Politics Plus

It has been a record physiotherapy day.  I did 50 minutes of bike riding and 40 reps of 5 resistance exercises on top of ultrasound, traction and chiropractic.  Three hours work which left me with low blood sugars and tired.  But all is well.  As soon as I am done here, I have a date with an ice pack and my favourite chair!

Huffington Post — Brandon Nichols knows first hand what it's like to get poisoned by mercury.

"I got mercury poisoning two or three times," he told CBC news. "I got some serious headaches."

The University of British Columbia grad student had been in South America, researching small scale gold mining operations in Ecuador and their use of mercury.

Mercury is widely used by the miners because it bonds with gold, allowing it be more easily separated from the ore hauled out of countless mines dotting the countryside.

The widespread use of the toxic liquid metal is creating a long lasting environmental hazard that starts with ore processing and travels all the way up the food chain. But much of it is hidden in remote corners of the developing world so it's receiving little attention.

Click through for more on an environmental catastrophe that we hear little about, but which we can reduce.

Alternet — While U.S. politics has a long history of nasty elections and ugly fights, it is now fair to say that Donald Trump wins the award for the most polarizing and offensive top-ranked candidate in our nation’s history. Put simply, he’s an asshole.  And so are his supporters.  That story has been covered, so I won’t rehash it here.  Instead the question that I want to ask is how his divisive bigotry is affecting the rest of us.

Trump’s politics are not just based on bigotry; they are based on hostility. They are founded on a winner-take-all strategy that characterizes anyone who disagrees with Trump as a loser.  It’s a politics of bullying and bluster.  But the problem is that bullying becomes the defining political discourse.

Republicans notoriously refer to Obama as a very divisive person, which is a lie in my view.  If we measure divisiveness by how often Republicans don't get their own way, then I suppose Obama is divisive, but that is not how it is measured.  Obama, although not perfect, tries to put people first which is anathema to Republicans, who delight in building up the rich and corporations.  "Divisive asshole" is the perfect name for Trump.  And the fact that so many people believe his fearmongering, while the MSM delight in promoting all his bullshit which provided titillation to "the masses", is abhorrent.

Politicususa — The Massachusetts Senator crystallized the issue by calling out Republicans for working for the NRA instead of the people, “If the Republican Party would rather work for the NRA than the American people and if they won’t do their jobs to keep our children safe, then somebody else has to step up.”

“And that’s why I strongly support President Obama’s actions to use the existing laws on the books to reduce background check loopholes, to increase mental health treatment and reporting and to improve enforcement of our gun laws,” she clarified, carefully using the phrase “existing laws on the books” to counter Republican claims that the President doesn’t have this authority. 

Go Lizzie!

My Universe — 

Yesterday I woke up to about 2.5 centimetres of snow on the ground while today it was freezing rain for a short time. The temperatures warmed up during the day so no more ice or snow, at least not on the ground about me.  But a quick look upwards yields a beautiful sight . . . more snow on the mountains behind me.  What a glorious view! 

Short Takes

Common Dreams — Speaking just blocks away from the belly of the beast, presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders on Tuesday gave a major policy speech during which he laid out his plan to take on Wall Street and end the era of "too big to fail" banking.

"To those on Wall Street who may be listening today, let me be very clear," Sanders said. "Greed is not good. Wall Street and corporate greed is destroying the fabric of our nation. And, here is a New Year’s Resolution that we will keep: If you do not end your greed we will end it for you."

A great speech from Bernie, and he is so correct . . . the US needs Glass-Steagall.  The world needs Glass-Steagall in the US.

Council of Canadians — On October 5, 2015, Canada, the United States, Mexico and nine other countries – together representing more than 40 per cent of the global economy – announced the conclusion of negotiations on the massive Trans-Pacific Partnership “free trade” deal.

