Author Archives: Danzig

With ballot finalized, county elections will be unopposed – Greenfield Daily Reporter

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HANCOCK COUNTY With the ballot finalized for the 2020 general election, most local elections in Hancock County will be unopposed. The deadline for independent candidates to file passed by on Wednesday, July 15, with no new new candidates, which means county offices will be filled by the Republicans who won in the June primary.

Those candidates include D.J. Davis for Superior Court 1 judge; Dan Marshall for Superior Court 2 judge; John Jessup and Bill Spalding for county commissioner; Kent Fisk, Robin Lowder and Keely Butrum for county council; Jane Klemme for county treasurer; and David Stillinger for county coroner.

Janice Silvey, chair of Hancock Countys Republican Party, said in June she believed the party had a strong field of candidates and was happy with how the election season had turned out.

Without any county-level contested elections, the biggest draw to the polls for most voters will undoubtedly be the presidential election between Republican Donald Trump and his presumptive Democratic opponent, former Vice President Joe Biden. However, there are also a number of other contested elections for state and federal office.

In the state Senate, Republican Mike Crider, R-Greenfield, is running for re-election in District 28. Crider, who was first elected in 2012, previously served as the director of Law Enforcement for the Indiana Department of Natural Resources and is running for his third term.

Criders Democratic opponent is Theresa Bruno, a member of the Warren Park Town Council in eastern Marion County. In a recent interview with the Daily Reporter, Bruno said she is passionate about education as a teacher and about health care as a survivor of a brain aneurysm.

Two of Hancock Countys representatives in the Indiana House of Representatives are running unopposed for reelection: Republicans Bob Cherry (District 53) and Sean Eberhart (District 57).

The race for the District 88 seat, which includes a portion of Hancock County containing Fortville and McCordsville, will be contested. The Republican nominee is Fishers attorney Chris Jeter. The Democratic nominee is Pam Dechert, who lives in the Geist area and works for Blackbaud, a software company that provides services to nonprofits.

Rep. Greg Pence, who represents Indianas 6th Congressional District, which includes Hancock County, is running for a second term. Pence recently told the Daily Reporter his biggest priorities include working to ensure businesses can reopen and the economy can recover from the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, along with his work on transportation and infrastructure issues.

Challenging Pence is Democrat Jeannine Lee Lake, who also ran against him in 2018. Lake is the publisher of The Good News, a publication in Muncie highlighting religious news and minority communities. Lake said she would be an advocate for equality for people of color, women, and LGBT people, along with prioritizing education and infrastructure funding. Libertarian Tom Ferkinhoff, who also sought the seat in 2018, will be on the ballot again as well.

At the state level, Gov. Eric Holcomb, whose executive orders have set state policy throughout the COVID-19 crisis, is up for re-election. Holcomb served as lieutenant governor under Mike Pence before his election to his first term in 2016. The Democratic nominee is Woody Myers, who previously served as the health commissioner for both Indiana and New York City before resuming a career in the private sector. Libertarian Donald G. Rainwater II also will be on the ballot.

The state attorney generals race also will be contested. At their recent convention, Republicans chose Todd Rokita over the scandal-plagued incumbent, Curtis Hill. Rokita served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 2011 to 2019 and as the Indiana secretary of state from 2002 to 2010. His Democratic opponent is Jonathan Weinzapfel, who previously served two terms as the mayor of Evansville and also was a state representative for five years.

The general election will be held on Nov. 3, 2020.

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With ballot finalized, county elections will be unopposed - Greenfield Daily Reporter

Is the 2005 Film ‘V for Vendetta’ About a Virus and Set in 2020? – Truth or Fiction

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Claim

The 2005/2006 film V for Vendetta was set in the year 2020, and its premise was the use of a virus to control populations.

Reporting

On June 21 2020, the Facebook page Cosmic Enlightenment shared the following meme, which claimed that the 2005 filmV for Vendetta was about the use of a virus to control populations and that it was set in the year 2020:

Alongside a still image of a character in the film, text read:

DID YOU KNOW?

A 2005 film titled V for Vendetta is about a totalitarian dictatorship that gains its power by creating a society of fear due to an alleged virus spreading throughout the world. In the film the media pushes fear-based propaganda on the television screen of every household and on the city streets. The authoritarian dictator promises security but not freedom. The constant theme of this is for your safety is repeated throughout the film. Most importantly the film ends with society waking up and the corrupt, fascist regime is dismantled. What year is the film set? 2020

The claim aboutV for Vendettas premise and setting in the year 2020 strongly resembled another, earlier coronavirus prediction rumor that the filmAkira was also prescient about the year 2020:

Did Akira Predict a 2020 Coronavirus Outbreak?

Although the film was in limited release in December 2005,it wasnt released to the United States until March 2006.

A March 2006 review written by Roger Ebert mentions the year 2020 at the start:

It is the year 2020. A virus runs wild in the world, most Americans are dead, and Britain is ruled by a fascist dictator who promises security but not freedom. One man stands against him, the man named V, who moves through London like a wraith despite the desperate efforts of the police. He wears a mask showing the face of Guy Fawkes, who in 1605 tried to blow up the houses of Parliament. On Nov. 5, the eve of Guy Fawkes Day, British schoolchildren for centuries have started bonfires to burn Fawkes in effigy. On this eve in 2020, V saves a young TV reporter named Evey from rape at the hands of the police, forces her to join him, and makes a busy night of it by blowing up the Old Bailey courtrooms.

Of the films basis, Ebert added:

This story was first told as a graphic novel written by Alan Moore and published in 1982 and 1983. Its hero plays altogether differently now, and yet, given the nature of the regime. is he a terrorist or a freedom fighter? Britain is ruled by a man named Sutler, who gives orders to his underlings from a wall-sized TV screen and seems the personification of Big Brother.

A Google search returneddisparate answers about the films chronological setting:

Listicles about the film often didnt mention a specific year for its setting before the 2020 coronavirus pandemic, often vaguely referencinga dystopian future.

Another simple Google search returned a brief synopsis above links to other plot summaries forV for Vendetta, where the virus element isnt emphasized at all:

Following world war, London is a police state occupied by a fascist government, and a vigilante known only as V (Hugo Weaving) uses terrorist tactics to fight the oppressors of the world in which he now lives. When V saves a young woman named Evey (Natalie Portman) from the secret police, he discovers an ally in his fight against Englands oppressors.

In June 2020, Screenrant revisited the plot of the film version ofV for Vendetta, framing it in terms of all that had transpired since 2005:

When the coronavirus pandemic became a worldwide panic, audiences turned to Contagion. During the most recent Black Lives Matter protests, bookshops reported record sales of works by Black authors (while, unfortunately, Netflix noted a sudden uptick in viewer numbers for The Help). Now, as protests continue across America and worldwide in opposition to police brutality against Black citizens and the scourge of systemic racism, it shouldnt surprise us that Netflix has been hyping V For Vendetta.

[]

Part of what keeps the fascistic government of V For Vendettas 1980s Britain in power is a pandemic. A disease known as St. Marys Virus has ravaged Europe and killed over 100,000 people by the time the film starts. It is later revealed that the virus was an act of biological warfare by Creedy, the leader of the ruling Norsefire Party, which was then blamed on a terrorist group. The result of this massacre and subsequent fearmongering was an overwhelming majority in Parliament for Norsefire. Its not exactly difficult to see why a dystopian thriller featuring a pandemic would prove so enticing right now. Its partly why audiences turned in droves to Steven Soderberghs Contagion after the coronavirus became a worldwide concern.

However, that assessment drew from concerns during the timeV for Vendetta was originally written as a graphic novel in the 1980s, and again at the time the adaptation appeared (on the heels of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq):

The key difference, of course, is that Contagion takes a relatively realistic direction in showing how a devastating pandemic would likely originate and unfold worldwide, whereas V For Vendettas pandemic is an act of biological warfare. The latter taps into political concerns that were common in both the late-1980s, when the graphic novel was written, and the mid-2000s, when the movie was made. During the 80s, there was a consistent fear that the Soviet Union would utilize germ warfare against America as part of the ongoing Cold War. The Bush administrations case for invading Iraq in the 2000s rested partly on the assertion that the country had never fully dismantled their biological arsenal, despite the Iraqis own claims that they had long abandoned this project. The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has, as of the writing of this piece, claimed more than 456,000 deaths worldwide, a number that greatly eclipses that of V For Vendettas virus.

