JOBS POLICIES, ANALYSIS, AND RESOURCES
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Trump’s War on Emissions Standards
Brief #66—Environment
By Rosalind Gottfried
Trump to Require Health Insurance as Proof to Receive Visas
Brief #83—Immigration
By Kathryn Baron
Facebook Political Ads Letter” Highlights Need To Pursue Sweeping Changes Beyond Social Media Platforms; November 2019
Brief #105—Civil Rights
By Rod Maggay
Should Journalists Predict Likely Nominees in the Presidential Election?
Brief #3—Presidential Campaign News
By Rosalind Gottfried
Microsoft wins $10B DoD JEDI Contract – Did Trump’s Antipathy for Jeff Bezos Play a Role?
Brief #8—Technology
By Charles A Rubin
Administration dismantles environmental protections that improve our “quality of life.”
Brief #65—Environment
by By Todd Broadman
Trump’s “Spying “Allegation Against the Obama Campaign Is a Hoax
Brief #104—Civil Rights
By Rod Maggay
Opioid Pharmaceutical Companies Reach 11th Hour Settlement and Avoid Taking Responsibility
Brief #64—Healths
By Taylor J Smith
How to Select the Best Democratic Candidate to Defeat Trump
U.S. RESIST NEWS OP ED Ron Israel, Managing Editor
Analysis: The Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act
Brief #50—Environment
Policy Summary
Last week U.S. lawmakers sponsored the first bipartisan attempt at climate legislation in nearly a decade. The Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act would impose a progressively increasing tax on carbon emissions, topping out in 2030 at $100 per ton of carbon.
The tax is coupled with cuts on EPA regulations that are viewed as redundant with the targeted energy production industries. However, if emissions exceed the targets set by the legislation, the EPA is authorized to impose regulation to make up the difference. Proponents of the bill claim the policy would reduce carbon emissions by forty percent in 2030 and by ninety-one percent in 2050. Analyses indicate that the bill would provide greater emissions cuts than competing proposals, such as those of Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) or Rep. Carlos Curbelo (R-Fla.). Whether these are plausible projections is highly uncertain, however, depending on factors such as economic growth, technological progress and policy developments.
The bill is designed to be revenue neutral: proceeds of the tax would be distributed back to American taxpayers in the form of a rebate ($500 on average per individual; around $3500 for a family of four). This revenue-neutral approach no doubt helped attract the Republican sponsors of the bill. This included Francis Rooney (R-Fla.), Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) and David Trott (R-Mi.), who were joined by Democratic House members Ted Deutch (D-Fla.), John Delaney (D-Md.) and Charlie Crist (D-Fla.). Its revenue neutrality distinguishes it from other current carbon tax bills and proposals that have recently garnered attention, such as the Curbelo and Whitehouse proposals or the more aggressive Green New Deal positions advocated by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY).
Analysis
Economist Noah Kaufman has offered positive, if measured, support for The Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act. It appears to be especially effective as a mechanism of carbon reduction, at least in the short term, as longer-term projections tend to involve more speculative assumptions.
His conclusions about the economic impact of the policy are more qualified and tentative, however. The proposal is structured in a highly progressive form, extending most of the benefits of the rebates to lower- and middle-class taxpayers, who, it is hoped, will then not feel the brunt of rising fuel and heating costs. But Kaufman also notes that its revenue-neutral approach “would sacrifice opportunities for better macroeconomic outcomes or government services.”
Kaufman is gesturing at some of the weaknesses in what is ultimately a neoliberal approach to the idea of carbon taxes, weaknesses that may explain why, as commentators such as Bill Scher have wondered, such a victory for climate change bipartisanship has largely been met with silence and indifference by the climate-activist community (Citizen’s Climate Lobby has vocally supported it, however).
Climate hawks worry that if tax revenues are not reinvested in the green economy, especially in renewable energy subsidies, the result will be unstable and squeezed energy markets, and thus, lower economic growth and higher unemployment. Hence, many probably see supporting Ocasio-Cortez’s concurrent push for the Green New Deal package as a better investment of advocacy capital.
Yet, some commentators note that even if the bill is effectively dead on arrival in the current political environment, it may create policy inertia similar to the way the Clinton healthcare push, and the center-right policies it spurred in response, eventually set the table of options for the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Additionally, for proponents of the bill like Scher, pragmatism and getting things done should trump climate change-policy perfectionism. And anyway, the biggest victory here was symbolic, thanks to the first development of some kind bipartisanship on climate policy in nearly ten years.
Perhaps, but the ACA may be an instructive example in a different sense. It may illustrate how suboptimally designed policy compromises can end up delegitimizing the entire enterprise with the American public, not to mention paving the way to electoral disaster for progressives. What’s more, the bipartisanship evidenced here is less impressive than it seems.
Rooney’s district in southern Florida is regularly hammered by the increasingly powerful hurricanes climate change is causing, while David Trott is retiring from a district that was just taken over by Democrat Haley Stevens. It is true that Brian Fitzpatrick has an impressive reputation for independence. Still, Fitzpatrick represents one of the few remaining House seats where gerrymandering has not made political centrism toxic. Indeed, it’s something of a miracle that in a Democratic wave election he held onto his seat in the newly redrawn First congressional district of Pennsylvania, which leans Democrat.
The idea that this represents a new inception of bipartisanship on climate change is wishful thinking, plain and simple. All the evidence necessary to demonstrate this fact can be found on @realDonaldTrump’s Twitter feed.
Of course, there is no question that eventually bipartisan compromises will have to be made for any climate change legislation to be passed. But if real negotiations on climate policy ever begin someday, one hopes Democrats will not be so desperate for any compromise at all that they allow the GOP to force them into dead-end policy solutions and electoral suicide.
Engagement Resources
- Greenpeace is “a global, independent campaigning organization that uses peaceful protest and creative communication to expose global environmental problems and promote solutions that are essential to a green and peaceful future.”
- The Alliance for Climate Education (ACE) is an organization whose “mission is to educate young people on the science of climate change and aid them in meaningful advocacy.”
- The Union of Concerned Scientists is a network of professional scientists who seek to bring the insights of science to bear on issues of public concern.
- Citizens’ Climate Lobby is “a non-profit, nonpartisan, grassroots advocacy organization focused on national policies to address climate change.”
- org “uses online campaigns, grassroots organizing, and mass public actions to oppose new coal, oil and gas projects, take money out of the companies that are heating up the planet, and build 100% clean energy solutions that work for all.”
- Climate Reality Project is “a diverse group of passionate individuals who’ve come together to solve the greatest challenge of our time. We are activists, cultural leaders, organizers, scientists, and storytellers committed to building a sustainable future together.”
- The Sunrise Movement is an activist organization working to further the idea of a Green New Deal revolution in climate change policy.
This Brief was posted by U.S. RESIST NEWS Analyst Jonathan Schwartz: Contact; Jonathan@usresistnews.org
Photo by Appolinary Kalashnikova
Trump is a Liar. So is Most of His Orbit. Will This Ever Disturb His Supporters?
