‘This is part of an avowed war on whistleblowers to include investigative journalists and publishers.’
Lawyers for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange on Monday warned of potentially devastating consequences for journalism around the world after a British judge denied Assange’s request to delay his U.S. extradition hearing in February. Continue reading →
Current events concerning Turkey and the Kurds in Syria remind me of a conversation I had with a US Air Force colonel almost 17 years ago in a courtroom in Des Moines. To refresh my memory, I dug deep into my closet and dusted off the transcript of the case, “STATE OF IOWA, plaintiff vs. CHRISTINE GAUNT et al.,” in which I was a defendant, heard in February, 2003, the month before the US invasion of Iraq. The following quotes from that dialogue are verbatim per the transcript. Continue reading →
One of the tropes Israel and its international phalanx of lobbyists has used since the state’s inception in 1948 is that “Poor Little Israel” requires Western money and diplomatic support because the small country is surrounded by hostile Arab countries. Neither of these contentions have ever been true. Continue reading →
‘This is why Donald Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo didn't want former U.S. Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch to tell her story to the American people.’
Marie Yovanovitch, the former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, told House impeachment investigators during a closed-door session Friday that President Donald Trump pressured the State Department to oust her after a “concerted campaign” of attacks led by Trump’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani. Continue reading →
‘The same administration that tried to cut food stamps to save money wants to make it easier for companies to avoid paying taxes by hiding their profits offshore.’
The Trump administration is reportedly considering gutting regulations designed to prevent corporations from shifting profits overseas to avoid U.S. taxes, a move Democratic lawmakers and progressives condemned as yet another effort by the White House to enrich large companies at the expense of workers. Continue reading →
The US is a declining empire, the more aggressive and widespread its malign activities, the sooner its fall from grace will arrive. Continue reading →
‘I'm not sending anyone to jail yet, but it's good to know I have that ability.’
Education Secretary Betsy DeVos on Monday was told in no uncertain terms that her refusal to abide by a 2018 order stopping her department from collecting on student loans made to predatory for-profit Corinthian College had the potential to land her in jail, though Magistrate Judge Sallie Kim made clear that was, for now, an unlikely outcome. Continue reading →
By Donald Trump’s own admission and through documents provided by an Intelligence Community whistleblower and former U.S. special envoy for Ukraine Paul Volker it is known that the Trump administration pressured at least four countries to dig up dirt on former Vice President Joe Biden and his son, Hunter Biden. The countries identified as being involved in the Trump operation thus far are Ukraine, the United Kingdom, Australia, and China. The attack on the Democratic Party’s leading presidential candidate in 2020 is far worse than that carried out by Richard Nixon henchmen G. Gordon Liddy, E. Howard Hunt, Donald Segretti, and Charles Colson in the Watergate scandal and events surrounding it. Continue reading →
‘GE hired a new CEO last year with a pay package worth up to $300 million.’
Workers are stuck “paying the ultimate price for executives’ poorly-timed deals,” said Our Revolution on Monday after General Electric announced it was freezing the pensions of roughly 20,000 employees with salaried benefits. Continue reading →
‘Five years of plunging farm prices, increasing bankruptcies, and climbing suicide rates were not discussed by Perdue. His message to them was basically, stop whining, your demise is inevitable.’
Furious family farmers flamed Department of Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue Wednesday after comments he made on the future of the dairy business that cast doubt on the future of small farms during a stop in Wisconsin Tuesday. Continue reading →
‘The people of California just went up against the most powerful corporate lobby in the country—and won.’
California Gov. Gavin Newsom on Wednesday signed into law historic legislation that would allow the state’s cities and counties to establish public banks as an alternative to private financial institutions, a move advocates hailed as a “stunning rebuke to the predatory Wall Street megabanks that crashed the global economy in 2007-08.” Continue reading →
‘Big Cable's lobbyists will use this as an excuse to swarm Washington, D.C. The internet must come together once more to beat back corruption and defend our online freedom.’
Digital rights advocates said the public must “be ready to fight like hell” to save the open internet from telecom attacks after a federal appeals court on Tuesday largely upheld the FCC’s 2017 repeal of net neutrality. Continue reading →
A business group comes out swinging on behalf of Medicare for All.
With the word “whistleblower” spinning through news cycle after news cycle these last few days, every headline about Trump, Giuliani and Ukraine is a powerful reminder that the whistleblower is a proud tradition in the United States, one that merits our support and protection. Continue reading →
‘Threats against a whistleblower are not only illegal, but also indicative of a cover-up.’
Lawyers representing the whistleblower who filed a complaint about President Donald Trump’s call with Ukraine’s leader warned in a letter over the weekend that Trump has put the safety of their client at risk by describing the anonymous individual as a traitor and issuing open threats of retaliation. Continue reading →
In July 2018, White House leaks indicated that Donald Trump gave his personal mobile phone number to various foreign leaders. Although Trump is known to have phoned some foreign leaders over his official White House landline, he is also known to call some leaders using his mobile phones on a whim and while some of his calls’ recipients, in Asia, for example, are asleep. Trump is also known to use multiple cell phones to call foreign leaders. Criminals, including narco-lords and drug smugglers, often use multiple “burner” phones in the hope they can evade detection and eavesdropping by law enforcement. Continue reading →
"It's not just abortion that they care about, they care about women's ability to exercise autonomy over their bodies and about denying them critical access to the services they need."