Again, that analysis existed through the retrospective lens of authorship in mid-2020, during an active pandemic. By contrast, a 2018 editorial aboutV for Vendettas relevance in that year only uses the word virus once and not in a literal manner referencing the actual virus in the film:

V for Vendetta is not merely a cautionary tale for our countrys political morass or trajectory it is a retelling of events that have, in their fundamental essence, already occurred. Responding to the film a decade ago, Moore savaged the Wachowski sisters adaptation as a Bush-era parable by people too timid to set a political satire in their own country. But as it turns out, the Wachowskis didnt need a CGI shot of the Lincoln Memorial exploding to make enduring commentary on the disease lurking in the heart of the American government. It has been encroaching for many decades now, festering and feeding on the worst bigotries of its citizenry, a virus of greed and inhumanity that has corrupted even the noblest intentions of our liberal democracy. Like Evey, we continue to endure each days fresh traumas, waiting in our cells for a new dawning; waiting for a time when, like Valerie, we will have our roses and apologize to no one; waiting for a day we know can only come after we decide wed rather die behind the chemical sheds than suffer one more injustice.

As is often the case in retroactive assessments of pop-culture predictions, the claim thatV for Vendetta was set in 2020 and was about a virus contained some truth, mashed up with a lot of Monday morning quarterbacking to make it look more prescient for attention and clicks. A virus was a plot element ofV for Vendetta, but the virus was not the films central focus. Moreover, a 2006 review by Roger Ebert placed the film as set in 2020, but most other pre-2020 references dont mention any year (or 2020 specifically). Although the meme wasnt completely fabricated, it was also clearly created with the benefit of hindsight which is, if youll pardon the dad joke, 2020.

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Is the 2005 Film 'V for Vendetta' About a Virus and Set in 2020? - Truth or Fiction

How Black Lives Matter Has Been Coopted by Russia’s Government and Its Opposition – Foreign Policy

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As Black Lives Matter protests spread across the globe, Russia has proven a notable exception. There have been solidarity demonstrations and localized movements against racism and police violence in Helsinki; Almaty, Kazakhstan; and Vilnius, Lithuania; but no such scenes in Moscow. Instead, Russia has used the civil unrest in the United States to continue its history of reflecting the United States most unbecoming aspects on itself. The Russian government and its liberal opposition alike have used their platforms to discredit the relatively peaceful spirit of the demonstrations and project ideas of U.S. weakness. And in doing so, the opposition stands to harm its larger fight against Russian state oppression.

The development of the Russian Lives Matter social media movement is perhaps the strongest example of how the liberal opposition in Russia has unwittingly aided its government in subverting a global anti-racist effort. Russian Lives Matter started after police raided a home in Yekaterinburg and killed a resident on May 31. Since the police shooting, members of Russias libertarian movement, including Libertarian Party leader Mikhail Svetov, have used the hashtag to shed light on Russian police violence against citizens. The hashtag is not a show of solidarity with the internationally known Black Lives Matter movement. Instead, #RussianLivesMatter has been used to undermine the American fight against systemic racism by downplaying the impact of racism against African Americans, by suggesting police killings of Black Americans were deserved, and by framing empathy towards victims of police violence in Russia as a zero-sum game.

The hashtag itself hints at the exclusionary undertones of the movements participants. In a recent podcast interview with the independent Russian media site Meduza, Svetov made clear that his concern was not racism, but police violence against ethnic Russians (a point he drove home by using the word russkie, meaning ethnic Russian, rather than the more all-encompassing rossiyane). Asked whether policing in Russia is influenced by race, Svetov demurred saying it depended on the region, noting that in Chechnya, for example, police violence is focused on Russians. In truth, much Russian police violence is targeted at ethnic minorities and migrants from Central Asia, Africa, and elsewhere, as can be seen in recent cases such as the September 2019 police torture of two Uzbek migrants and the June interrogation of Afro-Russian blogger Mariya Tunkara.

The omission of minorities from the Russian Lives Matter movement coincides with outright dismissals of Black Lives Matter, as Meduza noted, with supporters on Twitter saying things such as I dont give a damn about blacks in America when theyre lynching Russians in Yekaterinburg. Prominent Russian journalist Oleg Kashin added to the racist imagery online by posting a meme of Martin Luther King Jr. surrounded by shoeboxes and cellphone boxes with the text Martin Looter King.

Such racist sentiments have placed members of the Russian opposition in strange proximity to the government. Russian liberals who have vociferously opposed President Vladimir Putins regime are now silent at best and parrot Moscows messaging at worst. Russian liberals such as Ksenia Sobchak, who ran against Putin in 2018, and the high-profile journalist Yulia Latynina have gone a step further, writing articles and creating social media posts that focus on looting, property damage, and a perceived lack of law and order in the United Statesa near mirroring of government media, which portrays U.S. society in a state of chaos. Sobchak recently lost her job as a spokeswoman for Audi after posting a racist tirade on Instagram describing Black Americans as stupid and lazy. Latyninas recent op-ed in Novaya Gazeta compared the Black Lives Matter movement with Ukraines Euromaidan protests to undermine African American complaints of racism. That is why it is ridiculous and shameful to regard these pogroms as rebellion against the system, and to equate the rioters and even peaceful protests with those who really risk their lives when they go to the Maidan or Tiananmen Square. The protests, she wrote, were pogroms and the protesters hooligans.

The language echoes that of Russian state-controlled media. News sites such as RT and Sputnik have published articles decrying the woke mafia and focusing on an alleged rise in crime following demands to defund the police. Even the famous film Brother 2 received a new endingRussian viewers of state-controlled Channel One were surprised to see images of looting and police violence at the U.S. protests juxtaposed with the song Goodbye America.

Moscow, meanwhile, has used the opportunity to undermine U.S. legitimacy at home. In a recent interview, Putin pointed to the U.S. protests and Washingtons mishandling of the COVID-19 pandemic to contrast Russias rigorous law-and-order response.

This instance is hardly the first time Russia has sought to exploit U.S. racial issues, particularly police and civilian violence towards African Americans, for domestic and geopolitical purposes. During the 2016 presidential election, Russian operatives targeted African American communities with disinformation, including posts on police mistreatment of African Americans and posts on Instagram promoting Black women and beauty. The Internet Research Agency also created content on YouTube that focused on the Black Lives Matter movement.

These well-documented efforts demonstrate how systemic racism and police brutality against American civilians and specifically African Americans present a national security problem for the United States. Of course, the genesis of the threat is not Russias meddling, but the United States failure to address centuries-old systemic racism, which hands authoritarian regimes such as Russias an opportunity to undermine U.S. foreign policy in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. When Russia uses state-sanctioned violence against ethnic minorities and political opponents, can the United States project itself as a counter to this regime? As U.S. policymakers learned in the competition against the Soviet Union for influence in the newly independent African states during the 1960s, they cannot successfully promote democratic values abroad when U.S. citizens are denied their rights at home.

With the 2020 election on the horizon, Ukraines pivot toward the European Union, and an impending revision of the Russian Constitution that would extend Putins term limit, it is a critical moment for U.S.-Russia relations. And the failure of Washington to uphold fundamental rights within the United States will endanger the opposition in Russia and elsewhere.

Russias opposition, for its part, has missed a critical chance to build transnational solidarity against police brutality. In using the notoriety of the United States Black Lives Matter slogan and American white supremacy logic to shed light on Russian police brutality and promote ethnic Russian nationalism, opposition members have undermined their own cause. In its eagerness to ignore the role of racism in Russia, the Russian Lives Matter movement has inadvertently stumbled on the same messaging as Putins regime. In the long run, this can only hurt its cause. Putin has no problem using the police and accusations of hooliganism to stop public demonstrations against his regime. Now, Moscow can point to the very logic of the opposition regarding the protests in the United States amid any accusations of state oppression.

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How Black Lives Matter Has Been Coopted by Russia's Government and Its Opposition - Foreign Policy

Raise your glasses and toast booze-biz Jews – The Jewish Star

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By Joel Haber, The Nosher

This may be surprising, but Jews have a long and very influential history in the alcohol industry spanning Europe, Israel and North America.

For most of the 1800s, Eastern European Jews held a virtual monopoly on the business in their regions. They produced much of the beer and hard alcohol, and ran nearly all the taverns where it was sold. Jews had been in the trade for centuries, but when Polish landowners saw they could make 50 percent greater profits by turning grain into alcohol than by selling it for food, Jews seized the chance to play an integral role.

At the time, Polish Jews could neither become nobility nor work the land as peasants. While many Jews turned to trading and peddling, the lords saw a different opportunity. Jews were considered good with business, they reasoned well, and would be unlikely to drink up the product. So, under a leasing system known in Polish as propinacja, Jews were granted exclusive rights to run the alcohol industries.

By the middle of the 19th century, approximately 85 percent of all Polish taverns had Jewish management. Jews similarly dominated the industry in the Pale of Settlement (in todays Ukraine and Belarus), though on a slightly lesser scale.

Jewish participation in the alcohol business was so prevalent that according to Glenn Dynner, author of Yankels Tavern: Jews, Liquor, & Life in the Kingdom of Poland, 30 to 40 percent of Polands Jews (including women and children) worked in the industry. Thats an impressive statistic by itself, but considering that approximately three-quarters of world Jewry lived in Eastern Europe at the time, that amounts to about 25 percent of all Jews in the world!

