Source: spiked
by CS Strachen
“America sneezes, Britain keels over with influenza. For years, we have imported countless American social and cultural debates, be it on race or abortion. Political issues that divide Americans are almost always assumed to be relevant here. But this is not necessarily the case. Look no further than the growing opposition to opioids in Britain. In the US, opioid use is a blight on society. But to tens of thousands of British patients who suffer from a disability, opioids are the difference between leading a productive life and leading no life at all. This increased suspicion of opioids in the UK is therefore deeply concerning.” (04/15/24)
https://www.spiked-online.com/2024/04/15/in-defence-of-opioids/
Source: BBC News [UK state media]
“Coral around the world is turning white and even dying as recent record ocean heat takes a devastating toll. It has triggered the fourth global mass coral bleaching event, according to the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Bleaching happens when coral gets stressed and turns white because the water it lives in is too hot. Coral sustains ocean life, fishing, and creates trillions of dollars of revenue annually. Ocean heat records have been falling for months but this is the first global evidence of how this episode is affecting sea life. The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) confirmed the mass stress in all oceans (the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Ocean) after weeks of receiving reports from scientists globally.” (04/15/24)
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-68814016
Source: The Atlantic
by Claire Finkelstein & Richard W Painter
“Next Thursday, former President Donald Trump’s lawyers will argue before the U.S. Supreme Court that he is immune to all criminal charges against him arising from acts he committed while president. It is no exaggeration to say that this argument — that a president is permanently immune to criminal prosecution for any crimes committed in his official capacity — is the most dangerous assertion any official or former official has ever made in a U.S. courtroom. Should this argument be adopted by the Court, a president would have license to make use of the U.S. military to subvert democracy in multiple ways …. A less appreciated danger, but one that would present itself with greater regularity, is the weakening of the military chain of command, and with it civilian control of the U.S. armed forces.” (04/15/24)
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2024/04/presidential-immunity-supreme-court-trump/678050/
Source: Caitlin Johnstone, Rogue Journalist
by Caitlin Johnstone
“Anyone who wants the US and its allies to attack Iran is a psychopath. People who want to unleash a war of that scale upon our species should be rejected from our society as aggressively as child molesters and Nazis. … A new CNN report says multiple Biden administration officials ‘saw Iran’s attacks on Israel Saturday as disproportionate to Israel’s strikes in Damascus that prompted the retaliation.’ There are zero reported fatalities as a result of the Iranian retaliation. The Israeli strikes on the Iranian embassy in Damascus killed 16 people, including multiple high-level Iranian military officials. To see Iran’s response as ‘disproportionate’ is to admit you believe Israeli lives are worth literally orders of magnitude more than Iranian lives.” (04/15/24)
https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/2024/04/15/anyone-who-wants-the-us-to-attack-iran-is-an-enemy-of-humanity/
Source: My History Can Beat Up Your Politics
“Election 1916: ‘Everything is Different.'” (04/15/24)
https://myhistorycanbeatupyourpolitics.wordpress.com/2024/04/15/election-1916-everything-is-different/
Source: Reason
by JD Tuccille
“It won’t give him back the years he’s spent in confinement, but WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange may finally get a bit of justice after years of persecution for embarrassing U.S. officials. Under pressure from the government of the journalist’s home country of Australia, President Joe Biden said he’s ‘considering’ dropping the case against Assange. It’s been a long time coming, but such a move would be welcomed not just by the prisoner, but by people everywhere who scrutinize government conduct.” (04/15/24)
https://reason.com/2024/04/15/biden-hints-at-freedom-for-julian-assange/
Source: Fox News
“The New York Times has launched a mole hunt to determine ‘whether staffers leaked confidential information related to Gaza war coverage to another media outlet,’ according to the Wall Street Journal. The Wall Street Journal report called it the ‘latest internal crisis at the Times’ where infighting over coverage of ‘sensitive topics like the transgender community and social justice’ has erupted in recent months. … Times Executive Editor Joe Kahn was irked when The Intercept recently reported an episode of the Times'[s] podcast ‘The Daily’ about sexual violence committed by Hamas was shelved after ‘an intense internal debate’ about the story. Kahn told the WSJ that he’s open to ‘the normal push and pull of any newsroom — journalists challenging each other’s assumptions and debating whether coverage is fair,’ but opposition to the Hamas sexual-violence article ‘crossed a line when confidential Times work-product was allegedly shared outside the newsroom.'” (04/15/24)
https://www.foxnews.com/media/new-york-times-investigating-itself-faces-staff-rebellion-over-gaza-leaks-internal-crisis
Source: Antiwar.com
by Marc D Joffe
“Fiscal conservatives have been sounding the alarm about endemic federal deficits for years, but many also support the $95 billion supplemental foreign aid for Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan now before Congress. Can supplemental military spending be reconciled with budget balancing? Conservative hawks think so, but their faith is not supported by budget and political realities. The Congressional Budget Office projects that annual deficits will increase from $1.5 trillion this year to almost $2.6 trillion in fiscal year 2034 and that publicly held federal debt will reach an unprecedented 166 percent of GDP by 2054.” (04/15/24)
https://original.antiwar.com/marc-d-joffe/2024/04/14/do-fiscal-hawkery-and-supplemental-military-packages-mix/
Source: Associated Press
“Colorado’s Democratic-controlled House on Sunday passed a bill that would ban the sale and transfer of semiautomatic firearms, a major step for the legislation after roughly the same bill was swiftly killed by Democrats last year. The bill, which passed on a 35-27 vote, is now on its way to the Democratic-led state Senate. If it passes there, it could bring Colorado in line with 10 other states — including California, New York and Illinois — that have prohibitions on semiautomatic guns.” (04/14/24)
https://apnews.com/article/assault-weapon-ban-colorado-gun-91b1a35b838b984e743141ddc619a24c
Source: EconTalk
“When Prediction Is Not Enough (with Teppo Felin).” (04/15/24)
https://www.econtalk.org/when-prediction-is-not-enough-with-teppo-felin/
