Cornel West and Adolph L. Reed Jr. | Joe Biden Wants Us to Forget His Past. We Won't

02 May 19 It's Live on the HomePage Now: Reader Supported News Cornel West and Adolph L. Reed Jr. | Joe Biden Wants Us to Forget His Past. We Won't  Cornel West and Adolph L. Reed Jr., Guardian UK Excerpt: "After much huffing and puffing, Joe Biden has officially entered the race for 2020. In his announcement, he indicated his intention to hit the ground running immediately in early primary states, especially South Carolina." READ MORE Attorney General William P. Barr. (photo: Getty) Barr's Refusal to Testify Before House Panel Boosts Chance of Contempt Citation Rachael Bade, Mike DeBonis and Karoun Demirjian, The Washington Post Excerpt: "Attorney General William P. Barr told a House panel on Wednesday that he will not testify about special counsel Robert S. Mueller III's report, raising the prospect that Democrats will hold the nation's top law enforcement official in contempt of Congress." READ MORE Supporters of Bernie Sanders gather in the L.A. home of Tony Rzeteljski (not pictured) on April 27, one of thousands of house parties in support of the candidate. (photo: Irfan Khan/Los Angeles Times) Bernie Sanders Never Had This Before: A Real Campaign Machine Evan Halper and Matthew Ormseth, The Los Angeles Times Excerpt: "The last time Californians voted in a presidential primary, Bernie Sanders' campaign was so overextended and seat-of-the-pants that staff members nearly fumbled a solid-gold marketing opportunity." READ MORE Jose Gabriel Juarez, a former head waiter of the Grille Room at the Trump National Golf Club Westchester, spoke of the overtime he worked without pay. (photo: Joshua Partlow/The Washington Post) At Trump Golf Course, Undocumented Employees Said They Were Sometimes Told to Work Extra Hours Without Pay Joshua Partlow and David A. Fahrenthold, The Washington Post Excerpt: "He pressed his index finger onto a scanner and typed his personal code, 436. But he didn't go home. Instead - on orders from his bosses, Juarez said - he would stay on, sometimes past midnight." READ MORE Immigrant detention center. (photo: Getty) Once Again an Immigrant Child Has Died in US Government Custody Hamed Aleaziz and Adolfo Flores, BuzzFeed News Excerpt: "The boy, who was not identified by officials, is the third child to die in government custody since December, when a 7-year-old girl died hours after being taken into Border Patrol custody." READ MORE Saudi Feminist Malak al-Shehri and her husband Ayman al-Drees, who was arrested in Saudi Arabia. (photo: Twitter) The Husband of 'Saudi Arabia's Rosa Parks' Has Been Detained. She Refuses to Be Silent. F. Brinley Bruton, NBC News Bruton writes: "It is not known why al-Drees was arrested on April 4. The graduate of Ohio's Bowling Green State University had not recently spoken out about human rights or political reform, but he had chosen to marry a feminist." READ MORE Camp Lejeune's wastewater treatment plant. (photo: US Marines) EPA Slammed for Suggesting Weakened Standards to Clean Up Contaminated Drinking Water Diane Herbst, People Herbst writes: "The Environmental Protection Agency has proposed to weaken standards for cleaning up toxic chemicals used at military bases and found to have contaminated drinking water that millions of Americans consume, bowing from pressure from the Department of Defense." READ MORE Contribute to RSN Update My Monthly Donation

Jill Lepore | Eugene V. Debs and the Endurance of Socialism

17 February 19 PM

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WHY I CONTRIBUTE AND WHY OTHERS SHOULD TOO: Readers, who among us does not recognize that, but for the skills, labor and noble intent of RSN staff, we would not have easy access to critical information that is shaping our world and who we are as people? We live in interesting times and they require that we think critically and then act. News about our fellow man informs that thinking and those actions. Please make a contribution to support this free exchange of ideas, if only to show that it is valued. You vote with your dollars, folks. Be heard. Become a contributor. Thank you. / Eva, RSN Reader

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Jill Lepore | Eugene V. Debs and the Endurance of Socialism 

Jill Lepore, The New Yorker
Lepore writes: "People could listen to him talk for hours. 'Debs! Debs! Debs!' they'd cry, when his train pulled into a station. Crowds massed to hear him by the tens of thousands."
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Brittany Kaiser is said to be cooperating fully with the Mueller inquiry. (photo: Hardy Wilson/The Observer)

Mueller Questions Cambridge Analytica Director Brittany Kaiser
Carole Cadwalladr, Guardian UK
Cadwalladr writes: "A director of the controversial data company Cambridge Analytica, who appeared with Arron Banks at the launch of the Leave.EU campaign, has been subpoenaed by the US investigation into possible collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russian government."
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The American flag. (photo: iStock)

