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Glossary

31 December 2016 (Post-truth politics) Even in 2011, the Republicans had embraced post-truth politics, where what they say to win has nothing to do with the policies they will actually impose. Every time Obama foolishly offered them a concession, hoping for a compromise, the Republicans said, "Now give us another concession." However, part of the explanation is that Obama acted for a weak, centrist program, not a progressive one.

31 December 2016 (High inequality in the US) High inequality in the US is not inevitable. The obstacles are political.

31 December 2016 (Wells Fargo) Wells Fargo bank cheated customers by charging them for useless insurance policies they never signed up for. This means there are now several reasons to move your money out of Wells Fargo. In addition to the ethical reasons, such as financing part of the Dakota Access Pipeline, there is also the protection of your money. Don't leave your money where Wells Fargo has access to it. If we move enough money into smaller banks, we can defeat Wells Fargo.

31 December 2016 (Charter schools) Charter schools undermine public education, in Africa just as in the US.

31 December 2016 (Privatization of public transit) Cities and even public service campaigns are outsourcing transportation to Uber, which is a form of privatization of public transit. This excludes poor people, and subjects those who do use the service to being tracked. Lyft is no better than Uber in this regard.

31 December 2016 (Social security disability) How to get by on social security disability in the US: be homeless.

31 December 2016 (Evernote) Evernote has given itself additional right to read users' notes. Even before this change, Evernote notes were susceptible to being read under various circumstances. The way to protect your privacy is to keep your notes in your own computer.

31 December 2016 (Republicans in North Carolina) Since North Carolina elected a Democrat as governor, the Republicans in the state legislature are passing laws to reduce the governor's authority. The Republicans control the legislature due to gerrymandering that make it nearly impossible to remove them from control.

31 December 2016 (Intentional, coded racism) Calling out intentional, coded racism is not a matter of "political correctness." Such racism is not innocent, it is a system of propaganda.

29 December 2016 (The war in Syria) With various sides eager to lie, and willing to kill journalists, the war in Syria is endangering our ability to find out the truth about the events of war.

29 December 2016 (Slaves on Thai fishing boats) Thai fishing boats operated by slave labor now operate for long periods far in the ocean, transferring their catch to other ships to be ferried to land. This way, the fishing boats escape from all laws, and slaves can never escape. Greenpeace reports that this provides an entry path for tainted seafood, and urges prohibition of the practice of transferring caught fish to transport ships. Technology has made fishing ever more efficient, and the result is overfishing, as well as idleness for many fishing boats. More efficiency in fishing is the last thing we need.

28 December 2016 (NSA inspector general faces punishment) The inspector general of the NSA condemned Snowden for releasing information to the public instead of "going through channels" to report abuses internally in the NSA. Reportedly the same inspector general retaliated against another NSA staffer who did exactly that, and he faces punishment for it. As this example shows, reporting some illegality internally would be inadequate even if it were safe. We can't rely on internal reports to make the NSA obey laws, let alone to make it respect our freedom.

28 December 2016 (Bigotry) In Reed College, radical students intimidate teachers based on their "identity". This sort of bigotry becomes ludicrous when, as in Reed College, the students are factually mistaken about the people they label. But it's equally wrong when the labels are accurate. This form of bigotry is a part of the "political correctness" that some right-wing Americans resent. There are much bigger patterns of bigotry in our society. Many studies have shown that blacks and women are systematically judged by a harsher standard than while males. To measure this bigotry, we have to classify people as bigotry does. Then we can institute measures to change the bigoted judgments. That's where the classification should stop. To condemn speakers, to say their views should not be heard, because of labeling them is an injustice (which, as it happens, plays into the hands of right-wing bigots).

28 December 2016 (Contempt for truth in Turkey) In Turkey, the politics of contempt for truth led to a tyranny in which people are attacked unless they repeat lies.

