Reader Supported News | 28 December 15
Is Honest Information Worthless?
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Paul Krugman | The Donald and the Chump Factor
Paul Krugman, The New York Times
Krugman writes: "I suppose there are still some people waiting for Trump’s bubble to burst — any day now! But it keeps not happening. And it’s becoming increasingly plausible that he will go all the way. Why?"
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Paul Krugman, The New York Times
Krugman writes: "I suppose there are still some people waiting for Trump’s bubble to burst — any day now! But it keeps not happening. And it’s becoming increasingly plausible that he will go all the way. Why?"
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College Student, Mother of 5 Killed by Chicago Cops; Families Demand Answers
Megan Crepeau, Jeremy Gorner and Grace Wong, Chicago Tribune
Excerpt: "Police responding to a call about a domestic disturbance shot and killed a 19-year-old engineering student and a 55-year-old mother of five, and authorities acknowledged late Saturday that the woman had been shot by accident."
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Megan Crepeau, Jeremy Gorner and Grace Wong, Chicago Tribune
Excerpt: "Police responding to a call about a domestic disturbance shot and killed a 19-year-old engineering student and a 55-year-old mother of five, and authorities acknowledged late Saturday that the woman had been shot by accident."
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Chicago police fatally shot Quintonio LeGrier, 19, and Bettie Jones, 55, as officers responded
to a domestic disturbance at a West Garfield Park residence on Dec. 26, 2015. (photo: Abel Uribe/Chicago Tribune)
olice responding to a call about a domestic disturbance shot and killed a 19-year-old engineering student and a 55-year-old mother of five, and authorities acknowledged late Saturday that the woman had been shot by accident.
The families of both victims demanded answers after the deaths, which were the first fatal shootings by Chicago police officers since last month's release of a 2014 video of Laquan McDonald's death put a national spotlight on the city.
The Police Department said its officers responded to a home in West Garfield Park around 4:30 a.m. and were “confronted by a combative subject resulting in the discharging of the officer's weapon, fatally wounding two individuals.”
The 19-year-old, Quintonio LeGrier, was carrying a baseball bat and threatening his father when police were called, according to police dispatch radio traffic. No gun was recovered at the scene, a police source said.
The woman who was killed, Bettie Jones, was a downstairs neighbor who had been asked by LeGrier's father to keep an eye out for the arrival of the police, according to both families.
In a statement, the police said: “The 55-year-old female victim was accidentally struck and tragically killed. The department extends its deepest condolences to the victim's family and friends.”
The West Side tragedy was the first of two police shootings Saturday. In the second, on the Far South Side, officers said they responded to an “assault in progress” call in the 1000 block of West 103rd Place. Police said they encountered an armed man and shot him. The suspect was taken in serious to critical condition to Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn, officials said.
At the same time the police confirmed that the West Side woman was killed by accident, they also announced a major policy shift: All officers involved in shootings will be placed on routine administrative duties for 30 days.
The new policy is a dramatic change from the current requirement that officers have to come off active duty for three days.
Even while acknowledging the woman's accidental shooting, police offered a scant narrative of what occurred at the two-flat in the 4700 block of West Erie Street. They did not say why the officer fired his weapon, whether the “combative subject” was armed at the time or whether the officers had a Taser.
Questions were referred to the Independent Police Review Authority, which confirmed only that the shooting had occurred.
IPRA head Sharon Fairley responded to both of Saturday's shootings, visiting a police detective area and the Far South Side scene. Fairley took over this month after the resignation of previous IPRA chief Scott Ando. Other fallout from the McDonald video has included charges against Officer Jason Van Dyke, the firing of police Superintendent Garry McCarthy and the launching of a federal civil rights investigation, which Mayor Rahm Emanuel first opposed but later welcomed.
The Fraternal Order of Police did not comment on Saturday's shootings, a departure from years of on-the-scene statements from organization spokesman Pat Camden. The practice, quietly ended a few months ago, has come under intense scrutiny since the McDonald video release. After that shooting, Camden told the media that the teen had lunged at police. The video contradicted that report.
An Emanuel spokesman said the mayor was in Cuba on a family vacation but was in touch with aides in Chicago. Emanuel issued a statement Saturday night saying, “Anytime an officer uses force the public deserves answers, and regardless of the circumstances we all grieve anytime there is a loss of life in our city.”
A prayer vigil is planned Sunday afternoon at the scene of the West Side shooting, which left relatives outraged.
“I want this investigation to be thorough. I want answers,” said Bettie Jones' cousin Evelyn Glover Jennings. “Her blood is crying out from the grave saying, ‘Evelyn, avenge me.'”
While police said little about the shooting, relatives of the victims had plenty to say.
LeGrier had struggled with mental health issues in recent months, had become agitated and was carrying a metal bat in his father's upstairs apartment, relatives said.
“His father was scared because that's not his character,” said LeGrier's mother, Janet Cooksey, 49, who was not present at the time of the shooting.