But the 19th century seems to have been a peak time for Jewish involvement in alcohol worldwide.

In Hungary, we encounter many Jewish families prominently involved in wine production. The Zimmermans, for example, were among the famous and award-winning producers of Tokaj wine. (Their pre-Holocaust winery is now owned by one of the regions top producers.) Similarly, the Herzog family produced such high-quality wine (alongside their beer and spirits) that Emperor Franz Josef appointed them his exclusive wine suppliers.

In Germany and France, meanwhile, Jews were dragging the local alcohol industries into the modern age. In France, Jewish wine producers were vertically integrating into sales as well, while in Germany, Jews created the first industrial-scale breweries.

Across the Atlantic, German Jewish immigrants to the United States were disproportionately represented in alcohol production. In Jews and Booze: Becoming American in the Age of Prohibition, Marni Davis points out that they primarily focused on distilling whiskey due to its nationalistic significance. Those who bought and drank whiskey championed it as a deeply American product.

Simultaneously, back in Ottoman Palestine, wine production was returning for the first time in hundreds of years. Though ancient Israel was well known as a wine-producing region, hundreds of years of rule by Muslims (for whom alcohol is forbidden) turned the industry into little more than a memory. But when more Jews began immigrating and joining the small community that was already living there, the cultivation of grapes gradually returned.

In 1848, the Shor family opened a winery in the Old City of Jerusalem, adjacent to the Temple Mount itself. They were joined in the business in 1870 by the Tepperbergs and in 1889 by the winery later to be known as Carmel. These laid the groundwork for the booming wine industry that exists in Israel today.

Why were so many Jews prominently involved in the alcohol business during the 19th century? It was a period of transition in the world, with industrialization leading (among other things) to a big increase in alcohol production and consumption. At the same time, the old persecution of Jews had removed many other income sources, leaving Jews with few other ways to make a living. So part of the answer may be that, as had been the case so many other times throughout history, Jews simply took advantage of whatever opportunities they had, and succeeded.

Jews rapidly left the business toward the centurys end, thanks to both increased competition and government oppression, leaving this chapter in our history largely forgotten. Furthermore, even while Jews were prominent in the industry, there was an internal stigma against Jewish involvement in a profession that was seen as less than honorable and at times required the use of some loopholes to remain in compliance with Jewish law. In other words, the Jewish community also forgot because it wanted to forget.

Interestingly, however, many common Jewish surnames today indicate a connection to the alcohol profession: Kaback, Kratchmer, Schenkman, Korczak, Vigoda, Winick and Bronfman, to name a few. Plus, many of the alcohol businesses run by 19th-century Jews still exist, including the Israeli wineries, Loewenbrau Brewery, Herzog Winery and Fleischmanns Spirits.

While the legacy of Jews role in the alcohol business may be partly forgotten, the impact is far from gone.

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Raise your glasses and toast booze-biz Jews - The Jewish Star

Yorko: All of Lansing must work to protect Black, Indigenous and other people of color – Lansing State Journal

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Jessica Yorko, guest writer Published 12:18 p.m. ET July 16, 2020 | Updated 12:18 p.m. ET July 16, 2020

Jessica Yorko(Photo: Courtesy photo)

A palpable power shift is underway in our nation and community. We stand at the precipice of bending the arc of the universe towards justice for centuries to come.

Listen and you will hear grief, frustration, exhaustion, pain and uncertainty. Look and you will see courage in the face of great risk, soul searching, glimmers of reckonings and comeuppances, healing spaces for people harmed by anti-Blackness and refrains of Time's Up on Racism.

You will also see head-ducking, blame-shifting and doubling down on racism.

When we look back on this moment in history, what will we say about the role we played? Did we bear witness to pain and injustices that have gone unseen and unheard for far too long? Did we amplify the truths being elevated in this moment? Did we create accountability to Black, Indigenous and other people of color in all levels of government and society?

How are we, as white individuals, taking responsibility for harms we have caused to Black people and other people of color, regardless of intent? Do we have the humility and resilience to hear things that need to be said while working towards reconciliation and reparation? How do we listen and truly value the myriad Black and brown voices and lives in our community loud and quiet; rich and poor; queer and straight; transgender, non-binary and cis-gender; office-holders and private citizens; young and old?

Are we willing to talk about eliminating government-sanctioned use of captivity and lethal force against fellow humans?

Are we willing to re-envision government so it no longer includes institutions created to keep people in captivity? Captivity that, per the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, allows for the ongoing, legalized use of free labor (also known as slavery) among incarcerated peoplewho are disproportionately Black and brown?

What are our reservations, fears and concerns about eliminating vestiges and tools of human enslavement in our nation?

Lansing can seize this moment to abolish and restructure the systems that repress, subjugate, terrorize and murder Black and brown people. Lansing residents are leading a movement that re-envisions government structures, policies and budgets to eliminate racial oppression.

When you look back on this moment, what will you say about your role? Were you an accomplice in eliminating human enslavement? Or are you a sympathizer with those fighting to maintain the status quo of legal enslavement and use of deadly force against fellow humans?

I implore the people of this city, elected and otherwise, to look deep within themselves, seize this moment and work together until thatbright day of justice emerges.

The status quo has never been good enough. We owe it to ourselves and to each other to do better.We have a clear road map and mandate to do better. Followingthat road map is not only the work ofBlack and brown people. It is incumbent upon each of us to seize this moment and bend the arc toward justice.

Jessica Yorko isLansing residentwho served as a member of the Lansing City Council from 2010-2017.

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Yorko: All of Lansing must work to protect Black, Indigenous and other people of color - Lansing State Journal

Letter: Confederate monuments, the fake news of the time – Mountain Xpress

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[In response to Confederate Monuments Remind Us of Our History, June 24, Xpress:] When this controversy over people wanting to remove Confederate statues in the South first crossed my radar, I really knew nothing about it. Up until that point, I didnt even realize our country had many hundreds of these statues of Confederate generals and the like.

Hearing protesters wanting them removed, claiming they glorify not only racism, but the slavery of Black people, I could very much see where they were coming from. I can understand how these statues could be offensive to people, but why do we have hundreds of Confederate monuments throughout the Southern United States in the first place? As far as I can tell, the Civil War was about the Southern states, the Confederacy, wanting to keep slavery in place, whereas the rest of the country had come to terms with the fact that slaverys f**ked up and, like, we should probably stop doing that. The Confederacy was trying to secede from the United States of America and keep slavery alive. Fortunately, the Confederacy lost the Civil War, the states were reabsorbed back into the Union, and slavery was outlawed throughout the land.

So given the history, why the bleep are there people upset that these statues are coming down, and why were they even erected in the first place?

You got to love the internet I was able to look up a video by Vox on YouTube that breaks this part of the history down really well. Turns out there was this effort about 30 years after the war by a group of wealthy Southern elites under the name of the United Daughters of the Confederacy to propagandize to the youth in schools and erect all of these Confederate statues and monuments to sort of rewrite history, painting the South as fallen victims of big government oppression. Unbelievable stuff really, but these are the facts. I highly recommend checking out the Vox video on this called How Southern Socialites Rewrote Civil War History or look up the Wikipedia page on the United Daughters of the Confederacy or the Lost Cause of the Confederacy.

So, the next time someone says that removing these statues is erasing their history, ask them what history theyre talking about, because the history the statues and monuments are meant to represent pretends that the Civil War wasnt about slavery (kind of like denying the Holocaust) and by leaving the statues up, theyre promoting this falsified propagandized version of history, or as I loathe to refer to it: Fake news!#doyourresearch.