28 December 2016 (Lack of drug treatment for released prisoners) California has released many prisoners, but they can't find drug treatment and many have trouble finding a way to live without crime. This is a general problem in the US. 50 years ago, there were many jobs you could get after being released from prison, and you could live on one. Nowadays that is difficult.

28 December 2016 (Debtors prison in Jennings, Missouri) Jennings, Missouri, a suburb of St Louis comparable to Ferguson, jailed 2000 people for not paying fines. In 2014 it issued more arrest warrants than it had adult residents. Basically, it set up a scheme to fund the city by squeezing money out of the poor and weak.

28 December 2016 (Persecution of the homeless) 1/3 of US cities prohibit homeless people (and others) from "camping" on sidewalks, and use this as an excuse to steal their possessions. When business owners and rich people demand that the city persecute the homeless, the response they deserve is, "How would you like to be homeless?"

28 December 2016 (Uber's autonomous cars) Uber's autonomous cars frequently violate traffic laws. Uber tries to put the blame on human safety monitors, who could in principle intervene to stop this. That's the general Uber attitude: profits to the company, burdens to the drivers. I would guess that the safety monitors would be hard-pressed to react fast enough to prevent these maneuvers — which would mean that they are an excuse and a scapegoat, not a real safety system.

28 December 2016 (Education for girls in Cameroon) Mosques in Cameroon are starting education for girls as a campaign to turn the social climate against Boko Haram.

28 December 2016 (Teenager sends radio commands to pilots) An autistic teenager in Australia gave radio commands to pilots, pretending to be speaking from the control tower. This kind of hack is very dangerous. I hope he can learn to understand why he should not do it.

28 December 2016 (The cracking of the DNC) The evidence does not clearly link the cracking of the DNC to Russia. It is only suggestive, not conclusive. I wouldn't be shocked if Putin ordered this. He has a penchant for dirty tricks and for rigging elections (primarily in Russia). But I also wouldn't be shocked if Putin had nothing to do with it.

28 December 2016 (Foreign policy post offered to John Bolton) Trump offered a major foreign policy post to John Bolton, whose scheming made it possible for Dubya to pretend that Saddam Hussein had chemical weapons.

28 December 2016 (DMCA takedown notice sent to art piece) HBO sent a DMCA takedown notice to a piece of art that used the phrase "winter is coming". The article suggests that at some point in this issue, people confused copyright law with trademark law. The two have nothing to do with each other. HBO has no copyright claim based on that phrase. That phrase might be a trademark, but the DMCA is only concerned with copyright law and is not applicable to trademarks at all. Anyway, using a trademarked word or symbol in a noncommercial way is not trademark infringement.

28 December 2016 (Uncounted votes in Michigan) Michigan refused to count 75,000 votes for president, most of them in Detroit and Flint which means they are likely to be Democratic votes. The margin of Republican so-called victory was 10,000. Do you think the troll really won Michigan? Not likely.

28 December 2016 (Lousy nursing homes in Britain) Many Britons would rather die than live in a typical lousy nursing home using up the money they could otherwise leave to their children.

28 December 2016 (Destitute Brits) As the British state finds excuses to punish people by leaving them destitute, they end up in food banks.

28 December 2016 (Evacuation from east Aleppo) Evacuation of wounded people from east Aleppo has begun.

28 December 2016 (ISP choices in San Francisco) San Francisco has passed a law stopping landlords from limiting their tenants' choice of ISP. This is a small positive step, but not applicable in many places in the US because most places have few high-speed ISPs to choose among. For the US to get much benefit from ISP competition, it needs to offer most Americans a choice of many competing ISPs. Failing that, we should prohibit ISPs from keeping any records of what their customers connect to.

28 December 2016 (Ohio law bans abortion after 20 weeks) Ohio has passed a law banning abortion after 20 weeks. The aim is to create an opportunity for the Supreme Court to reverse the Roe v Wade decision, in case Trump gets to put a theocratic fanatic on the court.