LeGrier's father told his neighbor Jones downstairs not to approach his son while watching for police, family members said.
Responding officers were told by a dispatcher that a “male caller said someone is threatening his life. It's also coming in as a domestic. The 19-year-old son is banging on his bedroom door with a baseball bat.”
A relative of the teen said it appears LeGrier came to the front door as officers from the Harrison District pulled up. Jones' relatives believe she was behind LeGrier, near the entrance to her apartment.
Latisha Jones, 19, said she woke to gunfire and found her mother on the floor of her apartment with a gunshot wound to the neck. “She wasn't saying anything,” the daughter said. “I had to keep checking for a pulse.”
The Police Department did not say where the victims were standing when they were shot, but blood could be seen in the small vestibule and just inside Jones' apartment. At least one bullet appeared to have traveled through Jones' apartment, hitting at least two walls.
LeGrier's mother said the family was told her son was shot seven times.
“Seven times he was shot,” Cooksey said. “He didn't have a gun. He had a bat. One or two times would have brought him down.
“You call the police, you try to get help and you lose a loved one,” she said. “What are they trained for? Just to kill? I thought that we were supposed to get service and protection. I mean, my son was an honor student. He's here for Christmas break, and now I've lost him.”
She directed her anger at the mayor. “Emanuel, I want a personal apology for my son's life,” Cooksey said. “I don't want you to get on the news and say you're so … I want a personal apology.”
The NIU website shows LeGrier enrolled as a freshman in fall 2014 with an electrical engineering major. He graduated from Gwendolyn Brooks College Prep high school on the Far South Side.
“My son was going somewhere,” his mother said. “He wasn't just a thug on the street.”
Antonio LeGrier, the student's father, said his son had “emotional issues.” He believes the officer “messed up” and shot recklessly. “I don't feel that his life was worth losing because he got upset,” the father said.
A police source said investigators were waiting for the autopsy to determine how many times LeGrier was shot. The source also said investigators were looking into whether responding officers knew they were dealing with someone with mental health issues and whether anyone on the scene was equipped with a Taser.
Relatives of Bettie Jones said they, too, had questions.
“Right now there's a whole lot of anger, a whole lot of tears,” said her brother Melvin Jones.
Jones lived in the first-floor apartment with her boyfriend, he said. She was the mother of four daughters and a son, her brother said.
Melvin Jones said he and about 15 other relatives were at the apartment Friday to celebrate Christmas with food and card games. “She had an excellent Christmas. Family was over,” Melvin Jones said. “And then to wake up to this.”
Robin Andrews, Bettie Jones' youngest brother, said Jones had been battling ovarian cancer for several years and had recently taken time off from her job at a bakery to recuperate.
“She was already sick,” he said through tears. “She was already fighting for her life.”
Just Before Passing Surveillance Expansion, Lawmakers Partied With Pro-CISA Lobbyists
Lee Fang, The Intercept
Fang writes: "The night before Congress passed the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act, a broad expansion of surveillance power in America, legislators attended a party with the chief lobbyists for the bill."
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Lee Fang, The Intercept
Fang writes: "The night before Congress passed the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act, a broad expansion of surveillance power in America, legislators attended a party with the chief lobbyists for the bill."
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States Deny Pricey Hepatitis C Drugs to Most Medicaid Patients
Jake Harper, NPR
"In the last few years, new medications have come on the market that can cure hepatitis C with a more than 90 percent success rate. But these new drugs are famously expensive. A full 12-week course of Harvoni costs about $95,000. Because of that, Medicaid in many states restricts who receives the medication."
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Jake Harper, NPR
"In the last few years, new medications have come on the market that can cure hepatitis C with a more than 90 percent success rate. But these new drugs are famously expensive. A full 12-week course of Harvoni costs about $95,000. Because of that, Medicaid in many states restricts who receives the medication."
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Toxic Substances Kill More Americans Than Guns Each Year. And Congress Is Protecting the Killers.
Jim Morris, Slate
Morris writes: "Guns take more than 30,000 lives in America each year. But there’s a less-visible, even deadlier scourge that’s been mostly lost in an era of mass shootings and terrorism scares: work-related illness, which kills 50,000 people annually, according to the best government estimate."
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Jim Morris, Slate
Morris writes: "Guns take more than 30,000 lives in America each year. But there’s a less-visible, even deadlier scourge that’s been mostly lost in an era of mass shootings and terrorism scares: work-related illness, which kills 50,000 people annually, according to the best government estimate."
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Demolition, utility, and other workers can knock asbestos loose, sending invisible and potentially
deadly fibers airborne. (photo: Sabina Zak/Shutterstock)
Toxic substances kill more Americans than guns each year. And Congress is protecting the killers.
uns take more than 30,000 lives in America each year.
But there’s a less-visible, even deadlier scourge that’s been mostly lost in an era of mass shootings and terrorism scares: work-related illness, which kills 50,000 people annually, according to the best government estimate. Hundreds of thousands more are sickened by job-related exposures to toxic substances.