David AylwardAsheville

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Letter: Confederate monuments, the fake news of the time - Mountain Xpress

Myanmar urged to drop criminal complaint against HR defend… – United News of Bangladesh

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Fortify Rights on Thursday said Myanmar authorities should immediately drop criminal complaints against Maung Saungkhapoet and co-founder of human rights group Athanfor urging the government to lift internet restrictions in Rakhine and Chin states.The Kyauktada Township Court in Yangon opened the trial on July 7 and held its second hearing on July 14.At the 44th session of the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva this week, the new U.N. Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar, Thomas Andrews, expressed concern that freedom of expression in Myanmar appeared to be shrinking ahead of national elections scheduled for November 8.Special Rapporteur Andrews called on Myanmar to amend laws that have been used to violate freedoms of expression and assembly.The Government cut the internet in conflict-affected areas of Rakhine and Chin states and continues to prosecute human rights defenders who have called for lifting internet restrictions, which is a double violation of human rights, Maung Saungkha told Fortify Rights by phone.On July 14, Kyauktada Township Police Captain Myo Thet testified to the court that 27-year-old Maung Saungkha organized a protest and displayed a banner with others in Yangon in violation of Section 19 of the Peaceful Assembly and Peaceful Procession Law (PAPPL), which requires advanced notice to hold a protest.The charge carries a sentence of up to three months imprisonment and/or 30,000 Myanmar Kyat (US$20) in fines.During the first court hearing on July 7, the prosecutor submitted a list of six witnesses to the court. The court hearings are set to continue on July 21.On June 21, on the one-year anniversary of the internet shutdown in Rakhine and Chin states, activists unfurled a Burmese-language banner over the Sule overpass bridge in downtown Yangon, reading, Is the internet being shut down to hide war crimes and killing people?Citing the banner, on June 22, Police Captain Myo Thet filed a complaint alleging violations of Section 19 of PAPPL against Maung Saungkha.The complaint, which Fortify Rights has seen, alleges four other people were involved in unfurling the banner but only identifies Maung Saungkha.The Kyaukdata Township police apprehended Maung Saungkha on July 3 and brought him to the Kyauktada Township Court, which granted him bail. Criticizing government policies is protected under human rights law, said Matthew Smith, Chief Executive Officer of Fortify Rights.The internet blackout is wholly disproportionate. The government should immediately drop this and similar cases, amend the peaceful assembly law, and lift the internet ban, especially ahead of national elections in November.In recent weeks, Myanmar authorities have brought similar criminal complaints against other human rights defenders involved in protesting the internet blackout in Rakhine and Chin states.On June 21, Ramree Township Police Major Zaw Win filed a case against Myo Min Tun, a youth leader with the Ramree Township Youth Network, for allegedly holding a protest without informing the authorities beforehand in which he called on the Myanmar government to lift the internet shutdown.Police officers apprehended Myo Min Tun at his home on June 25 and brought him to the police station. On the same day, the Ramree Township Court charged him with violating Section 19 of PAPPL.On June 25, the Court sentenced him to 15 days imprisonment and/or a fine of Myanmar Kyat 20,000 (about US$14). Myo Min Tun chose to pay the fine.On June 21, in Kyaukphyu Township, a police officer brought a criminal complaint against Min Za Aung, 32, and Nay Soe Khaing, 31ethnic Rakhine/Arakanese human rights defenders involved in the Arakan National Partys Youth Affairs Committee and the Coral Child New Generation Youth Groupfor posting photos of themselves on social media wearing T-shirts that read End Internet Oppression.

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Myanmar urged to drop criminal complaint against HR defend... - United News of Bangladesh

Letters To The Editor: July 16, 2020 – The Rhino TImes

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What Will You Do?

Dear Editor,

I already know Im going to be called a wild eyed, tin foil hat wearing, Area 51 has aliens, whack job conspiracy theorist. So go ahead and get it out of your system Ill wait. (Jeopardy music plays.)

Ok, now on to my point. If and/or when the civilized society we used to have in this country, when they get their way and law enforcement becomes history and some organization made up of social justice warriors responds to whatever replaces the 911 system, what will you do? What will you do when socialist/communist/leftist/progressive community block captains patrol your neighborhood with the authority to dictate what you can and cannot do and how you must think? What will you do when your own children are recruited into junior socialist/communist/leftist/progressive social clubs and organizations created and run by government officials? And their first lesson will be how to watch, listen and report anyone speaking or acting contrary to what the government says is the proper words or deeds?

What action will you take? Will you roll over, cave in and become a drone? Will you hunker down and do whatever Big Brother says is the right thing? Or will you join with likeminded people and stand against the transformation of America, fighting to keep it from becoming a third world dump?

Ilhan Omar, a member of the witchs coven known as The Squad, has declared she wants to dismantle our social and economic system because of oppression. Think about this for a minute. This is a women who is being investigated for possibly entering this country illegally by marrying her own brother. She fled Somalia, a quintessential third world slum and cesspool where armed militias working for dictatorial warlords who prop up a farcical puppet government run things. She manages to BS her way into the Congress and almost immediately begins advocating for turning our nation into a clone of the garbage heap laughingly called a country she ran from. The only difference would be she would now be one of the warlords.

Im fearing the day that the transformation happens and what used to be called the United States of America could be renamed the Nation of Black Lives Matters (NBLM). The Stars and Stripes replaced by a clinched fist superimposed over a yellow star on a red field NBLM emblazoned on it.

I have a favorite saying: Planning doesnt cost you anything.

Alan Marshall

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Letters To The Editor: July 16, 2020 - The Rhino TImes

This 7-Year Old Just Delivered a Trailer Full of COVID-19 Supplies to the Oglala Sioux Tribe – Global Citizen

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Why Global Citizens Should Care

When Cavanaugh Bell went on a road trip to Mount Rushmore with his mom two years ago, they passed the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, home to the Oglala Sioux Tribe, on the way.

Bell asked his mom some questions about the Indigenous people who lived there, and when his mom described the widespread poverty and lack of basic resources on the reservation, he knew he wanted to help out.

Bell, now 7, delivered a 53-foot trailer full of essential supplies to Pine Ridge Reservation on Tuesday to help the community get through the COVID-19 pandemic. He also started a crowdfunding campaign for the tribe that has raised $1,075 toward its goal of $6,500.

With my community pantry and the great people that donate to it, I knew it was the best time to help Pine Ridge right now, especially as they try to stop the spread of COVID on the reservation, Bell told Global Citizen.

The trailer, which Bells parents drove from Maryland to South Dakota, was filled with cleaning supplies, non-perishable food items, and gently worn clothes and shoes that people donated.

The supplies could prove essential to a community that has little access to essential goods stores.

Cavanaugh Bell carrying supplies to the trailer; Cool & Dope

When the COVID-19 pandemic emerged, it soon became clear that Indigenous people in the United States and the world were being disproportionately impacted by the virus.

The Oglala Sioux tribe has ordered multiple lockdowns over the past several weeks to contain the spread of the virus. So far, around 100 people out of a population of 25,000 have contracted COVID-19.

Medical facilities throughout the reservation are understaffed and under-resourced, and the main hospital is contaminated with black mold, according to the publication Argus Leader. In fact, black mold pervades the entire community roughly 60% of homes on the reservation are contaminated with the toxic mold creating a chronic health crisis.

Related Stories May 22, 2020 The Navajo Nation's Lack of Clean Water Has Fueled a COVID-19 Crisis

The evidence of structural neglect by the federal government runs deeper.

A lot of their houses, 33% exactly, don't have running water or electricity, Bell told Global Citizen over email. They also only have one store they can go to, which is really far for a lot of the people who don't have cars.

While Bell is only 7, he figured he could play a part in supporting the tribe through his nonprofit,Cool & Dope.

The young activist started his advocacy career after being bullied in school. In 2019, Bell and his parents started Cool & Dope to help raise awareness of the prevalence of bullying and call for laws against the issue.

Cavanaugh Bell standing in front of the trailer; Cool & Dope

He has the ambitious goal of ending bullying worldwide by 2030.

So far, hes met with lawmakers throughout Maryland and won a few local victories. In Montgomery County, October is designated as Bullying Prevention month because of Bells advocacy.

Related Stories May 21, 2020 COVID-19 Is Devastating Worlds Indigenous Communities Beyond the Immediate Health Threat

Cool & Dope is helping other kids find their inner activist, too, by creating volunteering opportunities and allowing them to start their own anti-bullying initiatives.

I always say that people can have an impact, no matter their age, he said. And, I really know that when kids put their mind to it, we can accomplish anything. I would tell other kids to find things that they can do to make the world a better place and go for it.

Bells decision to help the Pine Ridge Reservation grew out of this passion for helping those who are mistreated. In the case of the Oglala Sioux Tribe, that mistreatment takes place on the structural level and takes the form of systemic oppression.

But he hopes that by bringing attention to the injustices facing the Pine Ridge Reservation, it can help generate momentum for long-lasting change.

Related Stories July 9, 2020 These Gorgeous Photos of Indigenous Life Are Helping Communities Fight COVID-19

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This 7-Year Old Just Delivered a Trailer Full of COVID-19 Supplies to the Oglala Sioux Tribe - Global Citizen

Gordon frustrated by ‘cavalier’ coronavirus attitudes – The Torrington Telegram

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GILLETTE As some vocal Wyoming residents continue to lose patience with and push back against any and all coronavirus-related public health measures, its clear Gov. Mark Gordon also is frustrated.

Gordons frustration comes from that resistance and what he calls a cavalier and irresponsible attitude toward COVID-19 and preventing its spread.

As an example, during a Wednesday afternoon press briefing, he cited a number of emails he received recently after an older Sweetwater County resident was named as the states 22nd confirmed virus-related death.

I got some email I really dont appreciate, the governor said. When somebody sends me a note that says, Well, these people were going to die anyway, theyre just dying earlier, Im sick and tired of that.

Gordon said he has gotten a number of very strange emails from people that I think if I met them on the street probably wouldnt feel that way.