Global women’s rights advocates raised alarm Monday after a leaked letter showed the Trump administration is pressuring U.N. member nations to join an international anti-abortion coalition. Continue reading →
A senior advisor to the Sanders campaign said it was ‘disgusting’ that the former vice president's campaign would be "echoing bogus GOP talking points."
Sen. Bernie Sanders hit back Monday after news broke that the centrist group Third Way is focus-testing attacks on Medicare for All to see what will stick, using a firm with close ties to former Vice President Joe Biden’s 2020 Democratic presidential campaign. Continue reading →
The disclosure by the British Parliament of the “Most Sensitive” Operation YELLOWHAMMER document describes a United Kingdom ripe for the machinations of Britain’s proto fascists, who make up a large part of the Tory government of Prime Minister Boris Johnson. YELLOWHAMMER’s prediction of economic and social chaos in the United Kingdom resulting from a hard-British exit (BREXIT) from the European Union will have dire consequences for the rule of law and democracy throughout the United Kingdom. Continue reading →
Election officials fear thousands of votes could go uncounted if the president leaves the Universal Postal Union
Thousands of absentee ballots could be uncounted in upcoming elections thanks to President Donald Trump’s objection to a treaty which governs the international mail exchange for nearly 200 countries. Continue reading →
‘I am in shock. I've worked here 15 years. This is why I keep the job—because of my benefits.’
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos on Thursday cut benefits for part-time workers at his grocery chain Whole Foods, drawing criticism from the left for a move that could leave thousands of people without health insurance. Continue reading →
Israel aggressively spies on allies and adversaries alike. Continue reading →
‘Every network should be covering this. Trump's dangerous takeover of our courts will last a generation.’
The Republican-controlled Senate quietly confirmed four more of President Donald Trump’s lifetime federal judicial nominees on Wednesday, bringing the total number of conservative judges successfully appointed by the administration to over 150. Continue reading →
Shortly before proroguing Parliament, British Tory Prime Minister Boris Johnson was ordered to release a classified report titled Operation Yellowhammer, a government-wide survey of how a no-deal British exit from the European Union (Brexit) would affect citizens of the United Kingdom and its territories, including three crown dependencies. The document that was officially released by the British government contains a redacted paragraph (number 15). However, WMR was able to obtain the paragraph and included it in our unredacted copy of the Yellowhammer document. Continue reading →
‘No matter how hard you try to hide, the American people will be watching—and we won't let you cut our earned Social Security benefits.'
Republican Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa is under fire after telling a recent town hall audience that members of Congress should negotiate changes to Social Security “behind closed doors” in order to dodge scrutiny from the media and advocacy groups. Continue reading →
If you are like most people, you know a lot more about how farm animals are treated on factory farms than dogs, primates and other animals are treated in US labs. It is no coincidence. Continue reading →
‘Intimidating reporters to influence coverage is a tactic of dictators and has no place here,’ said Sen. Jeff Merkley
Right-wing operatives allied with President Donald Trump are attempting to raise at least $2 million to fund a campaign to discredit journalists and editors at major U.S. media outlets like the Washington Post, Buzzfeed, New York Times, and HuffPost. Continue reading →
‘At a time when the federal government's job should be to help localities and states move faster toward cleaner energy and a cleaner economy, the government is walking off the field.’
Amid dire scientific warnings that the international community must act immediately to slash greenhouse gas emissions, President Donald Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency was reportedly set to take another step in the opposite direction Thursday by unveiling a rule that would gut restrictions on the fossil fuel industry’s methane pollution. Continue reading →
‘This is a move so perverse, so grotesque as to defy explanation.’
A Palestinian student set to attend his freshman year at Harvard was reportedly denied entry to the U.S. based on his friends’ social media posts, setting off a firestorm of criticism from progressives, though not the so-called “free speech warriors” of the right. Continue reading →
‘This is a new low for Trump. The administration is now literally deporting kids with cancer.
The Trump administration has reportedly ended a program which allowed immigrants with serious illnesses to temporarily remain in the U.S., a move by the White House that rights advocates decried as “a death sentence” for children receiving treatment for cancer, HIV, and other life-threatening diseases. Continue reading →
‘Death is an escape hatch for David Koch while the rest of us are left scrambling for the emergency brake before we go over the cliff.’
Billionaire industrialist David Koch, who spent vast sums of his billions in personal fortune promoting climate denialism and other right wing causes over the last four decades, died Friday at 79. Continue reading →
As a growing number of states move to pass laws that would criminalize pipeline protests and hit demonstrators with years in prison, an audio recording obtained by The Intercept showed a representative of a powerful oil and gas lobbying group bragging about the industry’s success in crafting anti-protest legislation behind closed doors. Continue reading →
Led by President Donald Trump’s xenophobic top adviser Stephen Miller, the White House reportedly spent months attempting to devise a way to stop undocumented immigrant children from attending public schools in the United States. Continue reading →