27 December 2016 (Overriding election results) Many presidential electors (members of the electoral college) are reportedly considering disregarding their states' official election results and not voting for the troll. It would be improper for electors to disregard the voters' choice over political disagreement. However, on this occasion there are two reasons why electors might legitimately decide to override the official election results: because the troll intends to violate the emoluments requirement of the Constitution, and is therefore unfit for office, and because of voter-suppression, which means that the official election results in some states are false and Clinton actually won.

27 December 2016 (Democratic Party emails) Reported details of the phishing attack that obtained John Podesta's password. The article ends with claims about Russian cracking groups, but I can't tell from this article whether those claims are credible. Craig Murray says that the Democratic Party emails came from a whistleblower, not from a cracker, and that he knows the whistleblower. I trust Craig Murray, but I am not sure which of the conflicting stories is true.

27 December 2016 (Malaysian opposition candidate imprisoned) The main Malaysian opposition candidate has been imprisoned and excluded on absurd grounds ("sodomy").

27 December 2016 (For-profit hospitals) A US hospital chain tricks people into committing themselves as mentally incompetent, then holds them as long as insurance will pay for. This is one of many reasons to eliminate for-profit hospitals.

27 December 2016 (US shelters officials accused of corruption) Officials accused of corruption in several countries have found shelter in the US. In some cases, there are valid reasons for not deporting them — for instance, that the justice system in their home country is suspect.

27 December 2016 (Republican election-rigging) We shouldn't let accusations of Russian interference blind us to the bigger wrong of Republican election-rigging.

27 December 2016 (Solar power backfire) Solar power backfire: in Australia, houses with solar power systems buy more electricity from the grid than houses without solar power. This defeats the intended social benefit of reducing fossil fuel use. It seems that the people who have got solar power don't think about how much electricity they are using. Perhaps they need very visible meters to show them how much power they are taking from the grid. Or perhaps there needs to be a higher tax on electricity from the grid.

27 December 2016 (Trump's potential conflicts of interest) Why Donald Trump's Potential Conflicts of Interest Are So Important.

27 December 2016 (Overfishing) The EU has increased fishing quotas in the teeth of existing overfishing, yielding to short-termers' political pressure.

27 December 2016 (Keeping poor people in jail) Across the US, the practice of keeping poor people accused of crimes in jail unless they can pay to get out is being eliminated, but some places hold out. In theory, you can post bail and get it back. But nearly everyone pays a bail bonds company to post the bail. The bail bonds company charges a certain fraction of the bail, and keeps it.

27 December 2016 (Prosecution for criticizing murder campaign) Philippine Senator De Lima faces prosecution for criticizing Duterte's murder campaign and his removal of her from being in charge of it.

27 December 2016 (ACLU fighting abortion-repression law) The ACLU is suing to overturn a Florida abortion-repression law that requires any person or organization giving anyone advice about abortion to register with the state, to hand out a state publication (surely full of anti-abortion lies), and to tell the woman's parents.

26 December 2016 (US to stop selling missiles to Salafi Arabia) The US will stop selling some missiles to Salafi Arabia because of its using them for war crimes in Yemen. This decision does not come because the US has learned new information about that intervention, in which it has been closely involved all along. It is a political decision. At least it's a change in the right direction, so I won't quibble.

26 December 2016 (Why Rick Perry is bad choice for DOE) What the Department of Energy does, and why Rick Perry is a bad choice to run it. I think there is something sleazy about funding nuclear weapons through the Department of Energy. It looks like a way to disguise how much of US government spending is actually on weapons and war.

26 December 2016 (Brazil's senate approves spending cuts) Brazil's senate has approved a 20-year cut in government spending, which 60% of Brazilians oppose. Brazil is in an economic slump, and cuts in spending are just the thing to make it worse.

26 December 2016 (Heroin use down, but overdoses up) Heroin use is down in the US, but deaths from overdoeses are up. It seems that the war on drugs is making heroin more dangerous. Heroin is not particularly dangerous if it is manufactured under proper regulation. It is dangerous because it is sold on the black market.