He said one email went so far as to insinuate those whove died from COVID-19 were lucky because theyre now meeting the Lord.

The governor bristled that some would use that as an excuse to not wear a face mask when prudent or discount the danger of the virus for vulnerable populations like older people.

Assisting you meeting the Lord isnt part of the deal, he said.

That the spread of the coronavirus has picked up again in Wyoming also is concerning, Gordon said. But in many cases he believes people letting down their guard or just getting tired of following public health recommendations is contributing to the increase.

As of Thursday, the Wyoming Department of Health is reporting 1,605 lab-confirmed cases of COVID-19 along with 380 probable cases. Of those lab-confirmed cases, 1,211 have recovered and there are 394 active cases.

In Campbell County, the WDH is reporting 74 lab-confirmed cases and 19 probables. Of those combined 93 cases, 70 have recovered and 23 are active.

Our numbers are ticking up, he said. What was concerning to me is we started July right around 150-260 (active) cases and that bounced up close to 400.

Its concerning. Its not dire at this point, but its very concerning.

Along those lines of being vigilant and responsible, Gordon reiterated his plea for residents to wear face coverings when out in public and social distancing cant be maintained. He also urges people to respect the decisions of private businesses that require customers to wear face masks.

Gordon said he doesnt understand the uproar over large big-box retailers like Menards and Walmart instituting policies that shoppers must wear masks in their stores.

While many of those opposed cite oppression of their rights and the U.S. Constitution, those who do are just plain wrong and off-base, the governor said.

Rights imply responsibility and people need to take responsibility, he said. There is no constitutional right to go infect somebody else. There is no constitutional right to go and put somebody else in harms way.

Along with public safety, he said the anger and vitriol aimed at those businesses is contrary to one of the most basic of Republican tenants: private property rights.

We are seeing (these policies) from private employers, and its their constitutional right, Gordon said. If I have a private business and I make a decision, thats my constitutional right. If you have a problem with that, go somewhere else.

While he urges people to respect the decisions of private businesses (even if they disagree), the governor also said he is not particularly inclined to order people wear masks in public as other states have done.

There have been some obnoxious individuals about wearing masks, he said. You have to understand what the damn constitution says. Those Republican principles we count on are ones we ought to be respecting.

The governor also said he and the Legislature have a lot of work to do to make deep cuts in the next biennium state budget, which is expected to be at least $750 million and as much as $1.5 billion short.

Hes already tasked departments to identify 10% they can cut from their budgets, but that wont be nearly enough to cover an expected 30% drop in revenues, Gordon said.

Put simple, we dont have enough income, he said. We lost roughly a third of what we count on to pay our bills for every program in the state. One third is gone.

Coal continues to be under enormous pressure and the oil and gas industries also are nearly at a halt with only one rig operating in the state now. Last year at this time there were 33 active rigs working.

He said using the states rainy day fund is only a Band-Aid approach and would only buy the state one year before making severe cuts.

Besides, Gordon said, its his job to balance the budget even if its difficult and means cutting programs and jobs.

I have to reduce what our expenditures are, he said. I have to cut the budget to make sure that we have a balanced budget.

There is no part of government that isnt feeling the pain.

He said that in 1998, the state had a little over 10,000 full-time-equivalent employees. Now thats down to 7,000, a testament to the kind of lean government Wyoming has done.

Thats not enough anymore.

Gordon said programs will have to be cut, which means jobs. He also said a program of furloughs will be happen. One hes already announced is state workers making more than $55,000 a year will have to take on unpaid day off a month.

I dont particularly like it but thats our state of affairs, he said.

He also addressed recent criticism he and state officials have taken for Wyoming bidding to buy land and other assets from Occidental Petroleum. While the amount of the bid hasnt been made public, Gordon said the money to buy those assets are part of the states investment portfolio and is only for use to advance investments for Wyoming.

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Gordon frustrated by 'cavalier' coronavirus attitudes - The Torrington Telegram

Free Speech and Due Process | 106.3 WORD – 106.3 WORD

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Released by SC AG Wilson.

(COLUMBIA, S.C.) South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilsontoday joined a 15-state legal brief filed with the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, urging the court to allow the Department of Education to reaffirm Title IXs commitment to protecting students from actual harassment while respecting free speech and fair process.

The Department of Educations Final Rule bolsters the anti-discrimination purposes of Title IX without infringing free speech or due process rights.

We think that some colleges and the U.S. Department of Education have been so intent on getting rid of anything offensive from campus that theyve trampled on the rights of students to free speech and due process, Attorney General Wilson said. Schools dont have to make a choice between fighting sexual harassment and protecting constitutional rights; we think they can do both.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton led the 15-state effort and said, Academic institutions cannot deprive students of their constitutional rights to free speech, due process, or fair trial. The Final Rule provides robust protection for individual rights where previous regulations and guidance failed. The Supreme Court has long recognized that students subject to disciplinary proceedings are entitled to due process, as is every American citizen.

Without safeguards, academic institutions can and have eschewed due process and imposed life-altering consequences on students without affording them the opportunity to defend themselves.

The vast majority of colleges and universities currently deny students the right to present evidence or cross-examine witnesses, and less than half require that fact-finders be impartial during investigations.

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Free Speech and Due Process | 106.3 WORD - 106.3 WORD

[RECAP] Free Speech and Black Lives on Campus – PEN America

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NEW YORKOn June 17, PEN America hosted Free Speech and Black Lives on Campus, a roundtable webinar organized in response to the recent protests that have galvanized a national call to conscience regarding the persistent challenges of racism and anti-Black violence in the United States. Panelists discussed how these events have reverberated throughout college and university communities, surfacing a series of urgent issues pertaining to racism in higher education and the actions university administrators must take to address these issues.

Moderated by PEN America Director of Campus Free Speech Jonathan Friedman, panelists included Neijma Celestine-Donnor (Director of Bias Incident Support Services, University of Maryland), Shard M. Davis (professor at the University of Connecticut, and cofounder of #BlackintheIvory), Jael Kerandi (Undergraduate Student Body President, University of Minnesota), Dinaw Mengestu (award-winning author and Professor of Written Arts, Bard College, and PEN America Trustee), and Joy Melody Woods (Ph.D. student, University of Texas at Austin, and cofounder of #BlackintheIvory). These excerpts from the conversation have been edited for clarity.

JONATHAN FRIEDMAN: The hashtag #BlackInTheIvory has released a floodgate of information. Can you talk us through some of the stories that youre hearingis it surprising? Is it not surprising? Is it what you expected?

SHARD M. DAVIS: The stories really run the gamut from physical assault against Black graduate studentsinvasion of their space, touching their hair without permissionto racial microaggressions, which are unfortunately very covert in nature. So, its really difficult for you to be able to identify and then articulate those microaggressions to an aggressor that what they are doing and saying is problematic. To be honest, Im not surprised. Just like many other #BlackInTheIvory truth-tellers, I see myself in almost every story.

JOY MELODY WOODS: My own experiences with higher education have not lived up to the expectations of an equitable, inclusive community. I think the equitable and inclusive things have been anomalies. This didnt go against my expectations. Ive been to multiple institutions, and Im not walking through the world with rose-colored glasses. I come into places with the thought process that this is possible; it could happen; it has happened before.

The stories really run the gamut from physical assault against Black graduate studentsinvasion of their space, touching their hair without permissionto racial microaggressions, which are unfortunately very covert in nature. . . Just like many other #BlackInTheIvory truth-tellers, I see myself in almost every story.Shard M. Davis

FRIEDMAN: People have conceived of higher education as a place that is apart from societya place for progress, openness, equity, offering an opportunity for people to get ahead in life. Have these institutions or schools in general gotten better at fighting racism since you were a child?

DINAW MENGESTU: I would say that the idea that these institutions are these seemingly idyllic bastions of liberal good values has been an idea that a lot of people are skeptical of if you were ever a minority college student. I dont think you ever forget those experiences. Faculty members arent able to convince you that the world is significantly better or has changed. So, Ive never had that delusional idea that entering academia would somehow wash away any racial problems. What is interesting, though, is how academic institutions see themselves as being forces for good or on the forefront of social change. However, this idea of what they are makes it that much harder for academic institutions to realize how far they fall short of living up to those ideals. So when youre inside of these institutions, to be able to sort of say, I know you may believe youre as good as you think you are, but in fact, theres this yawning or extremely wide gap between those ideas and whats actually practiced by the part of the faculty, the students, and all the people going into the maintenance of the institution.

Its my everyday life. Its walking down the street. Its going to the store. . . It is those instances that perpetuate this idea that everything is okay, or that we are operating in this normative that is appropriate or fair to Black students.Jael Kerandi

FRIEDMAN: One of the biggest issues is the way speech and hateful speech can have significant harms. Overtly racist and hateful acts really do disrupt and destabilize Black students lives. Could you speak to your own views of that and how youve tried to address it?

