN FROM A FORMER COMMUNIST STATE: | The So, masks are obligatory in all closed spaces (work, office, schools, transport, shops, etc… even at home when you receive friends/family who are not living with you in the same household —…

Marko Marjanoviƒá (2020-06-11). The Powers That Be Are Ecstatic That the Left Believes the Biggest Problem Right Now Are Statues of Dead White Men. anti-empire.com In the US and the EU both, we've witnessed the biggest monetary heist in history. We're sailing into a depression that central banks have set up for us over the past two decades. And we're doing so in the worst possible condition thanks to the Draconian, harebrained and unnecessary lockdowns that the politicians imposed on us. | Several of Empire's wars and occupations continue in Afghanistan, Somalia, Yemen, and Syria. Tension is being needlessly cultivated with China and Russia, and the entire architecture of nuclear arms control is just about done being thrown in that trash bin of history. | Simultaneously the…

Palestinian BDS National Committee (2020-06-11). European Court of Human Rights Deals Major Blow to Israel's War on Palestine Solidarity. globalresearch.ca ECHR rules unanimously that French highest court's criminal conviction of Israel boycott advocates violates the European Convention on Human Rights' freedom of expression article | *** | The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR)

_____ (2020-06-11). Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone Forms Around Emptied East Precinct. popularresistance.org The first night in the so-called Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone that has formed in the wake of police giving up the week-long blockade of the East Precinct was rainy and peaceful and full of speeches from activists, agitators, poets, and socialist city council members. | "I guess whatever the fuck we're doing is effective," one organizer identified as Magik said over a megaphone early in the night as police were still clearing the area. "They are going to move up. They are going to get everybody out of here and we are free to move through these streets and protest and march." | "Yesterday we were on 11th and Pine.

Tracy Keeling (2020-06-11). Palestinians score huge victory against Israel's apartheid regime in a European court. thecanary.co Palestinians have scored a major victory against Israel's apartheid regime in the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR). | On 11 June, the ECHR passed a ruling on a French court's conviction of people boycotting Israeli goods to show solidarity with Palestinians. It found that the convictions violated the European Convention on Human Rights. | As the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement

Jessica Corbett, staff writer (2020-06-11). In Landmark Ruling, European Court of Human Rights Sides With BDS Movement Over French Government. commondreams.org In a decision celebrated by international human rights advocates, a European court ruled Thursday that the conviction of 11 activists in France campaigning for a boycott of Israeli goods in solidarity with Palestinians "had no relevant and sufficient grounds" and violated their right to freedom of expression. | www.commondreams.org/sites/default/files…

VINS (2020-06-11). Alternatives to Policing—The Case for Public Health and Community Development Investments. projectcensored.org By Amber Yang As outrage sparks over police brutality, systemic racism, and socio-economic inequality, activists are calling to defund police. Despite other calls for anti-bias training, civilian review processes, and…