Photo A: The @nypost's cover today (horrific mass shooting in San Bernardino).
Photo B: The @nypost's cover after the Planned Parenthood shooting
Showing posts with label america. Show all posts
Showing posts with label america. Show all posts
3 Dec 2015
America's Double Standard Towards Religious Terrorism
12 Nov 2015
Homelessness in Hawaii
Lohe Akau, a 55-year-old homeless construction worker, carries his bodyboard through a homeless encampment in the Kakaako district of Honolulu. Homelessness in Hawaii has grown steadily in recent years, leaving the state with the nation's highest rate of homeless people per capita. There are estimated 7,620 homeless people living on the streets in Hawaii.
More pictures at Avax News
9 Nov 2015
The US norm of Police Violence
Early Friday morning, this man was slammed to the ground by Austin police – for jaywalking.
Bill Maher and “The Hateful Eight” filmmaker Quentin Tarantino discuss his recent efforts to call attention.
14 Sept 2015
12 Sept 2015
Tea Party Crazies Give ‘Jaw-Droppingly Shocking’ Alternatives To ‘Iran Deal’
The Tea Party crazies came out in full force on Wednesday at the “Stop the Iran Deal” rally.
It was a star-studded cast that included all the well known names of the conservative far-right, including Ted Cruz, Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, Michele Bachmann, Duck Dynasty’s Phil Robertson, and even Donald Trump.
Even though Republicans didn’t have enough votes to block the deal, nothing was going to stop these “patriots” from parading around in front of the capitol. They showed up in funny costumes, “we hate Obama” signs, and with enough energy to match their stupidity.
Several Tea Partiers were given an opportunity to say what they would do instead if the negotiation process were left up to them, and not Obama. After all, they claim this is a bad deal. So, it’s interesting (and downright funny or scary – you be the judge) to hear what their alternative plans would be.
7 Sept 2015
Empire Files with Abby Martin Launches First Show
Abby Martin debuts The Empire Files exploring the U.S. Empire and its rise to world hegemony at teleSUR English.
8 Aug 2015
Is Donald Trump a Hillary Plant?
Donald Trump is a stooge for Hillary Clinton. He's a plant. He's a ringer to sink the chances of Republican candidates who actually have a chance of defeating Hillary. Paul Joseph Watson
30 Jul 2015
Why Is America Outraged For Cecil The Lion, But Not For Sandra Bland?
Can someone – anyone – please explain why America is near-universally outraged over the death of Cecil the Lion, the 13-year-old protected African lion who was recently illegally poached, but not over the death of Sandra Bland, Sam Dubose and so many other recent victims of police brutality, injustice and murder? Cecil the Lion was shot and killed by wealthy Midwestern dentist Walter Palmer last week. Personally, I’m not happy about this. But then again, I’ve rightly been accused of being a “tree hugger” (to say the least).
When Cecil the Lion was killed, a number of news and alternative media sites ran pieces on the poaching. Each article easily got thousands of shares throughout social media. But Sandra Bland, by comparison, has received far less universal support. While there is outrage, for many it is quite conditional. While many say the police should have done things differently, Sandra Bland is also the recipient of their criticism.
But Cecil the Lion? Nearly everyone defends his right not to be shot. Even people who might not care one bit about what happened to him if he were a different species. Perhaps it’s because he is so rare and Americans want to hold on to him as something of an exhibit. His life is valuable not because it holds intrinsic value; not because it is valuable to him as a sentient being; not because it is anything other than a commodity of human intrigue. It is valuable because the dominant class in human society has decided it has value.
27 Jul 2015
Special Olympics Athletes Forced To Sleep On A Gym Floor And Fight Over Food
Hundreds of athletes arriving for the Special Olympics received a rather uncomfortable welcome to Los Angeles. Around 1,500 Special Olympics delegates spent last night sleeping on a gym floor at Loyola Marymount University, after delayed flights and buses left them stranded. The athletes had traveled from Norway, Mexico, Venezuela, Kenya and the Cayman Islands. Esmeralda Brockhurst, a delegation liaison for Portugal, tells ABC7, "They were sleeping on the floor, they were sleeping on cardboard boxes, things like that."