NEIJMA CELESTINE-DONNOR: My literal job is to respond to hate/bias incidents on campus. What I see that a lot of people dont always see is the impact, and the significant harm that it causes to students of color and other marginalized folks. We see that even in instances where something may happen to the person who did the particular action or caused the particular harm, theres lifelong harm that continues to sit with the people who have been impacted. Harm from slurs, harm from all of these microaggressions. . . and what were doing is trying to support folks putting their lives back together. One of the things we try to preach and emphasize is that the legality of an action has nothing to do with its harm.

JAEL KERANDI: Its my everyday life. Its walking down the street. Its going to the store. Its taking a walk. Its going on a run. Its making sure my brother gets home. Its making sure that when my dad leaves in the middle of the night, that he makes it back home. It is those instances that perpetuate this idea that everything is okay, or that we are operating in this normative that is appropriate or fair to Black students. At the end of the day, we are tuition-paying students. Education is a service. We are paying money into these institutions, and we deserve to hold them accountable to the values that they say on their websites.

Until we look at the foundations of these institutions that kept us out, and we had to fight to be here to get an education, we are going to keep having these conversations.Joy Melody Woods

FRIEDMAN: When we rewind the clock and we think about how society visualizes discrimination in, lets say, the 1950s, its very clear there is discriminationthe horrific videos and efforts to desegregate schools was very visceral and visible. However, racism that manifests today can be more invisible, so theres a disconnect between what we think of as racismsomething left in the pastand everyday racism now.

WOODS: Thinking of the 1950sand for some reason, people have this disconnect in thinking that it was so long agosome of these people who have these visceral, vile reactions to desegregation are parents and professors. Sure, we arent blocking Black and Brown bodies from coming into the institution, but those people are still in power and have created these systems. Until we look at the foundations of these institutions that kept us out, and we had to fight to be here to get an education, we are going to keep having these conversations. We need to look at the names of thingsbuildings, stadiums, benches, scholarshipsnames mean things. Until we look at that, we are going to continue around that mountain of how this invisibility is happening. Its very visible, but the system is set up to make it seem invisible.

KERANDI: I think people have thought that the blatant segregation has lost its effect or our schools are integrated and now were okay. In reality, when we look back at the 1930s when redlining was birthed by President Roosevelt and look at how it put students into different neighborhoods, we see that those families stayed in those neighborhoods and built communities, but the schools that were built around these communities were not ready to prepare these students for college or not given the resources to provide a good education. This perpetuates, and those students go to these high schools and middle schools that are underfunded, under-resourced weve been defunding education for yearsand they go on to college and dont feel as career-ready. Its cyclical. Segregation and redlining, we still see them having an effect on our communities todaytheyre still present. That impact is still very heavy today. Theyre very systemic things in our cities and states and local officials are still doing to perpetuate this forward. I think we also have to recognize that its still very inherent in our systems. You can still find deeds that still say white-only. People need to recognize that its everywhere, and it moves and it pushes unless we say right now that were going to pivot history. It cannot just be Black people saying, This is what we feel. Weve gone far beyond acknowledgements. If you refuse to acknowledge, you are simply choosing to ignore facts at this point. And thats when telling institutions that acknowledgement statements are not actions. . . We need to move beyond that. Action has to be made.

You cannot have a discussion on free speech without a discussion about power. The way free speech works on campus is that those that hold power have more access to free speech and more resources to engage in free speech.Neijma Celestine-Donnor

FRIEDMAN: What does it mean in even the ivory towers of forethought and social progress that these vestiges of racism could be so deeply visible?

WOODS: I think of the names of some of the buildings on campus here. Theyre there because someone gave them money, and if we change that name, are we losing money? Were looking at people afraid to lose money, which they have shown us that they are more afraid to lose money than they do our bodies. That was seen with the Ohio State football players today signing theyre accepting any risk of getting COVID so they can play. I dont know those players, but its really scary that were asking people to even sign something like that, and it all goes down to money. Until we have an ethical and moral repositioning which goes to getting people out of power, we will still be looking at these things that are so visible.

CELESTINE-DONNOR: I feel like these folks putting out statements and changing their products are very performative. I dont know if these people care about our lives and our bodies. Weve been talking about these things being problematic for years and for months, so for people to be doing it at this timein this moment where all eyes are on youmakes me think that this is very performative. I wonder what is going to happen moving forward, when the eyes are no longer on you.

DAVIS: It is absolutely performative. In this day and age, in the era of cancel culture, no one wants to be deemed as the racist or to lose dollars or endorsements or sponsors by having racist symbols that are attached to their company. No president wants their university in the national news because they didnt make a statement or acknowledge anti-Blackness rhetoric or they didnt acknowledge some racist event that happened on campus, so it is performative. I think that it is a performance because people want to make sure that they keep their pockets lined. They can still move forward in whatever business that they have.

Oftentimes, when youre being critical of the way that free speech is employed. . . that isnt because youre trying to necessarily take away free speech, but youre acknowledging an inherent power difference. Were not coming to free speech with a level playing field. We need a representation of values on campusthe values of Black academics and Black studentsand ensure that those ideas and those experiences are valued to the same degree.Dinaw Mengestu

FRIEDMAN: As Black members of academic communities on campus, do you feel that free speech as a concept has been something that has been an ally to this cause? Has it been equitably upheld?

CELESTINE-DONNOR: You cannot have a discussion on free speech without a discussion about power. The way free speech works on campus is that those that hold power have more access to free speech and more resources to engage in free speech. I think that, while free speech can be an ally to marginalized folks, when marginalized folks engage in counter-speech, they arent seen as exercising their own free speech. Instead, they are seen as attacking free speech. I think the ways we see free speech are deeply rooted in anti-Blackness and white supremacy. If it wasnt, free speech could be an ally, and when marginalized folks use their voices, it would not be seen as an attack on free speech. When the First Amendment was created, it was not created for people who look like us.

MENGESTU: Oftentimes, when youre being critical of the way that free speech is employed or say that youre using free speech in order to attack or threaten or minimize somebodys existence, is to acknowledge that isnt because youre trying to necessarily take away from free speech, but youre acknowledging an inherent power difference. Were not coming to free speech with a level playing field. We need a representation of values on campusthe values of Black academics and Black studentsand ensure that those ideas and those experiences are valued to the same degree. When we get to that point, then we can argue more about what free speech can actually look like.

FRIEDMAN: When so much hateful and denigrating expression is protected speech by the First Amendment, particularly at a public university, how can universities confront it in ways that dont infringe on peoples right to free speech but also acknowledge the harm that speech has on other students?

CELESTINE-DONNOR: You can acknowledge someone has the right to free speech but engage in moral leadership and denounce the concepts. What I see happening is that there is this fear that if I speak out against this hateful action, then Im speaking out against this persons right of free speech, and I actually think that is sort of cowardly. I want leaders of our institutions to engage in moral leadership and stop acting as though there are two sides. When we consider both sides, we are saying that these ideas can be equal on their merits. But theres no two sides when it comes to murder, or anti-Black racism.

MENGESTU: One of the challenges to how we respond to hateful speech is that it constantly evolves. Sometimes, hate speech announces itself very clearly, but other times it will happen in quiet ways. The question isnt to restrict speech, but how you make sure that people that are actually affected by it actually can acknowledge it and address it and speak to it in a way that doesnt actually leave them silent. My recognition and anger at hateful speech should not be seen as a threat to speech, but as a rightful and righteous response to that type of language. Im exercising my same right.

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[RECAP] Free Speech and Black Lives on Campus - PEN America

No, Cancel Culture Isn’t a Threat to Civilization – Bloomberg

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Pankaj Mishra is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. His books include Age of Anger: A History of the Present, From the Ruins of Empire: The Intellectuals Who Remade Asia, and Temptations of the West: How to Be Modern in India, Pakistan, Tibet and Beyond.

Trump is the foremost proponent of silencinghis critics.

Photographer: Scott Olson/Getty Images

Photographer: Scott Olson/Getty Images

A specter is haunting Western democracies. No, it is not the surging pandemic, mass death or catastrophic unemployment. It is, if you believe Donald Trump and some of his critics, the end of free speech and the advent of cancel culture.

Trump defined the new menace to civilization in his speech at Mount Rushmore, claiming that far-left fascists were driving people from their jobs, shaming dissenters and demandingtotal submission from anyone who disagrees.

Days later,a group of well-known writers including Salman Rushdie and J.K. Rowlingpublished an open letter in Harpers magazine agreeing that the forces of illiberalism were rampant on the left as well as the right, and that the free exchange of information and ideas, the lifeblood of a liberal society, is daily becoming more constricted.

Given the bizarre timing and nature of the complaint, it does not feel rude to ask: What are they on about?