11-Year-Old Boy Arrested for Refusing to Recite 'Racist' Pledge of Allegiance
Jay Connor, The Root
Connor writes: "An 11-year-old boy was arrested at school for refusing to recite the Pledge of Allegiance, in addition to being disruptive and refusing to leave his classroom."
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Victorina Morales, an undocumented immigrant who spoke about working on the housekeeping staff for the Trump National Golf Club. (photo: Christopher Gregory/NYT

Meet Victorina Morales, an Undocumented Immigrant Who Spent Five Years as Trump's Housekeeper
Democracy Now! 

 

Excerpt: "We speak with an undocumented housekeeper from Guatemala named Victorina Morales, who helped expose what was happening on the Trump properties by speaking on the record to The New York Times."
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Pope Francis. (photo: Vincenzo Pinto/AFP/Getty Images)

Gay Priests to Pope: Don't Blame Us for Child Sex Abuse
Barbie Latza Nadeau, The Daily Beast
Nadeau writes: "The letter couldn't have come at a better time."
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Workers are striking in Mexico at the world's second largest Coca-Cola bottling plant. (photo: Reuters)

Thousands Strike at Mexican Factories, 'It's Become a Social Movement'
teleSUR
Excerpt: "Strikes in Matamoros, Mexico continue as employees at the world's second largest Coca-Cola bottling plant demand higher wages, better bargaining rights and a one-time bonus."
READ MORE

Livestock are a leading source of the rise in methane levels (photo: Alamy)

Sharp Rise in Methane Levels Threatens World Climate Targets
Robin McKie, Guardian UK
McKie writes: "Dramatic rises in atmospheric methane are threatening to derail plans to hold global temperature rises to 2C, scientists have warned."
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RSN: John Kiriakou | There Can Be No Sentencing Reform Without Compassionate Release

27 January 19 PM

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WAVING HANDS FOR DONATIONS - HELP: No movement at all at this point on donations. “Someone else” is not the answer. We cannot serve a million readers a month with only 30 donations per day. Not fair, not possible. Come on, folks! / Marc Ash, Founder Reader Supported News

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RSN: John Kiriakou | There Can Be No Sentencing Reform Without Compassionate Release 

John Kiriakou, Reader Supported News
Kiriakou writes: "Just before New Year's Day, President Donald Trump signed a sentencing reform bill into law. The First Step Act was just that - a first step. It did away with a handful of mandatory minimum sentences, it clarified how good-behavior time is calculated, and it encouraged the appropriation of funds for job training and education. The problem, though, is that it didn't correct any of the mistakes of past efforts to 'reform' the criminal justice system."
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Michelle Alexander. (photo: MichelleAlexander.com)

Michelle Alexander | Time to Break the Silence on Palestine
Michelle Alexander, The New York Times
Alexander writes: "Until very recently, the entire Congress has remained mostly silent on the human rights nightmare that has unfolded in the occupied territories."
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Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand. (photo: Getty Images)

Where Are Democratic 2020 Hopefuls on the Trump-Backed Coup Attempt in Venezuela?
Marco Cartolano, In These Times
Cartolano writes: "Trump called Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro's government 'illegitimate' two weeks after Maduro's inauguration for a second term. The declaration came after Guaidó swore himself in as president with the support of several right-wing governments in Latin America."
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'I started to cry,' said Gabriel Sedano, an immigrant from Mexico who was among those fired. He had worked at the club since 2005. 'I told them they needed to consider us,' he said. (photo: Carolyn Van Houten/The Washington Post)

Trump's Golf Course Employed Undocumented Workers - and Then Fired Them Amid Showdown Over Border Wall
Joshua Partlow and David A. Fahrenthold, The Washington Post
Excerpt: "The firings show Trump's business was relying on undocumented workers even as the president demanded a border wall to keep out such immigrants."
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We're going after Facebook because that's where the money is. (photo: Josh Edelson/AFP/Getty Images)

Facebook and Google Need to Start Paying Journalists What They Owe Us
Ben Mathis-Lilley, Slate
Mathis-Lilley writes: "A wave of layoffs crashed on the news industry this week. Verizon is cutting 800 employees from its media properties, which include HuffPost and Yahoo. BuzzFeed will cut 15 percent of its staff, which is more than 200 people."
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Myanmar Army major generals Tun Tun Nyi (left), Soe Naing Oo (center) and Zaw Min Tun (right) attend a military press conference on Jan. 18. Myanmar's army said it killed 13 ethnic Rakhine fighters after the armed group carried out deadly attacks on police posts. (photo: Thet Aung/AFP/Getty Images)