The Council of Canadians opposes this deal because it includes an investor-state dispute settlement provision that allows transnational corporations to sue governments over legislation or policies made in the public interest, it extends the patent length (and profits) of pharmaceutical corporations by delaying the introduction of lower cost generic drugs, it slashes the domestic content requirement for automobiles, putting thousands of autoworker jobs at risks, and it undermines family farmers by opening up the Canadian dairy market to imports without creating new export markets for Canadian farmers.

The TPP could be voted on in the new Parliament early in 2016 and is expected to face a U.S. Congressional vote in the spring of 2016.

Read on in Council of Canadians.

The TPP directly threatens:

Public health and access to medicines: The U.S. is using the TPP to push for excessive patent protections and other intellectual property rights that are guaranteed to make medication much more expensive in Canada and even inaccessible to the poorest countries involved in the negotiations. Across the world, health advocates claim it is a matter of life and death that we say no to these changes in the TPP.

Click through for more details.  The video below is followed by a RootsAction petition if you haven't already signed it.

Petition to Stop the TPP

My objection to this deal can be summed up in three words: People not profits!  Just before Christmas, my student received news from her family in South Sudan . . . a close friend, who was like a sister but younger than her, died.  She had been ill a short time but with no doctor nearby and no money to buy medicine, her fate was sealed.  Her aunt's daughter-in-law who is very ill, will likely meet the same fate.  In the US, how many people cannot afford life saving drugs and medical treatment, even with Obamacare.  You generally can thank Republicans for that . . . and their corporate masters!  But the TPP affects more than just pharmaceuticals.  People before profits!

Common Dreams — American big business has now officially endorsed the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), giving many all the proof they need that the 12-nation deal—poised to be the largest ever—is bad news for people and the planet.  …

That endorsement followed Monday's announcement from the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) that it is throwing its weight behind the pact. "Open markets encourage cooperation and prosperity among nations and governments, rather than conflict, …"

And if you believe that highlighted line, have I got a bridge over swamp land to sell!

YouTube — Two videos from John Oliver,

And now a lighter look at resolutions.

My Universe —

And you thought it was only in Narnia and Lord of the Rings that trees showed their faces!

I said yesterday that today would be busy, and it was.  I arrived home finally about 18:30 and sat down to relax . . . that was that for about 2 hours.  Tomorrow should be more relaxed.  Certainly was nice to come home to 3 purring furbabies.

Short Takes

Alternet — America has succumbed to a vicious cycle in which great wealth translates into political power, which generates even more wealth, and even more power.  …

The progressive era welled up in the last decade of the nineteenth century because millions of Americans saw that wealth and power at the top were undermining American democracy and stacking the economic deck. Millions of Americans overcame their cynicism and began to mobilize.  …

… it is up to the rest of us to continue to organize and mobilize. Real reform will require many years of hard work from millions of us.

"Real reform will require many years of hard work from millions of us."  This is the bottom line!  Getting out the vote.  Unrelentingly pushing for change.  We are still in an age of instant gratification.  But we have to realise that change does not happen over night.  Change takes time, persistence and dedication.

Mother Jones — Between the shooting deaths of three people at a Colorado Planned Parenthood, the Supreme Court's decision to hear its first abortion-related case in nine years, and the more than 50 new abortion restriction laws enacted by state governments, abortion access was one of the most important issues of 2015. With presidential politics and ongoing legal challenges in the states, abortion rights will continue to be under fire in 2016.

"Last year's big events, like the Planned Parenthood videos and the Supreme Court case, have actually ginned up even more interest in restricting abortion," Elizabeth Nash, a senior state issues associate at the Guttmacher Institute, tells Mother Jones. "If it was possible, they've actually added more energy to decreasing abortion access."

Republicans say they want small government, but they insist on making more repressive laws that affect women. And family values?  They have no idea what true family values are!

Huffington Post — California lawmakers can ask for voters' opinions on campaign-spending laws after the California Supreme Court on Monday upheld the Legislature's power to use advisory ballot measures.