The Red Cross was called in late last night and provided the athletes with 1,200 blankets, 3,000 bottles of water and snacks. Before that, the became situation a bit chaotic, as one member of the British delegation told KNX 1070, “It’s a bit like carnage in there, nobody really knows what’s going on,” he said. “Fighting over food, it’s a terrible situation.”
21 Jul 2015
General Wesley Clark: ‘Disloyal Americans Need To Be Put Into Camps’
Retired Four-Star General Wesley Clark thinks “disloyal Americans” need to be sent away to special camps to “segregate them from society.” He’s referring to people like the Chattanooga shooter, who just shot and killed four Marines and One Navy sailor. What makes his comments so appalling, though, is there’s simply no evidence that the shooter, who happens to be Muslim, did this because of his religion or that he was even “radicalized.”
In fact, Mohammod Abdulazeez showed no outward signs of radicalization at all and even struggled with being a devout Muslim. The FBI has devoted a significant amount of resources to the case, but so far they have produced very little to warrant General Clark’s claims. All they can seem to find out about Mohammod is that he was suffering many of the same problems a lot of Americans face on a continual basis, i.e., debt problems, and drug and alcohol abuse.
14 Jul 2015
GOP's Trump problem a monster of their own creation
Rachel Maddow reports on how Donald Trump has been reinforced and legitimized as a political figure by Republican politicians and media outlets, making it difficult to distance themselves from his presidential campaign. Today it was revealed that people attending Trump's campaign announcement included actors paid to attend.
4 Jul 2015
Millions of Americans Have Nothing to Celebrate on the Fourth of July
To ring in another July Fourth, most Americans will kick off celebrations with beer, BBQ and fireworks. Most, but not all.
On Independence Day, the stirring words of Thomas Jefferson's Declaration of Independence, promising "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness," set the tone. Buried a bit further down, however, is another passage that is somewhat less well-known:
"...the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions."
That line, and America's subsequent history with Native Americans, goes a long way toward explaining why the holiday largely does not resonate with the United States' roughly 5.2 million indigenous peoples.
"Any holiday that would refer to my people in such a repugnant, racist manner is certainly not worth celebrating," Simon Moya-Smith, a culture editor at Indian Country Today told Mic. "[July Fourth] is a day we celebrate our resiliency, our culture, our languages, our children and we mourn the millions — literally millions — of indigenous people who have died as a consequence of American imperialism." For him, Independence Day is a celebration of genocide. A number of tribes and nations contacted for this story expressed various levels of discomfort with the holiday.
18 May 2015
The American Poor
Last week President Obama committed the cardinal sin of calling out Fox News (according to Fox News) on their downright pejorative coverage for years on anything concerning the poor. Fox fired back by essentially playing dumb and pondering why Obama was attacking them? Then Jon Stewart got involved offering a well-timed and spot on rebuttal of their lying ways. Of course, as skilled and pointed as it was, many still rebuffed it as “just comedy.” Coincidentally many of the same people who think things like gravity and climate change are “just theories.”
30 Apr 2015
Freddie Gray Intentionally Severed His Own Spine
On April 12, a 25-year-old African-American named Freddie Gray was arrested in Baltimore. No one knows exactly why he was arrested, other than the report that he ran after making eye contact with the police. Reportedly, Gray had a switchblade. He also had a record. During the arrest, though, Gray was seriously injured and ultimately, he died from spinal cord injuries.
Amid massive protests in Baltimore, the police have begun the public relations spin. Initially, rumors were making the social media rounds that Gray had a preexisting spinal injury from a car accident. That’s not true at all. On Wednesday, while official Baltimore police spokespeople are saying that they will not release information and they will instead take the case straight to the prosecutor (who, unless an outside prosecutor is appointed, is someone who works with the police every single day), the police office sprung a leak. They are now attempting to say that Gray injured his own spine – on purpose.
