Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – On Wednesday, a band of 20 Israeli squatters diagnosed with Covid-19, who had been placed in quarantine in their squatter-settlement on Palestinian land in the West Bank’s Ghor Valley, ghoulishly broke out and attacked a nearby Palestinian hamlet. They are members of the violent “Hilltop Youth” extremist group. The Israeli […]
Archives for April 2020
With Trump gross Incompetence, Bookstores moving Post-Apocalyptic Fiction into Current Events Section
(Tomdispatch.com) – In retrospect, it’s no surprise that, after the election of Donald Trump in 2016, dystopian fiction enjoyed a spike in popularity. However, novels like George Orwell’s 1984 and Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, which soared on Amazon, would prove more horror stories than roadmaps. Like so many ominous sounds from a dark basement, […]
With Oil Prices in Freefall, Coronavirus Reveals Weaknesses of Saudis, Arab Gulf States
By Marwan Kabalan | – ( Middle East Monitor) – The coronavirus outbreak has put the Arab Gulf States under the spotlight and exposed their structural weaknesses. It has also suggested that security, which is often the focus because of geopolitical regional rivalry, especially with Iran, distracts from other equally important threats. While it is […]
The Wealthy also Cushioned themselves at Expense of Poor in Era of Black Death, as Boccaccio’s Decameron Shows
By Kathryn McKinley | – The coronavirus can infect anyone, but recent reporting has shown your socioeconomic status can play a big role, with a combination of job security, access to health care and mobility widening the gap in infection and mortality rates between rich and poor. The wealthy work remotely and flee to resorts […]
Trumpism was Always the Tyrannical Tantrum of a Stubborn 5-Year-Old, but Now it will Kill People; Lots of People
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Trumpism is a form of fascism, of course, but at its core is a whiny rebellion against the achievements of human and civil rights since the 1960s. Do the new norms after the Civil Rights Movement stop people from saying in public that African-Americans, Hispanics, Native Americans, Asians and women […]
Unless we Halt Trump’s War on the Environment, the next Pandemic is coming for Us
( Foreign Policy in Focus ) – Congress is already thinking about how to prevent the next pandemic. See how quickly Cory Booker (D-NJ) has teamed up with Lindsey Graham (R-SC) to write a letter calling for a global ban on “wet markets.” The current pandemic is reputed to have originated in a wet market […]
Despite Trump support for Saudi Arabia, it is finally on the verge of defeat in Yemen
By Omar Ahmed | – ( Middle East Monitor ) – Exactly five years ago, the US-backed, Saudi-led Arab coalition carried out its first air strikes on Yemen in an effort to reinstate the disgraced, exiled President Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi. He is a statesman in name only who I have argued previously has neither power, […]
Trump Bankrupting WHO during Pandemic, Hurting Vaccine Coordination and Killing People in Global South
By Adam Kamradt-Scott | – US President Donald Trump has announced the US is cutting its funding to the World Health Organisation (WHO) – a decision that will have major implications for the global health response to the coronavirus pandemic. The US contributes more than US$400 million to the WHO per year, though it is […]
Trump Kneecapped World Health Organization amid Pandemic; Jimmy Carter used it in bid to Wipe out Guinea Worm
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – In another petty, destructive and self-serving tirade, Trump announced Tuesday that he is halting US funding for the World Health Organization. He attempted to shift blame for his do-nothing response to the building coronavirus pandemic in late January and February and much of March to the WHO. The organization did […]