26 December 2016 (Incomplete recounts show abnormalities) The incomplete recounts in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania have shown substantial abnormalities.

25 December 2016 (Urgent: Investigate Trump's ties to Russia) US citizens: call on Congress to investigate Trump's ties to Russia. The CIA has not provided proof of its claims of Russian interference in the election, and that claim might or might not be true. But we don't need to wait for certain knowledge before we investigate.

25 December 2016 (Oil spill in North Dakota) 130,000 gallons of petroleum have poisoned an area in North Dakota, not far from the Standing Rock pipeline. The test equipment that was supposed to detect leaks failed to detect this one. To get 130,000, I have subtracted the amount of oil that was recovered from the total amount that was spilled.

25 December 2016 (UK adopts formal definition of antisemitism) The UK has adopted a formal definition of antisemitism. I see no problem in the definition itself, which comes from the IHRA. However, some of the suggested interpretations pose problems. For instance, one says that it is antisemitic to claim that the existence of Israel is racism. I've met people who argued that the establishment of Israel was itself an act of racism, and while I don't agree with them, their reasoning was not based on bigotry. Another says that it is antisemitic to compare Israel's policies towards Palestinians to those of the Nazis. Uri Avnery has made such comparisons and it is absurd to call him antisemitic In a free country, people can argue about these points, but the state is not concerned. The injustice in Britain is that the state is concerned through its censorship policies. What makes this definition is important is that it sets the criteria for state censorship, the boundary between opinions that are permissible and opinions that are criminalized.

25 December 2016 (Annual Tory budget cuts) Some UK local regions have set targets for how many children to remove from their families and send for adoption. The targets are a response to the annual Tory budget cuts. At this point, there is no harmless place to cut, except the money that goes to rich people.

25 December 2016 (Eritrea) 10 years of European attempts to "engage" with Eritrea show that the very idea is ridiculous. In principle, abolishing such a cruel regime justifies war, if Eritreans want that sort of rescue — which we cannot take for granted — how could it be done? Ethiopia is no friend of Eritrea. Conceivably it is possible to bring Eritrean exiles to Ethiopia to train as an army, so that they can kick out the government that rules Eritrea. Of course, there are many possible reasons this could be a bad idea.

25 December 2016 (Neonicotinoid pesticides) Neonicotinoid pesticides damage bumblebees' brains so that they can't learn the way to get pollen out of some flowers.

25 December 2016 (Flooding and water shortages) Prepare for 50 million refugees from flooding and water shortages by 2020, according to a report form the Institute for Environment and Human Security.

25 December 2016 (Arrest scene staged for marriage proposal) Daiwon McPherson staged an arrest scene with the local thug department to make a spectacular proposal of marriage. To avoid accidents, they carefully informed everyone concerned — except one, the woman who was the target of the scene. She might have done something drastic to protect her boyfriend. But that was unlikely and it didn't happen. I tend to think that starting off a marriage in such a theatrical way bodes ill for its durability. It puts the emphasis on getting married rather than on the relationship itself.

25 December 2016 (The CIA torture report) Obama has declared the CIA torture report secret for at least 12 years. This decision protects the report from being destroyed by Senate Republicans, but I'm not convinced it is safe from being destroyed by Trump. The only way to preserve it for sure is to publish it, which I hope will occur one way or another.

25 December 2016 (Trump and Goldman Sachs) Candidate Trump criticized Goldman Sachs, and condemned Clinton for being close to that company, but he has already named three people from that company as officials — now including its president.

25 December 2016 (Obligatory gifts) There is a movement to reject end-of-year obligatory gifts. I rejected this when I was a teenager, and am glad that I did. For me, it was easy, as I was living nowhere near any of my family. I didn't try to convince others about it.

25 December 2016 (Misogyny in Salafi Arabia) Malak al-Shehri, a woman in Salafi Arabia, posted a photo showing herself with uncovered head. She has been arrested for this, demonstrating the misogyny of that Islamist monarchy. The damaging effects of that country's ultra-harsh version of Islam can be seen in the people who demand that she be killed.