In 1996 William Safire, in a column based largely on the right-wing conspiracy theories of the time, famously called Hillary Clinton a “congenital liar.” One can only guess what Safire would have written about Donald Trump. The president of the United States is liar. This is not groundbreaking information, and it is not a partisan viewpoint. It is a demonstrable fact, not to mention the consensus view of the American public, only thirty-two percent of which believe Trump to be honest and trustworthy according to recent polling.
Anyone familiar with Trump’s history knows he has always viewed truth as a fungible substance. Perhaps, more than anything else, his well-known and longstanding admiration for tyrants and dictators has derived from a commonly shared belief that reality is not something the clever and the powerful need adjust to and accept; reality, rather, is what they create. And unsurprisingly, Trump has tended to draw into his orbit those who also frequently lie.
Last Thursday brought perhaps the most consequential and demonstrable evidence of this when Trump’s former personal attorney and fixer, Michael Cohen, pled guilty to lying to Congress. These were the first charges brought against Cohen directly by Mueller (the previous charges were based on referrals by Mueller to the Southern District of New York U.S. Attorney’s office). The guilty plea was part of a newly established cooperation agreement with the special counsel’s office, which has apparently yielded over seventy hours of interview with Cohen.
Cohen, at the direction of Trump, had previously admitted to making hush money payments involving Trump’s extramarital affairs during the 2016 campaign, activities that are thought by many legal experts to be serious campaign finance violations. Cohen admitted to lying to Congress in testimony from August 2017, in which he claimed that negotiations for a possible Trump Tower project in Moscow ended in January 2016. According to Cohen, negotiations continued well after this date, through the end of the Republican primary campaign and into mid-June 2016.
According to Cohen, these false statements were made to Congress in “close and regular” contact with the Trump White House staff and legal team. The false statements were crafted in order to align with Trump’s “political messaging,” as Trump and his campaign had long suggested that contact with Russian representatives about the project had “effectively terminated before the Iowa caucuses of February 1, 2016.” Cohen now admits to extensive negotiations long after this date. He admits that he kept Trump abreast of these negotiations and even discussed planning a potential trip to Moscow with him.
Trump repeatedly claimed during this period of the campaign that he had no business dealings with Russia. This was a monumental act of bad faith on the part of a candidate for the highest office the country. Posturing as an impartial critic of Obama-era foreign policy on Russia, Trump repeatedly called for closer relations and for ending the 2014 U.S.-led international sanctions on Russia in response to its annexation of Crimea. He also repeatedly flattered Vladimir Putin, whose blessing would have been necessary in order for the Trump Tower, Moscow, project to proceed.
Over the weekend, Democratic lawmakers pointed to a series of damning implications of this for Trump’s integrity and judgment, or lack thereof. Incoming House Intelligence Committee chair, Adam Schiff, pointed out that “at the same time that Donald Trump was the presumptive nominee of the GOP and arguing in favor of doing away with sanctions, he was working on a deal that would require doing away with sanctions for him to make money in Russia. That is a real problem. It means that the compromise is far broader than we thought.”
Jerry Nadler, the soon-to-be House judiciary chairman, also noted that this would have effectively given the Kremlin kompromat, or compromising material, on Trump during the lead up to the Republican convention, since Putin would surely have kept careful tabs on Trump’s business negotiations with the explicit purpose of gaining such leverage. Russia has been referred to as a “blackmail state” for its widespread practice of seeking leverage over one’s enemies and competitors. This perhaps explains why even after the Moscow project fell through Trump still pushed to water down the GOP platform on Russian intervention in Ukraine.
Analysis
There are broader potential legal issues for Trump in this fiasco, based largely on speculation from Mueller’s bread crumbs in the court filings. You can read about them here and here. But we should acknowledge the obvious political implications of all this, which are already plain as day and more important anyway. This is that Trump had no compunction at all about, first, campaigning to change U.S. foreign policy without acknowledging his enormous personal and financial stake in these matters, and second, about flagrantly lying to voters and his own supporters over it.
On the first point, consider what was involved in this. Perhaps Trump really believed closer ties to murderers and autocrats, such as Putin, really are in the interests of the American public. If so, he has yet to ever offer a coherent explanation for why this would be the case. What’s more, despite his fawning hero-worship for Putin, he has hardly ever sought to enact any of these changes in policy now that he is in a position to do so. And beyond sheer national interest, there is the not inconsequential matter of undermining America’s tradition of supporting and defending democratic political vales and human rights, a tradition many American conservatives have a long history of supporting, but who now seem to see these values as impracticalities simply because Trump told them so.
As to the second point, what is there to say? It’s as if Trump-supporting America (yes, sadly, there really are two countries now) has made a willful choice to exist in a cocoon of doublethink, where Trump’s party line effectively dictates their grasp of broader political reality, even though there are mountains of evidence proving that Trump continually lies about that reality. What could possibility break them out of that cocoon is anyone’s guess.
Resistance Resources
- ACLU has “worked for almost 100 years to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed by the Constitution and laws of the United States.”
- Protect the Investigation is a “nonpartisan initiative to educate the American people about the importance of the special counsel investigation and its current findings.”
- Propublica exposes “abuses of power and betrayals of the public trust by government, business, and other institutions, using the moral force of investigative journalism to spur reform through the sustained spotlighting of wrongdoing.”
- Law Works engages “bipartisan voices and educates the public on the importance of the rule of law, the role of the special counsel in the justice system, and the integrity of our judicial institutions.”
- Nobody is Above the Law is a clearinghouse for organizing events to protect the Mueller probe.
- Stand Up America is an “organization born after the outpouring of resistance to Donald Trump’s election in 2016. They are committed to providing you with the information you need to take impactful action and make your voice heard.”
- Protect Democracy is a “nonpartisan nonprofit with an urgent mission: to prevent our democracy from declining into a more authoritarian form of government.”
This brief was submitted by U.S. RESIST NEWS environment news analyst and Russia investigation reporter Jonathan Peter Schwartz: Jonathan@usresistnews.org
Photo by rob walsh
Senate Passes BUILD Act
Brief #52—Foreign Policy
Policy Summary
In a show of bipartisan support, the “Better Utilization of Investments Leading to Development Act of 2018”, or the BUILD act, was passed on October 5th and later signed by President Trump.. First introduced in February by Republican Senator Bob Corker and Democratic Senator Chris Coons, the act creates the International Development Finance Corporation (IDFC) as a successor to the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC), with an increased budget of $60 billion, and the intent to facilitate public spending and federal support to encourage private investment in foreign markets. Supporters have promised that this will lead to sustainable, broad-based economic growth, and an increase in public accountability and transparency.