In a 6-1 decision, the Golden State's high court ruled lawmakers have the power to place a nonbinding measure on statewide ballots asking voters if Congress should be spurred to overturn the U.S. Supreme Court's 2010 Citizens United ruling on unlimited independent campaign donations.

This sounds promising , another tool in the End Citizens United tool box, at least in California.  Will similar measures catch on in other states?  Certainly not in Republican states.  Citizens United should have never come to be.

My Universe —

The natural order!

Well I spent yesterday doing laundry and the Politics Plus Monthly Report so I pooped out before doing an Open Thread.  Today, the end of the laundry!  As I sit here, I can hear the fog horn blowing out in the inlet.  Tomorrow is physio, teaching, and a doctor's appointment so it will be a long day.

Short Takes

Huffington Post — But 2016 Republican candidate Carly Fiorina dismissed Iran’s reaction to the death of the leading anti-government protester.

“I take the Iranian condemnation with a huge grain of salt,” Fiorina told CNN’s "State of the Union" on Sunday. “This is a regime that tortures citizens routinely, that thinks nothing of executions, that still holds four Americans in jail.”   …

Retired neurosurgeon and presidential hopeful Ben Carson went further, suggesting that the nuclear deal struck last July between Iran, the U.S. and five world powers pushed Saudi Arabia to violently repress its Shiite population.

“The Saudis have been one of our strongest allies in the Middle East, and I think it’s unfortunate that we put them in the position we have by showing the support to Iran that we have with this foolish deal,” Carson told ABC’s “This Week." 

These Republicans call Saudi Arabia an ally of the US yet Saudi Arabia, according to the Human Rights Watch World Report 2015. continues to "… try, convict, and imprison political dissidents and human rights activists solely on account of their peaceful activities. Systematic discrimination against women and religious minorities continued. … subjected hundreds of people to unfair trials and arbitrary detention. New anti-terrorism regulations that took effect in 2014 can be used to criminalize almost any form of peaceful criticism of the authorities as terrorism."  In addition, Saudi Arabia is the world's #1 importer of arms as at 2014.  What does it do with all these arms when it only has a standing armed forces of 239,000?  The Saudi's have not assisted in the placement of refugees from anything I have heard, and in the past were thought to be supporting ISIS in various ways.

The US is seen as the "boogeyman" in the Middle East, contributing substantially to the instability in the region.  But Saudi Arabia is destabilising force as well.  By executing Shiite dissident cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr, Saudi Arabia has upped the ante.  The Iranian response has not helped either, but it is a direct response to Saudi Arabia's provocative action.

Count on Republicans to throw gasoline on a fire.

The Guardian — Speaking in Biloxi, Mississippi, the Republican presidential hopeful implied that the Obama administration should have heeded his call for the US to seize oil assets controlled by Isis but had instead allowed the terror group to prosper.

“I’ve predicted a lot of things, you have to say, including, ‘Get the oil, take the oil, keep the oil.’ Right? I’ve been saying that for three years, and everybody said, ‘Oh, I can’t do that. I mean, this is a sovereign country. There is no country!” Trump said.

“They’ve created Isis. Hillary Clinton created Isis with Obama,” Trump said.

As I understand, ISIS was "created" by Baby Bush and Cheney when they invaded Iraq for oil, toppled Sadam Hussein and left a vacuum in Iraq.  Out of the sectarian violence came ISIS to fill the vacuum.  And leave it to Trump not to acknowledge the role his inflamatory rhetoric has played in recruitment videos.  He probably wants an OSCAR nomination for his work.

Alternet — "Fear," a great Jedi master named Yoda once said, "leads to anger," which leads to hate, which leads to suffering, which, of course, leads to the Dark Side.  …

In other words, it went down exactly the way Republicans wanted it to go down. They've always used fear to win elections.

Whether it's fear of same-sex couples getting married, fear of the government taking away the people's guns or fear of Black men, they've always understood that fear works to motivate their white base.

IMO, Thom Hartmann is spot on.  Time to get the progressive vote out and talk down the fear.

My Universe — 

"Please sir, might I have more?"