25 December 2016 (If Putin helped Trump for oil deal) Conjecture: Putin intervened to help make Trump president for the sake of an oil deal that was blocked by US sanctions. If this is true, the US is in the position of a banana republic, with a government imposed to serve the local elite and foreign business interests.

25 December 2016 (Coal production) US coal production is on the way out, with or without the EPA. Note, however, that the reason natural gas is so cheap in the US is fracking, and that's likely to poison people's drinking water unless the EPA starts doing its job. And it may have as much greenhouse effect as coal, when all the leaks of gas (methane) are counted.

25 December 2016 (Erdoğan arrests dissidents) A suicide bombing was seized on by Erdoğan to arrest over 200 dissidents and opposition politicians, calling them "terrorists". It's clear that those people couldn't all be connected with the bombing. Most of them, perhaps all, must be falsely accused. Terrorism means political violence aimed at civilians. This bombing appears to have been aimed at armed agents of the state, not at civilians. If so, that makes it rebellion rather than terrorism. Turkey and the PKK had a cease-fire that lasted for many years, until it was broken by Erdoğan for political reasons. I hope that they mutually reestablish the cease fire, and that Turkey returns to respecting human rights, for the benefit of all its citizens of whatever ethnic group and whatever politics or religion.

23 December 2016 (Urgent: Fire Bannon) US citizens: call on Trump to fire Bannon for promoting bigotry. More information about Bannon. Here's one of the cited examples: an article that attacks Anne Applebaum mainly for her political activities. The article, by Matthew Tyrmand and published under Bannon's authority, mentions that she is a Jew as a brief aside; that point is not a focus of the article. However, the aside is harsh in tone, and entirely irrelevant to the political points. The only possible reason for including it was as an anti-semitic cheap shot.

23 December 2016 (Smog protest in Chengdu, China) A smog protest in Chengdu, China, met with heavy repression. Because protesters wore smog masks, people wearing masks to protect themselves from smog were also suspect.

23 December 2016 (Tartars face repression) Crimean Tatars that oppose Russia's annexation of Crimea face prosecution, exile, psychiatric investigations, even disappearances. This is what Putin does to opposition everywhere in Russia. But the Tatars also face collective repression. The Tatars are a minority in the Crimea, and would not be entitled to determine the Crimea's fate on their own. The Crimea is full of people of Russian origin, and it is possible that most of them in 2014 wanted the Crimea to become part of Russia. There's a good case that they were entitled to a real referendum about this question. But you can't tell anything about the public's views from an election run under Putin's repression. His elections are sham.

23 December 2016 (Kyrgystan's democracy) Kyrgyzstan, the one country in central Asia with some amount of real democracy, has adopted constitutional changes that may reduce democracy.

23 December 2016 (Australia to invest in second Sydney airport) Willful blindness: Australia plans to invest 4 billion dollars in a second airport in Sydney, to prepare for increased air travel. It takes decades for those investments to pay off, but if they keep increasing carbon emissions, flying won't continue long enough for that.

23 December 2016 (Exam proctoscopy) Some remote exams demand total control over your computer. To agree to that is extremely dangerous: they could insert malware and copying your files. The exam service company says it does "proctoring", but I think "proctoscopy" describes it better. Letting a company have total control over your computer is simply nuts. Imagine a computer security school which asks every student to submit to this, and flunks whoever says yes. This was reported for a job interview for Amazon. Amazon reportedly no longer uses that method, but the employee's words suggest that this disservice is mainly used for course exams. There is no reason to think schools have stopped doing this.

23 December 2016 (Global heating's effect in the Arctic) Global heating has altered air and water circulation in the Arctic. It looks like the Earth's ecosphere is already crossing the edge of the cliff. Exxon has already brought about the disaster it has been campaigning to stop us from avoiding. Trump will now try to prevent US scientists from telling us about it.