Analysis
The most apparent absence from the BUILD act is the lack of enforceable restrictions preventing investments from supporting regimes which participate in the abuse of human rights and/or have corrupt ineffective governance systems.. The bill promises to ensure an increase in social stability and decrease in poverty, but it’s mostly worded in vague aspirations. It’s also questionable whether the intent of the bill is even to benefit the host countries of these investments. Part of the billions in taxpayer money apportioned to the IDFC will be used to reduce risk for companies investing in foreign countries, but many of these risks are caused by the instability created by US exploitation of the labor and resources of the global south. The strategy of funneling private capital into these economies has been the modus operandi of the US for years, and rather than resulting in greater development in poor countries, it has reduced access of the residents of those countries to their own land and resources, while pushing them further into debt. If there is a surplus of taxpayer money which can be used to benefit those living outside our borders, perhaps it could be better allocated canceling foreign debts and supporting foreign businesses trying to build a stable economy within the confines of their own border.
Resistance Resources:
- International Labor Rights Forum: The ILRF is a US-based nonprofit advocacy organization working to develop a safe working environment for the international working poor.
- International Centre for Trade Union Rights: The ICTUR is an international NGO that brings together trade unions, human rights organisations, research institutions, and lawyer’s associations to defend the rights of workers around the world to organize.
This Brief was submitted by U.S. RESIST NEWS Foreign Policy Analyst Colin Shanley: Contact Colin@usresistnews.org
Photo by Joakim Honkasalo
North Carolina Election Highlights Need To Prioritize Election Integrity; State Elections
Brief #71—Civil Rights
Policy Summary
On November 6, 2018, the United States held its biennial federal elections. As dictated by the U.S. Constitution, every seat in the House of Representatives was up for election as well as the required 1/3 of the total Senate seats which meant thirty – three Senate seats were being contested (as well as an additional two seats due a special election being called for a total of thirty – five Senate seats being contested nationwide).
In North Carolina’s Ninth Congressional District the election was between Republican Mark Harris and Democrat Dan McCready. After the votes were tabulated, Mr. Harris had a 905 vote lead over Mr. McCready with more than 280,000 votes cast in the district. Mr. McCready conceded the election the next day. However, the state Democratic Party in North Carolina soon after filed numerous affidavits with North Carolina’s Board of Elections alleging wrongdoing with regard to the election in North Carolina’s Ninth Congressional District and local elections in Bladen County. On November 30, 2018, in a unanimous vote, the Board of Elections announced that they would delay certifying the congressional election and declaring a winner due to “claims of irregularities and fraudulent activities.” They also announced that they voted 7 – 2 to hold a public hearing on December 21, 2018 “to assure that the election is determined without taint of fraud or corruption and without irregularities that may have changed the result.” LEARN MORE
Analysis: While the issue of voter suppression has focused primarily on the issues of gerrymandering, voter ID requirements and discriminatory tactics, other tactics are just as often used and should not be ignored. The 2018 election from North Carolina’s Ninth Congressional District and from nearby Bladen and Robeson Counties helps to illustrate how far some people will go to manipulate an election in order to have an outcome that they desire. The incidents are disturbing and have the potential to cast doubt not just on the integrity of North Carolina elections but on elections nationwide and the concept of democracy in the U.S.
In Bladen and Robeson counties, 3,400 absentee ballots were requested by voters but a high percentage were not completed and not mailed back. An analysis by the News & Observer found that many of the unreturned absentee ballots were from minority voters nearly 3 times more than from white voters who requested absentee ballots. This follows on the heels of Mr. Harris’ win in the primary election held in May where he won an astonishing 96 percent of all absentee ballots cast in Bladen County. Also, Bladen County voter Datesha Montgomery stated in a sworn statement that a woman came to her door and told her that she was collecting absentee ballots. Ms. Montgomery voted for two local elections and then was told by the woman to sign the envelope and that the woman told her that she would finish the voting on the absentee ballot for Ms. Montgomery. At least five other people have stated in sworn statements that people came to their doors and offered to fill out absentee ballots for them. These incidents occurred in neighborhoods that were primarily African – American. These are certainly troubling incidents and the Board of Elections made the right decision in delaying certification in the congressional race and in further investigating the allegations of irregularities and fraud. It is not about gerrymandering or voter ID but the incidents in North Carolina are still an assault on democratic principles and should be investigated so something like this will be prevented from happening again. LEARN MORE, LEARN MORE, LEARN MORE
Engagement Resources:
- The Voter Participation Center – non – profit group dedicated to registering and mobilizing the American electorate.
- HeadCount – non – profit group’s infopage on states voting information.
- Vote.org – online guide with up to date information on voting rights.
This brief was compiled by Rod Maggay. If you have comments or want to add the name of your organization to this brief, please contact Rod@USResistnews.org
Photo by Element5 Digital
What is Robert Mueller’s Endgame?
Speaking to CNN a few months back, the legendary journalist Carl Bernstein insisted that Robert Mueller’s team of investigators were building a “vast narrative” of what transpired during the 2016 election between the Trump campaign and a variety of anti-American actors, including Russian intelligence and Wikileaks. At the time, Bernstein’s suggestion seemed tenuous, built more on hopeful speculation than known facts. But as each week passes, this seems more and more likely to be Mueller’s endgame. The question is: Does he have a viable path to accomplishing it?
Even before taking on one of the most sensitive national security investigations in U.S. history, Mueller was seen as sphinxlike. He was low key and by the book, but nevertheless a relentless investigator. He has had a long history of service to his country, as a Vietnam War veteran, prosecutor, and director of the FBI during the post-9/11 era. There would seems to be no question that, regardless of his affiliation with the Republican Party, Mueller has probably viewed his role in the Russia affair through a largely nonpartisan lens.
Given his reputation for thoroughness, it seemed possible at times that the Russia probe’s apparent scope and time length could simply have been a product of that thoroughness. Perhaps Mueller was just wanted to leave no stone unturned in the process of ensuring that America’s electoral system was secure against its enemies. Indictments have been handed down with regularity, often leading to criminal convictions. Yet, many of those indicted were peripheral members of the Trump orbit. And other than the Russian troll ring Mueller indicted last February, many of the crimes these figures were accused of seemed only tangentially related to the main purpose of the special counsel’s investigation.
Moreover, very few of the investigation’s targets seemed capable of directly implicating Trump himself. Michael Cohen, the closest person to Trump to plead guilty charges related to Mueller’s probe, was not directly connected to the campaign. Paul Manafort, Trump’s campaign chairman, did not seem to have been indicted for crimes directly related to collusion with Russia. But otherwise, Trump’s confidants, family members or anyone else that could directly connect him to possible Russian collusion seemed to have been ignored by Mueller. The president’s defenders, from his spokesperson, Sarah Huckabee-Sanders, to his cheerleaders at Fox News, assured the president’s supporters this demonstrated that there is no evidence of coordination or collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia or other anti-American actors.
But since the end of the midterm “blackout”—the common FBI practice of maintaining silence over politically charged cases during election seasons—Mueller has begun moving briskly, seemingly taking actions that could eventually implicate Trump and his circle. In the initial weeks after the midterms, the pre-election silence from the special counsel’s office remained in place, leading some to wonder if Mueller was beginning to wind down. We now know differently.