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Institutions and businesses have long been able to fire employees at will. A few may have acted even more hastily in recent months out of fear of being publicly shamed, or the desire to appear in tune with the anti-racist zeitgeist.

But the handful of firings on political grounds, which neither Trump nor his critics care to specify, are dwarfed by the immense human tragedy unfolding before our eyes: hundreds of millions of people losing their jobs and dignity for no fault of their own.

Moreover, free speech has never been more widely available than it is today. So much so that the cacophony of voices liberated by digital media too frequently drowns out well-informed and sensible opinion. Trump, who blurts out several hot takes every day, is himself an example of the verbal incontinence enabled by Twitter in recent years.

It is also true that historians, economists and sociologists are able to hold Twitter discussions of a quality that shames much of what appears in the pages of major newspapers and magazines.

This is not to say that speech has become restricted in the traditional media. After nearly 25 years of publishing in a broad ideological range of mainstream journals and specialist periodicals, I can attest that conversations about almost everything, from political economy and international relations to literature and gender relations, have never been more vibrant. Nor have they featured such a wide range of voices, from the East and South as well as the West and North.

Back in the 1990s, when I started out, African-American writers and thinkers were hard to find in mainstream periodicals and there were hardly any voices from India, let alone the non-Anglophone parts of Asia. One or two writers resident in the West were tasked with articulating the experiences of whole nations, even continents (as in the New York Times praise for Rushdie: a continent finding its voice).

Today, conservative as well as liberal and left-wing outlets feature a multiplicityof opinion and analysis. Much more variety is still needed human experience is always growing and many book and magazine publishers are sincerely trying to achieve it.

Given this necessary progress, the picture that Trump and highly prominent writers draw of narrowed and darkened intellectual horizons seems wholly unrecognizable, even paranoid.

Could it be that increasingly diverse voices and rich conversations are a threat to their free speech more accurately, the prerogative of famous and powerful people to speak at length on all sorts of things without interruption or disagreement? For instance, Rowling seems intent on tweeting her disapproval of transgender people. Certainly, a closer examination of the critics of cancel culture confirms the suspicion that many of these self-appointed defenders of free speech prefer monologue over dialogue.

Trump, who routinely advocates sackings and boycotts of his detractors, is the worlds leading exponent of the very thing he attacks.But commitment to liberal values is also not widely upheld among the anti-Trump signatories of the Harpers letter.

They include writers who have campaigned against academics on political grounds (Bari Weiss, Cary Nelson), a human-rights professor (Michael Ignatieff) who outlined permissible forms of torture, journalists (Paul Berman, David Frum, Anne Applebaum) who championed the illegal war on Iraq, a political scientist (Yascha Mounk) who hailed the recent military coup in Bolivia as a triumph of democracy and a novelist (Martin Amis) who proposed a Muslim ban (including strip searches and mass deportations) much harsher than the one enforced by Trump.

If those culpable for todays abysmal moral and political climate sense anger and frustration against them among younger people, it is because they have never been held accountable. Nor are they likely to face any professional consequences in the future, notwithstanding their overheated claims that cancel culture is another pandemic.

Trump might be voted out in November. The writers, journalists and academics guilty of cruel blunders and terrible misjudgments will remain as entrenched as ever.

No doubt this networked minority will continue to protect its privileges by invoking various dangers to free speech.But no one should mistake its fear of obsolescence and irrelevance for any kind of liberalism.

This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.

To contact the author of this story:Pankaj Mishra at pmishra24@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story:Nisid Hajari at nhajari@bloomberg.net

Before it's here, it's on the Bloomberg Terminal.

Pankaj Mishra is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. His books include Age of Anger: A History of the Present, From the Ruins of Empire: The Intellectuals Who Remade Asia, and Temptations of the West: How to Be Modern in India, Pakistan, Tibet and Beyond.

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No, Cancel Culture Isn't a Threat to Civilization - Bloomberg

Was Trump Campaigning In The Rose Garden? – Free Speech TV

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In this clip, Randi discusses Trump's latest "press conference" from the Rose Garden.

The Randi Rhodes Show delivers smart, forward, free-thinking, entertaining, liberal news and opinion that challenge the status quo and amplifies free speech.

Dedicated to social justice, Randi puts her reputation on the line for the truth. Committed to the journalistic standards that corporate media often ignores, The Randi Rhodes Show takes enormous pride in bringing the power of knowledge to her viewers.

Watch The Randi Rhodes Show every weekday at 3 pm ET on Free Speech TV & catch up with clips from the program down below!

Missed an episode? Check out The Randi Rhodes Show on FSTV VOD anytime or visit the show page for the latest clips.

#FSTV is available on Dish, DirectTV, AppleTV, Roku, Sling and online at freespeech.org

Randi Rhodes Rose garden Social Justice The Randi Rhodes Show Trump press conference

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Was Trump Campaigning In The Rose Garden? - Free Speech TV

Here are Thursday’s biggest analyst calls of the day: Amazon, Nikola, Apple, Tesla, Peloton & more – CNBC

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Zoom CEO Eric Yuan speaks before the Nasdaq opening bell ceremony in New York on April 18, 2019.

Kena Betancur | Getty Images

(This story is for CNBC PRO subscribers only.)

Here are the biggest calls on Wall Street on Thursday:

JPMorgan said in its downgrade of Cisco that it sees "limited" investor enthusiasm and earnings per share growth.

"We are downgrading CSCO shares to Neutral led by our expectation for limited investor enthusiasm for the shares in the absence of visibility into a return to revenue growth amidst continuing headwinds to Enterprise spending in the backdrop of an uncertain macro, although latest checks indicated Enterprise IT spending remaining more resilient than expected."

Deutsche Bank said in its upgrade of the food companies that they were "too compelling to stay sidelined."

"We are reinforcing our constructive view on Staples, and highlighting incremental preference for the Food subsector (upgrading MDLZ and KHC to Buy). Recent COVID-driven events should allow Food companies an opportunity to accelerate self-improvement efforts; reduce their leverage ratios faster (enhancing strategic optionality); increase much needed reinvestments in capabilities, marketing, and innovation; and in turn improve go-forward fundamental prospects, especially relative to smaller, less well-financed competitiona proven formula for success in other CPG subsectors over the past 5+ years."

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Here are Thursday's biggest analyst calls of the day: Amazon, Nikola, Apple, Tesla, Peloton & more - CNBC

Tesla and NIO Investors Beware: The IPO of Another EV Maker Is Coming Down the Pike – The Motley Fool

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Many investors who have hit the gas on investing in electric vehicle (EV) manufacturers recently have enjoyed massive gains. Other investors, however, have been sitting on the side of the road for the right time to pick up shares -- eating the dust of EV stocks, like Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA), NIO (NYSE:NIO), and Nikola (NASDAQ:NKLA) that have passed them by. But investors will soon have a new opportunity to consider as the IPO of another EV maker is on its way.

Founded in 2015, Li Auto is a China-based manufacturer that filed paperwork with the SEC last week to debut on the American market with a $100 million offering. The company began production of its first model, Li ONE, in November 2019, and it has delivered more than 10,400 vehicles as of June 30. In the first quarter of 2020, Li Auto reported revenue of $120.3 million and a net loss of $10.9 million. At present, the company is solely focused on delivering its vehicles to the Chinese market.

Image source: Li Auto.

Unlike Tesla and NIO, whose lineups include a variety of models, Li Auto is focused on the SUV market. The company's only model in production, the Li ONE, is a six-seat, large electric SUV, and it plans on launching a full-size, electric SUV in 2022. Beyond that, the company says it intends to grow by "developing new vehicles including mid-size and compact SUV models."

Further distinguishing itself from Tesla and NIO, Li Auto's EVs rely on both batteries and gasoline. The company's extended-range electric vehicles are powered by a battery pack and a range extension system, which generates electricity with the help of an internal combustion engine.

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Tesla and NIO Investors Beware: The IPO of Another EV Maker Is Coming Down the Pike - The Motley Fool

Instead of Criticizing Tech Valuations, Embrace Them – Bloomberg

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Saku Panditharatne is a consultant for the technology industry. She was formerly an analyst at venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz and specializes in 3-D graphics and augmented reality.

Elon MusksTesla has led technology stocks to record highs.

Photographer: Saul Martinez/Getty Images

Photographer: Saul Martinez/Getty Images

The Covid-19 pandemic may have hurt the economy, but for technology stocks it feels like 1999 again. The Nasdaq Composite Index just reached a record high having rebounded about 50% from its low of the year in March. The stock market is not the economy, but it does feelstrange for stocks to be soaring in the middle of a deep recession.

The difference is timescale: stock prices represent revenue and earnings very far out into the future, not today. If plans for new technology are sound, the outlook can still look bright even though the present seems gloomy. The rationale for sky-high valuations for tech stocks in the late 1990s also came from projected profits in the decades to come. These so-called concept stocks won investors through a compelling story about future potential, even though the company in the near term would generate little-to-nothing in terms of real revenue.