22 December 2016 (Trump nominates another arsonist) Trump has nominated another arsonist official: a global heating denialist who would ruin federally managed land pulling out fossil fuels and burning them.

22 December 2016 (Goober drivers) Uber claims its drivers are independent contractors, but not very independent, since they are not allowed to contract for other ride companies. By the way, it is clear that Juno has the same basic injustice as Uber: customers must run nonfree software and identify themselves. Uber is more nasty and arrogant, but both of them are enemies of our freedom. We should should reject both of them completely.

22 December 2016 (Russia and Syria overturn Geneva conventions) Russia and Syria, encouraged by the example of Guantanamo and CIA torture, have overturned the Geneva conventions. They have established that no atrocity is beneath them. I am not convinced that a victorious Assad would make Syria into an "Iranian-led Shia protectorate". (Assad would surely continue a friendly relationship with Iran, but that's not the same thing.) But if it does, I don't see that it would be as bad for the world as Salafi Arabia already is. Nonetheless, I agree with the article overall. The US must stop its imprisonment without trial.

22 December 2016 (Keeping jobs in the US) Obama proposed measures to punish US companies that moved jobs out of the US. Republicans defeated them. Obama also proposed foolish measures to "reward" companies for not doing so. Imagine offering each millionaire a government subsidy for each day he didn't do some antisocial thing. Why is it that our government tries to influence the poor by punishing them, and to influence the rich by making them richer?

20 December 2016 (Convicted of "inciting discrimination") Geert Wilders, a Dutch populist, was convicted of "inciting discrimination" for suggesting it would be desirable to have "fewer Moroccans" in the Netherlands. The question of how many immigrants a country should have is a valid political question, and it should not be a crime to say "fewer". However, some points in Wilders' party platform are outright tyranny. "Preventive" imprisonment is Guantanamo — an injustice. So is exiling citizens for crimes. Banning the Qur'an is outrageous censorship. Kicking out asylum seekers is cruelty. Cutting foreign aid is cruel. Cutting public broadcasting won't save much money and seems foolish. Not supporting research is certainly foolish. Some aspects of the program might be good. Increased direct democracy could be good if implemented the Swiss way, where plebiscites can be held to validate or to reject laws passed by the legislature. The promise to reduce taxes and increase benefits is questionable. That can be done for a while by deficit spending, which is the right way to give the economy an emergency boost, but is harmful to continue for the long haul. Does the Netherlands need an emergency economic boost just now? How will rents be lowered? Building more housing would do the job well, but they might try some other less healthy method. Cutting taxes for owning a car is a way of subsidizing fossil fuels. Do they want the sea to overflow their dikes?

20 December 2016 (US prisoners) An estimated 1/4 of US prisoners were imprisoned in the absence of any public interest in keeping them in prison.

20 December 2016 (Opposition to kindness) Nuns that feed the homeless in San Francisco got money to buy a permanent base, but the other residents don't want any kindness in their building.

20 December 2016 (Urgent: Divestment from DAPL) Everyone: call on two large California retirement funds to divest from the Dakota Access Pipeline. They should be required by law not to invest in any fossil fuels or fossil fuel infrastructure.

20 December 2016 (Professor Watchlist) Students suggest names to add to the Professor Watchlist.

20 December 2016 (Resistance to trumpery) Why we must keep the resistance to trumpery nonviolent.

20 December 2016 (CIA-cocaine scandal of the 1980s) The coverup of the CIA-cocaine scandal of the 1980s shows we can't trust the major newspapers to separate truth from falsehood. However, the situation today, where hate groups and political manipulators fabricate a dozen fake stories a day and supporters take them as truth, is even worse. I think it is an important insight that this is not a matter of ceasing to care about the truth, but active rejection of unpleasant truths. As for those that invent and post fake news, they don't believe it. They are lying and they don't care, because they want to win by hook or by crook. Did you know that, when Trump is inaugurated, he will give everyone that voted for him the ability to fly by holding their arms out to the side? It will be easy for them to try this: just step out the nearest window.