Amid Renewed Violence in Myanmar's Rakhine State, Arakan Army Returns to Spotlight
Ashley Westerman, NPR
Westerman writes: "The central government has been trying to broker peace and stop ethnic factions from targeting it for the past 70 years, leading some to call Myanmar's turmoil the world's longest civil war."
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Packaging free shower products are displayed at 'Lush,' handmade cosmetics store, in downtown Milan, Italy, January 25, 2019. (photo: Stefano Rellandini/Reuters)

Consumer Foods CEOs in Davos Hot Seat Over Plastic Waste
Jessica DiNapoli and Mark Bendeich, Reuters
Excerpt: "Consumer products companies including Procter & Gamble Co and Coca-Cola Co are emerging as new targets for global activism, with green groups blaming them for fouling the ocean with plastic and activists urging governments to regulate them."
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RSN: Sold for Parts: How One of the US's Most Dangerous Companies Used Immigration Law Against Immigrant Workers Hurt on the Job

The US has a long history of supporting brutal thugs. overthrowing legitimately elected leaders and wondering why people flee. 

The article below, while lengthy, is worth reading in its entirety and sharing. 



EXCERPT:

Thousands of Mayans had been living in Indiantown after fleeing a campaign of violence carried out by the Guatemalan military. More than 200,000 people, most of them Mayan, were killed or forcibly disappeared in the conflict. A report commissioned by the United Nations described instances of soldiers beating children “against walls or throwing them alive into pits,” and covering people “in petrol and burning them alive.” In 1981, in a village of Aguacatán, where many Case Farms workers come from, soldiers rounded up and shot 22 men. They then split their skulls and ate their brains, dumping the bodies into a ravine.

Through the years, the United States had supported Guatemala’s dictators with money, weapons, intelligence and training. Amid the worst of the violence, President Reagan, after meeting with General Efraín Ríos Montt, told the press that he believed the regime had “been getting a bum rap.” The administration viewed the Guatemalan refugees as economic migrants and communist sympathizers — threats to national security. Only a handful received asylum. The Mayans who made it to Florida had limited options.

Beecher arrived at the church in time for Sunday Mass, and set himself up in its office. He had no trouble recruiting parishioners to return with him to the Case Farms plant in Morganton, in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Those first Guatemalans worked so hard, Beecher told the labor historian Leon Fink in his book, “The Maya of Morganton,” that supervisors kept asking for more, prompting a return trip. Soon vans were running regularly between Indiantown and Morganton, bringing in new recruits. “I didn’t want [Mexicans],” Beecher, who died in 2014, told Fink. “Mexicans will go back home at Christmastime. You’re going to lose them for six weeks. And in the poultry business you can’t afford that. You just can’t do it. But Guatemalans can’t go back home. They’re here as political refugees. If they go back home, they get shot.” Shelton approved hiring the immigrants, Beecher said, and when the plant was fully staffed and production had doubled “he was tickled to death.”

The Labor Department, in addition to finding numerous safety violations, fined Cal-Clean, Case Farms’ sanitation contractor, $63,000 for employing four child laborers, including Osiel. The fines and the citationsagainst Case Farms have continued to accumulate. Last September, OSHA determined that the company’s line speeds and work flow were so hazardous to workers’ hands and arms that it should “investigate and change immediately” nearly all the positions on the line. As the company fights the fines, it finds new ways to keep labor costs down. For a time, after the Guatemalan workers began to organize, Case Farms recruited Burmese refugees. Then it turned to ethnic Nepalis expelled from Bhutan, who today make up nearly 35 percent of the company’s employees in Ohio. “It’s an industry that targets the most vulnerable group of workers and brings them in,” Debbie Berkowitz, OSHA’s former senior policy adviser, told me. “And when one group gets too powerful and stands up for their rights they figure out who’s even more vulnerable and move them in.”