It was during the weeks following the midterms that Trump submitted his written answers to Mueller’s queries. Notably, this was also a period that saw a fair amount of bitter and unhinged behavior from Trump, even by his standards. We can now surmise that Mueller was waiting to review Trump’s answers before making his next moves. These moves, which began early last week and seemed to cascade through Thursday morning’s announcement of Michael Cohen’s second plea deal, have been striking in their aggressive and, at times, audacious posture in relation to a sitting president.
The week began with Mueller accusing former Trump campaign chairman and now convicted felon Paul Manafort of lying during his cooperation interviews with the special counsel, for which Mueller was determined to pull any recommendation of leniency in Manafort’s upcoming sentencing, and possibly to reopen further criminal charges. Initially, it was assumed that Manafort had lied about something directly related to the central investigation; however, the Wall Street Journal soon reported that the lies Mueller was referring to involved Manafort’s business dealings and connection to a former Ukrainian associate.
The pulling of Manafort’s plea deal for what appears to be tangential lies seems fairly heavy-handed. And no doubt it is, but we soon learned information about Manafort’s actions in the period since his cooperation agreement with Mueller that places the special counsel’s rather brutal move in a different relief. Manafort had continued to cooperate with the Trump legal team behind Mueller’s back during that period, apparently feeding them information about Mueller’s questions to Manafort. Thus, it would appear Mueller’s move against Manafort was less about prosecuting perjury and more about retaliation for double-crossing the special counsel.
We also learned of the first plausible—arguably, even likely—channel linking Trump himself directly to Wikileaks, and by extension, to Russian’s 2016 election sabotage. This was precipitated through an aborted plea agreement with Jerome Corsi, a longtime right-wing conspiracy theorist and rather pathetic toady to Trump’s own lackeys, such as Roger Stone. Having learned through sources, whose identity remains obscure, that Russian operatives had apparently given Wikileaks hacked emails from the Democratic National Committee and Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta, Stone, according to Corsi, requested that Corsi seek out Wikileaks founder Julian Assange in order coordinate the release of these emails at the most beneficial moment for Trump.
The draft of the plea agreement, which Corsi released to various news outlets, made reference to specific emails Corsi had sent to Stone during the summer of 2016, and especially one particular email from August 2, 2016. In it Corsi, by turns: confirmed Wikileaks’ possession of the hacked emails; indicated their contents and the general time period of release; and even suggested insinuations against Clinton that Trump could make in the run up to the release of the emails, which the emails would then “confirm.” Stone has confirmed not only that he spoke with Trump throughout the summer of 2016, but that he spoke to Trump the very next day on August 3. However, Stone claims he inexplicably chose not to share this information with Trump.
Everything Corsi proposed in the email played out just as he suggested it would to Stone, right down to Trump’s insinuation that Clinton was in ill health and no longer up to the duties of the presidency, to which the Podesta emails ended up lending mild support. Yet Corsi, comically and unbelievably, continues to deny that he had ever made contact with Assange or anyone connected to him. Instead, in a bizarre interview with Ari Melber of MSNBC, Corsi, a famously accomplished liar, couldn’t come up with anything better than to say he had guessed, on the basis of no evidence at all, about the contents of the email he sent to Stone.
The revelation of the Corsi-Stone email exchange from August 2, 2016 should arguably be viewed as perhaps the most consequential development of the Mueller probe to date. This is because there is now, not just a plausible, but likely, chain of communication between Russian intelligence and Trump himself. Wikileaks received the emails from Russian hackers, who were likely affiliated with Russian intelligence. Corsi, then, despite his absurd denials, clearly received confirmation of this along with directions from Wikileaks, and passed it along to Stone, who, in turn, spoke to Trump the next day. The idea that Stone did not pass along this information to Trump seems utterly implausible, especially given that Trump appeared to follow the instructions Corsi relayed to Stone to the letter.
This is damning. By itself, it suggests a more than plausible likelihood of a willful conspiracy between a foreign power bent on throwing the U.S. presidential election and the Trump campaign, including Trump himself. Yet, the surreal week was not finished.
Thursday crowned the week with news of the blockbuster plea agreement between Michael Cohen and Mueller, in which Cohen revealed that Trump had been engaged in ongoing negotiations with Russia over the licensing of a new Trump Tower in Moscow throughout presidential primary campaign and into the early summer of 2016. Trump had lied about the existence of these negotiations to the press and the American public, while Cohen, under the direction of the White House, would go on to lie about the existence of these negotiations to Congress.
This will be the topic of my next post. But even now, we can note here that the leverage Russia would have had over Trump during the summer of 2016, was multidimensional and overdetermined. I have not even touched on other avenues in which Trump could have come by information suggesting Russia would intervene on his side, such as the infamous Trump Tower meeting between Don, Jr., Paul Manafort, and some obscure Russian nationals; or the incriminate email exchanges a few years earlier between Cohen and the Russian mafia appendage Felix Sater.
And this is only what we currently know. Trump has a long history of involvement with Russia, much of which could involved his personal life and financial dealings. The pressure points that Putin—who Trump, bizarrely, never fails to grovel to—could have over Trump may be deep and profound. All this suggests Russia had—and may still have—more than enough leverage over Trump to influence on his policy positions in relation Russia, such as, for example, altering the Republican platform during the 2016 convention to water down its support for Ukraine against Russian-influenced separatists.
Analysis
With all this said, what finally can we guess at this point about Mueller’s endgame, given that the outlines of a potential case against Trump himself are just beginning to emerge?
It is difficult to avoid the conclusion at this point that there is not a great deal of evidence supporting Bernstein’s “vast narrative” prediction. We can see quite a bit of evidence that could be deeply compromising and politically damaging to Trump. But is it the kind evidence that could bring down Trump’s presidency? I have a hard time picturing this happening based on the evidence available. This is not to say that Trump hasn’t once again been exposed as morally and temperamentally unfit to be president, but if you frequent U.S. RESIST NEWS you probably already knew that. Trump supporters don’t frequent U.S. RESIST NEWS.
As I’ll write more about in the next post, the Trump Tower, Moscow, fiasco is deeply troubling, indicating that Trump was willing to flagrantly and knowingly lie, on stage, to his own supporters, not to the mention to the rest of the American public. There is also good chance it could strike close to home for him, as reports indicate that Mueller has looked closely at the activities of Trump’s children. And yes, there is compelling evidence at this point of at least some level of coordination, via Stone and Corsi, between Russian intelligence saboteurs in collaboration with Wikileaks and the Trump campaign, probably including Trump himself. Finally, as Manafort demonstrated, there is a virtual smorgasbord of evidence of obstruction of justice for Mueller to wade through. Yet, is this really going to be enough to bring down the Trump presidency?