According to a police document obtained by the Washington Post, a prisoner shared the transport van with Gray and said that he could hear Gray “banging against the walls” of the van. He also said that he believed that Gray was “intentionally trying to injure himself.
29 Apr 2015
Baltimore Official Ruins A FOX Reporter’s Attempt to Smear Protesters
In this clip, a Fox News correspondent rudely badgers a Baltimore City Councilman for explanations for the riots that broke out on Monday evening, and gets shut down by the nuanced and impassioned arguments of Nick Mosby, 7th District.
Also see: 11 Stunning Images Highlight the Double Standard of Reactions to Riots Like Baltimore on Mic.com
9 Mar 2015
Female Revolutionaries That You Probably Didn't Learn About In History class
Blanca Canales
Blanca Canales was a Puerto Rican Nationalist who helped organize the Daughters of Freedom, the women’s branch of the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party. She was one of the few women in history to have led a revolt against the United States, known as the Jayuya Uprising. In 1948, a severely restricting bill known as the Gag Bill, or Law 53, was introduced that made it a crime to print, publish, sell, or exhibit any material intended to paralyze or destroy the insular government. In response, the Nationalists starting planning armed revolution. On October 30, 1950, Blanca and others took up arms which she had stored in her home and marched into the town of Jayuya, taking over the police station, burning down the post office, cutting the telephone wires, and raising the Puerto Rican flag in defiance of the Gag Law. As a result, the US President declared martial law and ordered Army and Air Force attacks on the town. The Nationalists held on for awhile, but were arrested and sentenced to life in prison after 3 days. Much of Jayuya was destroyed, and the incident was not fairly covered by US media, with the US President even saying it was “an incident between Puerto Ricans.”
9 more Female Revolutionaries That You Probably Didn't Learn About at Films For Action
4 Feb 2015
Bill would let Texas teachers legally kill students
Schoolteachers in Texas will be allowed to use lethal force against students without risking legal repercussions if a new bill being considered in the Lone Star State’s legislature becomes a law. The bill –HB 868, or the “Teacher’s Protection Act” – affords educators legal immunity in the unlikely event that they happen to kill any of their students during school-sanctioned events.
Specifically, the bill – introduced to the Texas State Legislature on January 22 by Rep. Dan Flynn (R-Canton) – says “an educator is justified in using force or deadly force on school property, on a school bus or at a school-sponsored event in defense of the educator’s person or in defense of students of the school that employs the educator if, under the circumstances as the educator reasonably believes them to be, the educator would be justified…in using force or deadly force, as applicable, in defense of the educator or students.”
Indeed, the language does not limit any hypothetical action on the educator’s part to be done in self-defense: the proposed bill actually allows teachers to use deadly force on children if they believe another student or their self is in danger. As of August 2014, Texas was among eight states in the country where laws allow school employees to carry firearms on campus, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. And, as the Houston Chronicle pointed out this week, teachers in Texas are already granted immunity if they assault a student, and the “use of force, but not deadly force, against a [student] is justified.”
13 Jan 2015
Were Gitmo Murders Covered Up As Suicides?
What really happened at the Guantanamo Bay detention facility on the night of June 9, 2006.
14 Dec 2014
Timelapse video reveals massive size of New York City protests
The massive protest marches against police brutality on Saturday in Washington D.C. and New York City have received a fair bit of media attention, but just how big were those protests? Although some officials have released numbers, we still don't have a final, definitive call on just how many protesters came out. Some reports put the D.C. march at 10,000, while others, from the NYPD, put the New York march at 12,000 (a number that has been disputed by protesters on the ground).
But one aerial video of the MillionsMarchNYC march in New York, shot from a window overlooking 6th Avenue and 29th Street, offers a hint at just how large the march was. It's impossible to get an accurate count from watching the video, but the stream of humanity is impressive, whatever the final number.
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