Centro San Jose, a social welfare agency and legal clinic in Canton, Ohio, has been swamped the past few years as hundreds of unaccompanied minors have come to the area, fleeing violence in Guatemala. (photo: Hector Emanuel/ProPublica)

Sold for Parts: How One of the US's Most Dangerous Companies Used Immigration Law Against Immigrant Workers Hurt on the Job 
Michael Grabell, ProPublica 
Grabell writes: "One of the most dangerous companies in the U.S. took advantage of immigrant workers. Then, when they got hurt or fought back, it used America's laws against them." 
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http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/43353-sold-for-parts-how-one-of-the-uss-most-dangerous-companies-used-immigration-law-against-immigrant-workers-hurt-on-the-job

RSN: Bill McKibben | It’s Time to Break Free From Fossil Fuels, The US Is Dropping Bombs Quicker Than It Can Make Them

Reader Supported News | 13 April 16

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Bill McKibben | It’s Time to Break Free From Fossil Fuels 
 
Bill McKibben, EcoWatch 
McKibben writes: "This May, people will be joining hands in a new way to step up that fight on the front lines. This May, we’re breaking free from fossil fuels across the globe." 
READ MORE

Police Raid Law Firm at Center of Panama Papers Scandal 
Melanie Eversley, USA Today 
Eversley writes: "Authorities on Tuesday raided the law firm connected to the Panama Papers global corruption scandal. Police officers guarded the perimeter of the offices while prosecutors worked inside." 
READ MORE

Cable News Devotes 30 Seconds to Mass Arrests on Capitol Hill 
Lee Fang and Zaid Jilani, The Intercept 
Excerpt: "During daytime and afternoon news segments, CNN did not devote any coverage to the Democracy Spring actions. MSNBC mentioned the protests for approximately 12 seconds, while Fox News mentioned the arrests and discussed the protests for about 17 seconds." 
READ MORE

The US Is Dropping Bombs Quicker Than It Can Make Them 
Stephen Snyder, Public Radio International 
Snyder writes: "Ongoing air wars in Middle East have caused an unexpected dip in the Pentagon’s stockpile of air-to-ground munitions." 
READ MORE

Bill O'Reilly: Many African-Americans 'Are Ill-Educated and Have Tattoos on Their Foreheads' 
Hanna Trudo, Politico 
Trudo writes: "Bill O’Reilly interrupted Donald Trump’s claims about how he would create jobs for African-Americans on Monday night to make a louder point: That many of them are 'ill-educated and have tattoos on their foreheads.'" 
READ MORE

Elections and Undocumented Immigrants in the United States 
Ilka Oliva Corado, teleSUR 
Oliva writes: "In the United States, undocumented immigrants are as indispensable as cheap labor, but excluded as human beings. They are denied employment benefits and their human rights are abused. Come presidential election time, they become the most precious fodder for the Democratic and Republican parties." 
READ MORE

Top Climate Denier Turns Down $20k Bet From Bill Nye
Graham Readfearn, EcoWatch 
Readfearn writes: "Bill Nye said he was willing to bet Marc Morano, one of America’s most outspoken climate change deniers, that 2016 would be one of the 10 hottest years on record. He also offered a bet the current decade would be the hottest on record." 
READ MORE

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Immigration Process

Ruth Rodriguez

To my friends on FB, those I trust believe in justice, allow me to share something that has been on my mind; especially lately with all the anti immigrants rhetoric, because it is especially those of us immigrants who don't share the right skin tone, usually being the white privilege one, that end up getting the worst treatment.

The next time you hear about "those illegals", you might want to know about a little racket that our government has been carrying on, especially in countries where the majority are poor, and the living conditions border on inhumane.

Here's how the immigration process has been designed by Washington in my country of birth. When a person, heeding our Lady Liberty call "to bring me your tired....", makes the decision to start the process requesting a visa to travel to the United States, applicants must pay a fee of $400.00. That amounts to about $16,000 pesos in my country of birth. That amount is for the application only, it doesn't include all the the documents and the other expenses as well as travel from the countryside to the city where the US consulate is located. In other words, it is a very expensive endeavor, many families end up selling many of their property to gather enough "pesos" to buy dollars, another expense put on poor people.

Now, that's the first step, then you are given an appointment where the US consulate will inform you with a letter of acceptance or rejection. Almost always the first try ends with a rejection, they give no reason why the application was denied, and at bottom of the letter it advises that you may apply a year from the rejection date. Every time one submits an application its the same expenses all over again, and the agony of waiting and hoping this time its a positive response.

Its been reported of cases where people have done this for ten years, (this amounts to about $160,000pesos paid to the US government), some give up, then they are others who out of desperation may listen to some scammer, promising to arrange for legal status, charging sometime as much as thousands of dollars, only to find they have been taken by a scam. Many of the people who apply for visas are decent, law abiding citizens whose only crime is attempting to better their lives and the lives of their families, and in the end, up with little possession and financially starved.

I share this because I believe its time that people view the complexity of this situation. The next time you see an undocumented workers you might consider that that person may have paid his way ten times over. I also think its unfair for our government to have immigration policies that are fair with countries that they choose, like the idea that our Northern borders can enjoy humane immigration policies, while dehumanizing our neighbors from our southern border, this is so wrong and biased..