Again, unless there are parts of this we are not aware of, Mueller seems to have approached this as the prosecutor he has always been, seeking to build a carefully circumscribed and airtight case against his targets. But even if everything the available evidence implies turns out to be true, these scandals ultimately seem unlikely to turn his supporters against him, which is the only way enough Republican senators would be willing to vote for conviction in an impeachment trial. Most GOP voters would probably have happily voted for him even knowing all this, likely viewing his actions as mere opportunism or self-defense, rather than treason, obstruction and conspiracy to defraud America.
On the other hand, Mueller does seem to believe there was a major conspiracy between the Trump campaign, including Trump himself to some degree, and various anti-American actors. He has invested significant professional and political capital in the investigation and moved aggressively and systematically against his targets, who appear to include Trump. The more aggressively he pursues Trump and his lackeys, as he did most recently in his brutal response to Manafort’s double-dealing, to fail to deliver the kind of devastating, presidency-ending vast narrative Bernstein predicted could be a humiliating stain on the stellar reputation Mueller spent his professional life cultivating. But how he gets to there from what we currently know of the collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia remains unclear.
Resistance Resources
- ACLU has “worked for almost 100 years to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed by the Constitution and laws of the United States.”
- Protect the Investigation is a “nonpartisan initiative to educate the American people about the importance of the special counsel investigation and its current findings.”
- Propublica exposes “abuses of power and betrayals of the public trust by government, business, and other institutions, using the moral force of investigative journalism to spur reform through the sustained spotlighting of wrongdoing.”
- Law Works engages “bipartisan voices and educates the public on the importance of the rule of law, the role of the special counsel in the justice system, and the integrity of our judicial institutions.”
- Nobody is Above the Law is a clearinghouse for organizing events to protect the Mueller probe.
- Stand Up America is an “organization born after the outpouring of resistance to Donald Trump’s election in 2016. They are committed to providing you with the information you need to take impactful action and make your voice heard.”
- Protect Democracy is a “nonpartisan nonprofit with an urgent mission: to prevent our democracy from declining into a more authoritarian form of government.”
- Timeline of Corsi-Stone-Wikileaks backchannel (Washington Post)
This brief was submitted by U.S. RESIST NEWS environment news analyst and Russia investigation reporter Jonathan Peter Schwartz: Jonathan@usresistnews.org
Photo by Samantha Sophia
Threats to the Affordable Care Act Amid Midterm Medicaid Success
Brief #48—Health
Policy Summary
Throughout the Trump Administration’s tenure, there has been an underlying campaign promise: dismantling and destroying the Affordable Care Act. Translation: cutting off healthcare to millions of families. The key policies in the administration have been to expand access to junk plans offered by insurance companies often out of the ACA marketplace, keep preexisting condition exclusion principles in place, and limit the reach of Medicare and Medicaid. Early in November, there was movement to continue to kick people off of Medicare to lower drug costs, which mainly affects the most vulnerable in American society. This movement directly contradicted the majority of people’s opinions on healthcare. Even extremely Republican states (e.g. Idaho) passed by a popular vote increasing access to Medicaid.
Analysis
Ultimately, the midterm success of Democrats supporting more universal healthcare has indicated the slowing of these policies meant to destroy access to healthcare. The Trump Administration and Director of Medicare and Medicaid, Seema Verma, are attempting to reform healthcare to offer more choice of private and public plans to the public. However, this is a terrible method to try to encourage those that can’t afford to sign up for healthcare to sign up. The free market approach to healthcare just ensures that the richest and most privileged in our society have access to adequate healthcare. This is why so many democrats (especially those from Republican majority states) that will be taking office support universal healthcare and ran heavily on that platform. While less people are signing up for the ACA plans, the popular approval for expanding public healthcare could indicate long term success for the ACA. This would hopefully hold true for the 2020 general elections. Ideally, the Trump Administration’s attacks on Medicaid and Medicare will be limited because of their unpopularity, however, there is no question that the effects have already been felt and have hindered the effectiveness of Obama-era healthcare reform.
Resistance Resources:
- National Patient Advocate Foundation-Advocates for and promotes action for supporting Medicare/Medicaid for underserved populations. Volunteer with a center near you help clarify the healthcare process and get people covered.
This Brief was submitted by U.S. RESIST NEWS Healthcare Policy Analyst-Sophia Adams Name: Contact Sophia.lorene30@gmail.com
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Immigration Policy Updates
Brief #59—Immigration
Policy
During the past week, when many Americans gave thanks for their blessings, those making their way to the southern US border were faced with continuing hostility and exclusion. President Trump invoked similar rhetoric he used to impose the travel ban on countries with dominantly Muslim populations, in his most recent attempts to ban asylum to all individuals who cross the border illegally. A federal judge from San Francisco temporarily blocked the government from denying asylum to those crossing the southern border between ports of entry, which led to Trump criticizing the Justice Department for appealing his request as being biased and an “Obama judge.” President Trump made claims that these measures were necessary ahead of the arrival of the Migrant Caravan from Central America, as such asylum seekers had no “lawful basis for admission into our country.”
Upon arrival at the southern US border, the Migrant Caravan was met with tear gas, as they attempted to cross as a large crowd; men, women, and children alike. US Customs and Border Protection – those that are policing the border – claim their personnel had been assaulted and hit by stones, while immigrants on the other side claim stones were thrown after “a person got hit [tear gas] and a lot of kids fainted.” President Trump defended his use of tear gas stating “here’s the bottom line: Nobody’s coming into our country unless they come in legally,” and further justifying it by saying the tear gas used was a “very minor form” and that it was “very safe.”
When confronted about the various images of women and children running from the tear gas circulating the media, Trump responds curtly questioning why these individuals are even there and why they would be running up into an area where tear gas is forming and knowingly putting children at risk. He also notes that in some cases, these ‘parents’ are not parents at all, but ‘grabbers’ – individuals who “grab a child because they think they’ll have a certain status by having a child.” He questions why an adult would put a child in such a precarious situation after claiming the tear gas was actually “very safe,” when the real question should be, why is there tear gas. Homeland Security Secretary, Kirstjen Nielsen, essentially backs him up by accusing Migrant Caravan organizers of using women and children as “human shields” and thus “putting vulnerable people in harm’s way.” Well, why is there “harm’s way?”
Analysis
The Chemical Weapons Convention prohibits the use of tear gas in war, but allows it for domestic law enforcement purposes, perhaps to respect the law of sovereignty. According to the Centers for Disease Control, tear gas can cause blurred vision, choking, shortness of breath, coughing, burning and swelling of the nose. And some journalists said it was very painful even from a notable distance away, using the terms “tear gas” and “very safe” in one sentence sounds like an oxymoron. Even if the use of tear gas was solely to invoke fear and there was no risk of bodily harm, it still contradicts the language used by both President Trump and Secretary Nielson on the subject matter: “harm’s way,” (so it is not benign) “very safe” (as opposed to dangerous?), “human shields,” etc.