Maybe concept stocks were a crazy phenomenon from a more exuberant time, such as Beanie Babies or jelly shoes. But take Tesla Inc. True fans are buying the stock because they believe in a vision of a technologically advanced electric car and other products, while grouchy short-sellers write long, critical blog posts about the companys weak balance sheet and high debt. Is it better to price the stock on the concept, or on the fundamentals alone? Neither seems like the perfectly accurate way to value the company.

Valuations that are too high can lead to vaporware and waste, but a valuation that is too low can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. In other words, if Tesla were valued only on its balance sheet, the company might not be able to raise enough cash to keep building and developing electric cars. It seems a fairly safe bet that Tesla is innovative enough to keep coming up with new inventions, above and beyond their existing revenue lines, but when new products are involved, the expected future profit and revenue over the long term is difficult to predict.

Many people would put a high probability on Apple Inc. coming out with a new product, such as virtual reality glasses, but the companys shares were trading at around a relatively paltry 20 times earnings through much of 2019, which amounted to not much more than future iPhone revenue. Although the ratio has moved up to about 30, that still seems low for a company like Apple and may be a sign investors are shifting away from valuing it just on iPhone revenue. Experienced venture capitalists are happy to take the risk on hypothetical products for early-stage startups, but the stock market hasnt figured out how to price in products that are yet to be created by established public companies.

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Its often said that tech companies ship their org chart, meaning that the products they create can be directly predicted by the structure of the organization. By looking at the people and incentives, an outside observer should be able to estimate the impact, quality and probability of success of a new product, and perhaps even future revenue. If Apple had hired a world-class team of chip engineers who had all taken a pay cut to work on a cutting edge project, we might expect its share price to rise on the news, though without a better valuation method, we can't yet say precisely by how much.

Economist Stian Westlake used the phrase intangible capital to describe the benefits a company derives from its people and organizational structure. If we could use an org chart to accurately price intangible assets, it might be easier to value a company for not only its past products, but expected future products as well.

To be sure, the difficulty of pricing in new product lines does exist in the realm of private companies. Softbank Group Corps Vision Fund made big and bold bets in promising companies, valuing them above what their revenue might suggest. But some of these companies were not able to meet their targets, collapsing under the weight of too much capital. For growing tech unicorns, valued in the $1 billion to $50 billion range, it is certainly difficult to raise money for a new product line based on intangible assets. Capital should be flowing into these highly innovative, cutting-edge companies in the current low-interest rate world, but few understand how to structure the appropriate financing.

With an economy in trouble, the path back to prosperity depends on tech companies rapidly scaling up, generating revenue and creating jobs. Finer-tuned pricing of intangible assets could speed up the recovery process, allowing growing tech companies to raise money for new product lines, rather than just to scale up old ones. It could also help them to acquire old economy companies in leveraged deals financed around symbiotic revenue benefits.

In some ways, intangible capital is reminiscent of the nascent days of high-yield bonds in the 1980s, in that an accurate formula could change the world. Price it correctly, and you would be able to leverage small amounts of capital to totally reshape the economy instead of promoting breakups and hostile takeovers. So instead of criticizing high stock prices for tech companies, embrace and understand them for they may be the key to the economic recovery. The race is on to figure out the winning formula.

This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.

To contact the author of this story:Saku Panditharatne at saku@asteroid.zone

To contact the editor responsible for this story:Robert Burgess at bburgess@bloomberg.net

Before it's here, it's on the Bloomberg Terminal.

Saku Panditharatne is a consultant for the technology industry. She was formerly an analyst at venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz and specializes in 3-D graphics and augmented reality.

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Instead of Criticizing Tech Valuations, Embrace Them - Bloomberg

20 Boy Names With Meanings Any Parent Would Love – CafeMom

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20 Boy Names With Meanings Any Parent Would Love - CafeMom

How the Western Sydney Wanderers gave voice to artist Khaled Sabsabi – Sydney Morning Herald

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Containing 70,000 photoshop layers stripped from 10,000 photographsthat were then reconstructed to form 1000 3D video sequences across 96 monitors, the installation is a form of meditation and reflection, what Sabsabi calls the spiritual component of the process.

It was inspired by the Prophet Muhammads statement that there are 70,000 veils of light and darkness separating an individual from the Divine veils which Sufis understand to mean layers of enlightenment. For Sabsabi, the works third dimension symbolises crossing a threshold into the metaphysical.

Using a decades worth of images, the installation is always morphing, always changing but the movement is also subtle, symbolic of life, says Sabsabi, who describes the work as being concerned with memory its worth, how it is shaped, how it determines the self, how it is lost, distorted and reconstructed.

The screens in 70,000 Veils are installed around a corner, like a beckoning hand or an arm around the shoulder. Corners are a foundational element of Sabsabis practice, where simple geometry allows for complex symmetries to play out. They are also employed in A Promise to facilitate pauses and transitions between works.

Another work, Sanjak (2002-2012), is also about transition and marking time, with a Sufi ceremonial banner decorated with holy names and the artists genealogical lineage. I have a personal connection to the object [and] the community, he says. On my return to Lebanon in 2002 after migration to Australia in 1978, I walked into my first reconnection with tasawwuf [Sufism] and this Sanjak was being made. When I left in 2011 to complete the work Corner [of which Sanjak forms a part] this was gifted to me and was my friend in this journey."

He adds: Sharing it in this exhibition is a way to greet people and share this Baraka - blessing - with the audience. To share the knowledge, wisdom and goodwill of this piece [with the] community is part of the conversations that we need to have.

A Promise: Khaled Sabsabi is at the AGNSW from July 18.

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How the Western Sydney Wanderers gave voice to artist Khaled Sabsabi - Sydney Morning Herald

Ashraf Karayath Re-invents the Meaning of Life with his Debut Fiction Novel ‘Janaka and Ashtavakra- A Journey Beyond’ – India Education Diary

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Mumbai: As the current world is grappled by the Covid-19 pandemic, Ashraf Karayaths debut novel Janaka and Ashtavakra- A Journey Beyond, published by Rupa Publications, sets a new meaning of life. For most of the population across the world, the key characteristics of life has come out to be anxiety, stress, fear and uncertainty. However, the mythological novel sets the journey in search of knowledge, liberation, enlightenment, consciousness and answers some of the questions pertaining to the absolute realities of life. The author believes that this is the most important time to keep the negative emotions at bay and strengthen our quest required to elevate our immunity and fight with the pandemic.

Janaka and Ashtavakra: A Journey Beyond is a novel that narrates the story of an ancient Indian king, of his turbulent life, of impending war in his kingdom, and of treachery and conspiracy within the secretive world of his palace. Although dramatic, the work is an allegorical tale meant to appeal to modern people caught up in and torn by the difficulties of their lives. The novel is written on the premise of the vibrant storytelling tradition of the epic Ramayana and renews and deepens beloved characters for modern readers. The subtitle of the book, A Journey Beyond, derives from the kings search for self-realization: for enlightenment that comes in a flash of second, in the blink of an eye.

This book is allegorically written, with strong messages and insights, for the modern reader who is caught in the rat race and has forgotten the meaning and charm of life. Although the story is set a few thousand years ago in India, it throws light on the modern readers questions about existence, and one can easily relate himself to the king and his struggles.

Ashraf Karayath, hailing with twenty-five years of business experience coupled with a background in management philosophy, authored the book to unravel the timeless knowledge of ancient Indian culture and spirituality.. As an individual, Ashraf was always intrigued about the influence of subjectivity in our lives, and how the world evolves out of our consciousness. As he found the profound message of Ashtavakra Gita, he was planted with an idea to read and write more about it which is now turned into his first novel.

The author says, This is the time where we all need to calibrate ourselves to the strength of our inner wellbeing, which is dominant and inherent in us. For me, spirituality is nothing but untapping those innate strengths we have within us.

About the AuthorBorn in Nadapuram, a village in Kerala, India, Ashraf moved to Dubai after finishing his MA in English Literature in the early nineties. He holds more than twenty-five years of strong and impressive business experience. He is a visionary and innovator who has launched global brands in cloud computing in the Middle East. He is a cloud evangelist, with hands-on experience in Enterprise Software Solutions, and has specialization in Salesforce.com solutions in the Middle East and Africa. He has driven Agile business transformation for Saleforce.com clients by simplifying technology discussions and implementing the most targeted, innovative, and cost-effective technology solutions. He is an extremely spiritual person with a deep passion for philosophy and existentialism.

The book is now available on AmazonAmazon: https://www.amazon.in/Janaka-Ashtavakra-Journey-Beyond-Karayath/dp/9389967058

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Ashraf Karayath Re-invents the Meaning of Life with his Debut Fiction Novel 'Janaka and Ashtavakra- A Journey Beyond' - India Education Diary