Occupational disease lacks the macabre drama of a San Bernardino, California, or a Newtown, Connecticut. The bodies cannot be easily counted. The victims may hang on for years or decades before quietly succumbing. Often, only families, friends, and former co-workers acknowledge their deaths.
In a series called “Unequal Risk,” the Center for Public Integrity has tried to bring this little-understood, little-examined topic into the light. The most important takeaway: Many work-related diseases are preventable.
Actually, it’s worse than that. In effect, these diseases are legally sanctioned by the U.S. government, which has made the conscious decision to treat workers more callously than the general public when it comes to protection against toxics.
The casualties of this policy have names: Chris Johnson, Mark Flores, Johnathan Welch, Gene Cooper. The first two struggle with debilitating conditions. The last two are dead–Welch at only 18.
What’s remarkable is that the agency charged with regulating toxic substances in the workplace, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, admits that for the most part it’s unable to do so. OSHA, Congress, industry, and the White House all bear responsibility.
The nation’s worker-protection laws are so weak—and offer so little deterrent value—that the departments of Labor and Justice just announced plans to bolster the use of environmental statutes as a workaround. Violations of the Occupational Safety and Health Act at most are misdemeanors, but environmental crimes can bring felony convictions. Agency officials say employers with safety problems are often environmental offenders as well; they’ve urged federal prosecutors to investigate both types of crimes together.
The devaluing of the American worker doesn’t stop with the infliction of illness. It continues when he or she tries to win benefits through state or federal compensation programs, or seeks redress in the courts.
Often those who litigate are doing so for their families, not themselves. Such is the case with Kris Penny, a 39-year-old Floridian who is dying of an asbestos-related cancer called mesothelioma. Penny believes he was exposed to asbestos while installing fiber-optic cable a little more than a decade ago. No one warned him to take precautions, he says. “I’m not going to be the last guy this happens to, I can promise you,” he told us the day before he underwent radical surgery in Baltimore in August.
The outlook for worker health in this country isn’t encouraging. Certain uses of asbestos are still legal in the United States, though more than 50 countries have banned it. While a relatively modest 400 metric tons of asbestos were consumed in the United States last year, untold amounts are still embedded in buildings and infrastructure. Demolition, utility, and other workers can knock it loose, sending invisible and potentially deadly fibers airborne.
“The stark realization that asbestos is legal, lethal, and everywhere is igniting feelings of anger, fear, and disgust,” says Linda Reinstein, CEO and co-founder of the Asbestos Disease Awareness Organization. “Similar to gun violence, many people have become numb and complacent about asbestos.” Reinstein, whose husband died of mesothelioma, has pressed tirelessly for a ban and has become a fixture on Capitol Hill.
Some members of Congress have different plans. In early January, the House is expected to vote on a bill proponents say would discourage “false or exaggerated” claims against asbestos trusts set up by corporations that made or used the mineral. The legislation, which passed the House two years ago, would require claimants to disclose personal information such as work histories, diagnoses, partial Social Security numbers, and the amounts of money being sought.
Key sponsor Blake Farenthold, a Texas Republican whose district includes industry-rich Corpus Christi, says all of this is necessary to “ensure that funds meant to benefit legitimate future asbestos victims are not used to pay abusive claims.”
But the legislation has triggered fierce opposition, notably from mesothelioma victims.
“We have heard that [it] is needed because of an epidemic of fraud against the trusts,” nine widows and patients wrote in a February letter to lawmakers. “But the evidence doesn’t support this claim. This bill treats us and other asbestos victims like criminals rather than innocent victims of corporate deceit.”
The real aim, they wrote, is to create delays so claimants die before they can recover anything from the trusts: “It’s astonishing to us that, of all the issues Congress could be addressing relating to asbestos, you have chosen one that does nothing for victims, but … gives additional tools to the asbestos industry to drag out these cases and escape responsibility.”
http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/34290-toxic-substances-kill-more-americans-than-guns-each-year-and-congress-is-protecting-the-killers
Yemen: US-Backed Saudi Coalition Illegally Bombing Residential Areas
Human Rights Watch
Excerpt: "According to the United Nations, most of the 2,500 civilian deaths since the coalition began its military campaign in late March against the Houthis, also known as Allah Ansar, have been from coalition airstrikes."
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Human Rights Watch
Excerpt: "According to the United Nations, most of the 2,500 civilian deaths since the coalition began its military campaign in late March against the Houthis, also known as Allah Ansar, have been from coalition airstrikes."
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California’s Largest Tribe Bans GMO Crops and Genetically-Engineered Salmon
Lorraine Chow, EcoWatch
Chow writes: "The Yurok Tribe decided on the GMO ban in order protect its ancestral lands."
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Lorraine Chow, EcoWatch
Chow writes: "The Yurok Tribe decided on the GMO ban in order protect its ancestral lands."
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