This occurrence in conjunction with Trump’s push for the asylum ban, raises alarming flags about his disregard for separation of powers, the division of government responsibilities into separate branches of the government so no one branch holds supreme power, is an important distinction between democracies and authoritarian governments.
Resistance Resources
- The ACLU: a non-profit with a longstanding commitment to preserving and protecting the individual rights and liberties the Constitution and US laws guarantee all its citizens. You can also donate monthly to counter Trump’s attacks on people’s rights. Recently, the ACLU has filed a lawsuit challenging the separation of families at the border.
- The National Immigration Law Center: an organization that exclusively dedicates itself to defending and furthering the rights of low income immigrants and strives to educate decision makers on the impacts and effects of their policies on this overlooked part of the population.
- FWD.us: an organization that aims to promote the tech community to support policies that keep the American Dream alive. They specifically and currently focus on immigration reform.
This Brief was authored by Kathryn Baron. For inquiries, suggestions or comments email kathryn@usresistnews.org.
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Noam Chomsky: How the US “Politically Vulgarizes” Genocide and War Crimes
Interview was originally posted on the website Truthout
Noam Chomsky has revolutionized multiple fields of study, from psychology to linguistics to political science. With books such as Manufacturing Consent (with Edward S. Herman), The Fateful Triangle, Hegemony or Survival, and others, he has enlightened people all over the world. For these reasons and more, Chomsky is regarded as one of the most influential thinkers of our time.
Shortly after the 2016 US elections, Truthout had the privilege of being able to sit down with Professor Chomsky in his office for a chat on an array of different topics, from ethnic conflicts to anarchism.
What follows is a transcript of the conversation, edited for clarity and length.
Pitasanna Shanmugathas: Until not so long ago, liberal, socialist and Marxist theoreticians assumed that conflicts involving ethnicity were a phenomenon of pre-modern society and that such conflicts would progressively fade away. Why haven’t we as a society been able to overcome the futility of engaging in ethnic conflict?
Noam Chomsky: To some extent, we have. Not totally. There has been progress. Take Europe; for centuries, Europe was the most [brutal] place in the world. The Europeans were just slaughtering one another. [During] the Thirty Years War of the 17th century, maybe a third of the population in Germany was wiped out. There was another 30 years war in the 20th century — from 1914 to 1945 — a total horror story. I don’t have to tell you what happened in Europe, the rest of the world. Since 1945, there have not been any major wars in Europe. Is that because we are more civilized? No. It is because it was understood that the next time you have a war, you are finished. Humans have created the capacity to destroy themselves and everything else, and we have come very close to blowing everything up. There have been many cases where terminal nuclear war was extremely close, and the threat is, in fact, increasing now.
Well, take, say, Europe again. One of the greatest achievements of post-war Europe — now under threat incidentally — is a slow move toward a kind of federalism. The Schengen Agreement, which permits free passage among the countries of Europe, is a step toward a more tolerant … society; it is a kind of federalism. It has positive and negative aspects because of the way it is implemented. Because of the way it was integrated into the Eurozone — which is something separate from the [European Union] — it has led to a situation where sovereignty has passed from populations to the bureaucracy in Brussels, with the German banks hanging over their shoulders. That is where basic decisions are made. It does not matter who people elect for their own government — the major decisions are out of their hands. That has led to extreme resentment — justified resentment — taking self-destructive paths, but the resentment is understandable. That is part of the background for the rise of the ultra-right parties that appeal to the population on the grounds that they no longer control their own destiny…. Now we are back to [a] Europe of competing nationalities, which [has] a pretty ugly past.
How has the concept of genocide become, as you state, “politically vulgarized,” and why is it dangerous to politicize the concept of genocide?
Well, genocide had a meaning in the early stages. I mean, it is not a matter of the definition, but the way it was understood. Genocide meant what the Nazis did to the Jews, for example. That was genocide. By now the term is used so broadly that people even talk about committing genocide against five people, or a massacre somewhere with a couple hundred people is called genocide. And in fact, it is used in a very restrictive way. We use the term genocide to refer to the atrocities committed by someone else, not our own.
Let us take a real case — the Clinton and Blair sanctions on Iraq — that actually was called genocide by the distinguished international diplomats who administered the oil-for-food program, the so-called “humanitarian” aspect of the sanctions. Denis Halliday, who resigned in protest, because he said they are genocidal, and Hans[-Christof] von Sponeck, who followed him, resigned on the grounds that the [sanctions] amounted to genocide. Hans von Sponeck, in fact, published a detailed book about it called A Different Kind of War. They did condemn the sanctions as genocidal.
What was the result? Try to find a copy of von Sponeck’s book. Try to find a reference to it. Try to find a review. Try to find anything. This is wiped out of Western commentary. The last time I looked, there was not a single review in the United States. The only review in England, I think, was in the Communist Party newspaper.
So what needs to be done to reverse the political vulgarization of the concept of the genocide? Can it still be used?
It can be used if we are willing to … recognize that crimes are crimes whether they commit them or we commit them. We could, for example, listen to Justice Robert Jackson — the chief prosecutor of Nuremberg — his injunction to the tribunal. He spoke to the tribunal and said: We have to recognize that crimes are crimes whether they commit them or we commit them. We are handing these defendants, he said, a poisoned chalice, and if we sip from it, we must be subject to the same conditions. If not, the whole trial is a farce.
Is that applied when Britain and the United States invaded Iraq? It is a textbook example of aggression with absolutely no justification, [a] textbook example of what the Nuremberg tribunal called the “supreme international crime,” which differs from other war crimes in that it includes all of the evil that follows. For example, the rise of ISIS [also known as Daesh] and the death of millions of people, includes all of that. Can you find any commentary in the United States even calling [the US-UK invasion] a crime?
Obama is greatly admired on the left because he said it was a blunder. It is just like German generals after Stalingrad who said that the two-front war was a blunder, which it was. We should have knocked out England first. That is as far as you can go.
The head of Human Rights Watch, Kenneth Roth, when this was specifically brought to his attention, can only go as far as saying that [Iraq] was a mistake. Was it a mistake when the Nazis committed aggression? Was it a mistake when Russians invaded Afghanistan? If you are a loyal communist, it was a mistake. We do not call it that…. At most, we made “mistakes.”
Go back to Justice Jackson. Anybody listen to his words? Then take Vietnam. The worst crime of the post-[World War II] era … millions of people killed, three countries destroyed, people still dying from the chemical warfare that was initiated by John F. Kennedy and expanded. Is it a mistake? Is it a crime? Is anybody guilty, responsible?
[In November 2016], the Obama administration [sponsored] a big memorial of the Vietnam War, and Obama made a passionate speech with his elevated rhetoric about what happened. He even did talk about crimes; he talked about the crimes that were committed against the American veterans who were not treated properly. What about the Vietnamese?
Let’s take Jimmy Carter, the “human rights president,” right after the war. [In] 1977, he was asked in a press conference, “Do we owe any debt to Vietnam?” He said we owe them no debt because the destruction was mutual…. Was there a comment? A few commented on it. I commented on it, and a couple of other people. Until we rise to a minimal level of civilization, we can’t use the term genocide.
In the aftermath of conflicts, to what extent are truth and reconciliation commissions a viable form of achieving justice and accountability?
I think they make sense in many situations. For example, take South Africa: There were horrible crimes committed under apartheid. But to try to punish people for those crimes would have torn the society to shreds and undermined any hope of progress and development, so a decision was made by the [African National Congress] — which I think is understandable — to avoid direct punishment and to settle for a truth and reconciliation commission to expose the nature of what happened, so at least it is kind of understood. Same was done in Central America, Brazil and East Timor.
Take East Timor, which was, if the term genocide has any meaning, what Indonesia did in East Timor, with the backing of the United States, Britain, other Western countries, even Sweden, that comes about as close to genocide as anything since the Second World War. East Timor finally won its independence. Should they carry out war crimes trials against Indonesia, Australia, United States and others? Or should they try to mend the fences with Indonesia and maybe settle for a truth and reconciliation commission? I think the latter, which is what they are doing. They have to live in the world, right?
Let us take where we happen to be sitting right now [in the US]. The Native population suffered a migrant crisis of an incredible kind … where the immigrants come in with the intention of exterminating and expelling the population. That is not what we call a crisis, but that is what happened here…. Should they institute war crimes trials against the people who live in their homes? It would not make a lot of sense. It would make a lot of sense to bring out understanding of what happened, to call for reparations and so on, but not war crimes trials. It just means nothing in these circumstances.
Is it genocide? … The Western hemisphere had about 80 million people when Columbus arrived, and pretty soon about 90 percent of them were gone.
Political scientists like John Mearsheimer, Kenneth Waltz and Joseph Nye have each defined what they consider to be “power” in international relations. You have criticized power structures and power systems. But I would like to know what you consider to be power in the field of international relations.
That is pretty straight forward. Power is the ability to issue orders which others have to follow; to the extent that you can do that, you have power. The orders do not have to be verbal. It can be actions: so, if you can invade Iraq, worst crime of the 21st century, and you get no censure or no reaction for it — that is power.
I think as an anarchist, in the long term, you believe that centralized political power ought to be eliminated and turned down to the local level, so what role (if any) would federalism play in your long-term vision of anarchism?
The general anarchist pictures — at least within the tradition I associate myself with — are highly federalist, but they assume that they are based on the notion of voluntary association. So there should be self-determination in all institutional structures of life. But voluntary associations could extend to regions and countries, internationally, that is a kind of federalism supported from below. I think it makes good sense in a complex world.
Evidence Mounts of Trump Campaign Conspiracy with Russia, Anti-American Actors
By Jonathan Peter Schwartz
Policy Summary
Several revelatory developments emerged this week in the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election. To be sure, they hardly reveal the full scope of what special counsel Robert Mueller and his team may know, but, taken together, they offer big clues to what Mueller will eventually report.
The week began with the collapse of the cooperation agreement between Paul Manafort and the special counsel’s office. Prosecutors for the special counsel accused Manafort of lying during his cooperation interviews about “a variety of subject matters.” The filing notified the court that any promises made to Manafort concerning leniency in his sentencing were voided. Under the terms of the plea agreement, Manafort could not withdraw his guilty plea. The special counsel can also proceed to try Manafort on a variety of further charges beyond those he has already been convicted of.
Most commentators found the logic of Manafort’s alleged perjury perplexing. It is possible that Manafort was telling the truth—this was his lawyers’ response to the filing—but few commenters found this possibility believable. The filing was especially definitive in its language, suggesting prosecutors have strong corroborating evidence for their allegations. This leaves only a few possible explanations for his behavior. Most concluded that Manafort must have received assurances of a presidential pardon. Speaking on Wednesday, Trump did nothing to tamp down this speculation, suggesting that pardoning Manafort was not “off the table.”
Wednesday brought further evidence of this possibility as Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s personal lawyer, acknowledged that Manafort’s legal team continued to brief Trump’s team about Manafort’s testimony to Mueller after the cooperation agreement. Manafort did this without informing the special counsel’s office, and Giuliani seemed to relish having outflanked the prosecution. Legal experts seemed to agree that Manafort and the Trump team’s actions were not illegal, but that they again raise serious ethical and political questions, especially as it relates to the question potential presidential pardons. However, some commentators suggested that this activity could add further evidence for a case of criminal conspiracy to obstruct justice on the part of Trump and his associates.
This possibility was given further support when Giuliani confirmed on Wednesday that Jerome Corsi, who is also a target of the Mueller probe, had entered into a joint defense agreement with Trump’s legal team. Corsi, a conservative conspiracy theorist, has been thought to be a peripheral character in this drama. It became evident on Tuesday, however, that his role in Russia’s 2016 election sabotage was now of crucial interest to the special counsel’s investigators. Corsi’s connection to the Trump campaign appears to have been based on his relationship with Republican dirty-trickster Roger Stone, a long-time friend of Trump and business partner of Manafort, who is widely viewed as potentially a key figure in facilitating any cooperation between the Trump campaign and Russian interference. Specifically, Stone appeared to have had prior knowledge of Russia’s email hacking of Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman, John Podesta, whose emails were later released by Wikileaks at a key moment in the presidential campaign (during the controversy over Trump’s Access Hollywood video). When asked by the House Intelligence Committee about his advance knowledge of the Podesta emails, Stone’s explanation was that he had simply guessed on the basis of informal research.
However, on Tuesday Corsi shared with several news services draft documents of a plea deal with the special counsel’s office that he was about to reject. The potential plea agreement reveals that Mueller has evidence suggesting Stone and Corsi acted as facilitators and backchannels for apparent coordination between the Trump campaign and Wikileaks, who appeared to be working in tandem with the Russian Intelligence services who hacked Podesta and the Democratic National Committee’s emails.
Specifically, the special counsel has apparently gained possession of emails exchanged between Stone and Corsi during the summer of 2016 in which they appeared to be facilitating coordination between the Trump campaign and Wikileaks via its founder, Julian Assange. The emails show Corsi having contacted an intermediary who shortly after met with Assange. Corsi then conveyed the results of the meeting to Stone, whom the document claims was at the time in regular contact with members of the Trump campaign, “including then-candidate Donald J. Trump.” Stone has also admitted to this contact during summer 2016.
There were also reports of further collaboration between Trump associates and Wikileaks. Specifically, the Guardian reported on Tuesday that Manafort secretly visited Assange on several occasions prior to his joining the Trump campaign. Manafort vehemently denied the report, threatening The Guardian with libel litigation. Manafort’s intense response may be related to the possibility that the special counsel appears to have begun probing whether such a meeting took place according to reporting by Carl Bernstein.
Trump and the Republican leadership in Congress seemed to view these events in crisis mode. Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell squashed the possibility of legislation geared toward protecting the Mueller probe from interference from Trump and his recently installed acting attorney general, Matthew Whitaker. This is in spite of recent bipartisan indications of support, including that of Senate majority whip, John Cornyn. Trump, on the other hand, spent the past three days lambasting Robert Mueller over Twitter. And perhaps with good reason, as reports indicate that Trump was explicitly asked by Mueller in written questions whether he had prior knowledge of the Trump Tower meeting between his son, Trump-campaign officials and Russian operatives, and whether Roger Stone told him of the Wikileaks email dumps beforehand.
Analysis
Mueller appears to be closing in on Trump and other key figures in his orbit. We can hardly know for sure whether anything illegal was done in relation to the Russian sabotage campaign by the Trump campaign or Trump himself, but the evidence is mounting. Trump himself seems unhinged when it comes to Mueller, and has taken actions, such as installing a political hack and lacky as acting attorney general a day after the midterm elections or attempting to prosecute his political enemies on a whim, that are audaciously corrupt.
There is a growing body of evidence that he and his attorney Rudy Giuliani have orchestrated a wide-ranging coverup of what occurred in the summer of 2016. This is not speculation or conspiracy theory; this is the only possible conclusion that can be drawn from the known facts as gleaned from authoritative reporting and a special counsel investigation backed by the full force of the federal government (excluding, of course, the White House).
Every American has an interest in determining the truth of these claims. Hopefully, there really was not conspiracy between Donald Trump, his campaign and Russia and other anti-American actors. But if where’s smoke, there’s fire, the available facts suggest it is getting awfully hazy at the White House.
Resistance Resources
- ACLU has worked for almost 100 years to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed by the Constitution and laws of the United States.
- Protect the Investigation is a non-partisan initiative to educate the American people about the importance of the special counsel investigation and its current findings.
- Propublica exposes abuses of power and betrayals of the public trust by government, business, and other institutions, using the moral force of investigative journalism to spur reform through the sustained spotlighting of wrongdoing.
- Law Works engages bipartisan voices and educates the public on the importance of the rule of law, the role of the special counsel in the justice system, and the integrity of our judicial institutions.
- Nobody is Above the Law is a clearinghouse for organizing events to protect the Mueller probe.
- Stand Up America is an organization born after the outpouring of resistance to Donald Trump’s election in 2016. They are committed to providing you with the information you need to take impactful action and make your voice heard.
This brief was submitted by U.S. RESIST NEWS environment/at-large policy analyst Jonathan Peter Schwartz: Jonathan@usresistnews.org
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Major U.S. Government Climate Assessment Ignored by U.S Government
Policy Summary
Political controversy erupted this last black Friday, a day normally reserved for nonpolitical pursuits, such as bargain hunting and post-Thanksgiving family therapy. The controversy was instigated by the White House’s release of Volume 2 of the Fourth National Climate Assessment. A product of 13 government agencies, the National Climate Assessment is congressionally mandated, its release therefore not left to the administration’s discretion.
The report paints a bleak picture of the impact climate change will have on the American economy and environment in coming decades of the twenty-first century. Extreme weather events—illustrated most recently in the intense 2018 hurricane season and California wildfires—are soon to become even more common and destructive. Heat-related deaths will become a greater threat as many regions become nearly unlivable.
On the economic from, along with the obvious damage to real estate and infrastructure from sea-level rise and extreme weather, numerous other areas of the U.S. economy will be affected. Given the international supply chain of most major U.S. manufacturers, production could also be seriously hampered by extreme weather events. Agricultural productivity will likely also decline as each 1°C rise above pre-industrial temperature levels results in a 3-7% decline in crop yield.
The report also notes the potential for rising domestic and international political instability resulting from more varied and numerous environmental refugee crises.
The National Climate Assessment comes a month after the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released a dire report predicting that severe humanitarian crises could be a dominant aspect of global politics as early as 2040. Both reports were noted for their unusually direct language—a striking departure for the typically measured scientific community. As David Wallace-Wells notes in a comment on the I.P.C.C. report that could as easily apply to the new Climate Assessment, “[T]he real meaning of the report is not ‘climate change is much worse than you think,’ because anyone who knows the state of the research will find nothing surprising in it. The real meaning is, ‘you now have permission to freak out.’”
Yet, despite two of the most direct statements to date by the scientific community, both internationally and in the U.S., on the threat posed to human civilization by climate change, the Trump administration did its best to undermine and deny these findings. The release of the report on Black Friday seemed obviously intended as a news dump on a day when few Americans would be paying attention. A statement from the administration suggested the report was “largely based on the most extreme scenario.”
Climate advocates, such as Philip B. Duffy of the Woods Hole Research Center, attacked the administration, noting the “bizarre contrast between this report, which is being released by this administration, and [its] own policies.” Former vice president Al Gore said in a statement that the “President may try to hide the truth, but his own scientists and experts have made it as stark and clear as possible.”
Analysis
As climate expert Michael Mann noted on CNN on Friday, “[W]e don’t have to use our imagination anymore because we saw this play out over the past several months.” California’s 2018 wildfire season was unprecedentedly lethal and destructive. The 2018 hurricane season was similarly violent and destructive. But these are only the obvious effects of climate change. Most of its future impacts will be akin to the proverbial frog in boiling water. It will be a slow-motion catastrophe, especially for the Earth’s nearly one billion slum dwellers and the hundreds of millions more who only recently escaped extreme poverty.
While the National Climate Assessment largely focuses on U.S. interests, this myopic focus probably fails to grasp just how desperate the global international order could become as these millions of people begin seeking refugee status in cooler and richer northern countries. Echoing a 2015 statement by the Pentagon, Stephen Cheney, former Marine brigadier general and CEO of the American Security Project, writes, “Climate change is what we in the military call a ‘threat multiplier.’ Its connection to conflict is not linear. Rather, it intensifies and complicates existing security risks, increasing the frequency, scale, and complexity of future missions…. [Its] effects will be particularly destabilizing in already-volatile situations, exacerbating challenges like weak governance, economic inequality, and social tensions—and producing truly toxic conflicts.”
Engagement Resources
- Greenpeace is “a global, independent campaigning organization that uses peaceful protest and creative communication to expose global environmental problems and promote solutions that are essential to a green and peaceful future.”
- The Alliance for Climate Education (ACE) is an organization whose “mission is to educate young people on the science of climate change and aid them in meaningful advocacy.”
- The Union of Concerned Scientists is a network of professional scientists who seek to bring the insights of science to bear on issues of public concern.
- Citizens’ Climate Lobby is “a non-profit, nonpartisan, grassroots advocacy organization focused on national policies to address climate change.”
- org “uses online campaigns, grassroots organizing, and mass public actions to oppose new coal, oil and gas projects, take money out of the companies that are heating up the planet, and build 100% clean energy solutions that work for all.”
This Brief was submitted by U.S. RESIST NEWS Analyst Jonathan Schwartz Jonathan@usresistnews.org
Photo by Jon Tyson