20 December 2016 (People misinformed by right-wing noise) Trump voters are factually mistaken about what happened under Obama. This shows how effective the right-wing noise machine is at misinforming people.

20 December 2016 (Global heating positive feedback) Global heating positive feedback: it will speed up the action of soil bacteria that metabolize carbon and release greenhouse gas. The effect is huge — like "adding another United States" to the world's climate cycle. I don't think global heating is likely to cause the extinction of humans. That would be almost as hard as making cockroaches extinct. But it could destroy technological society and kill most of the humans alive at the time. If you're young today, you could live to see this happen.

20 December 2016 (Batteries for nighttime and peak power in UK) Batteries won a substantial fraction of the auction to provide nighttime and peak power in the UK. Some existing coal plants also won, but no new large gas plants. The article refers to some who inexplicably think it would be better to burn gas rather than charge batteries from windfarms. I can't imagine a rational argument for that.

20 December 2016 (Bigotry/hate groups play SEO game) Bigotry/hate groups have figured out how to SEO Google's page rank algorithm, so that sites saying "Jews are evil", and falsehoods such as denial of the holocaust, come up at the top of search questions. It isn't clear how to defend against this. If Google chooses the results of specific searches, it will become legally responsible for its choices, which currently it is not. Maybe opponents of bigotry need to play the SEO game against the hate groups.

20 December 2016 (Denying the homeless a place to sleep) Spikes and railings are increasingly used in the UK to deny the homeless any place they can sleep. When they do find a place, people are hired to spray them with hoses. Loud music prevents sleeping in public space. Park benches are designed with bars so people can't sleep on them or under them. This suggests that one way to help the homeless would be to saw off those bars, or deactivate the speakers. Government programs in the US are gradually reducing homelessness. Trump's spending cuts could put an end to that.

20 December 2016 (Demolition of Israeli Colony in West Bank) The occupants of just one non-state-authorized Israeli colony in the West Bank face demolition of their houses, much as thousands of Palestinians have. The inhabitants of Amona have a lot of warning, and won't have to pay for the demolition. They won't find it impossible to get a building permit anywhere else. And they, unlike most of those Palestinians, did something to deserve this — stealing Palestinians' land. Perhaps the US should convert its aid to Israel into purchase of the housing in these Israeli colonies, which it could then turn over to Palestinians.

20 December 2016 (Digital payments) The Indian state of Goa is trying to require all merchants, even in the market, to accept digital payments. Present-day digital payments for purchases disrespect the purchaser's freedom because they are not anonymous. When governments pressure people to identify themselves when they buy, we should not rely on their pressure to be defeated by natural resistance. We should push back, and hard. That's why I don't use my bank card to buy anything but airline tickets.

19 December 2016 (Charges against Backpage.com dropped) Charges against Backpage.com and its owners, because prostitutes advertise there in coded ways, have been dropped. Long live the First Amendment. Prostitution should be legalized, too, and regulated to protect the rights and safety of prostitutes.

19 December 2016 (Trumpery) Trump says he won't actually work on Celebrity Apprentice, just get credit. A typical piece of trumpery, because the question is not whether he does work, but whether he gets paid.

19 December 2016 (US Border Patrol) The US Border Patrol chases border crossers on the Mexican border into harsh terrain, as a tactic to kill lots of them.

19 December 2016 (Labels for products of Israeli colonies) France requires products of Israeli colonies in the West Bank to be labeled explicitly as such.

19 December 2016 (US government photo data base) The US government makes its photo data base available for stores to recognize people. The announcement says that only criminal's photos are offered for matching. But we know that the US government has photos of millions of other Americans. Does it secretly match the photos companies send against all of them, too, and make a private tracking list?

19 December 2016 (Fair use) The newspaper lobby wants to reduce fair use. I would not oppose very narrow laws to make very large companies such as Facebook and Google pay more money to newspapers when their articles are read through those sites.

19 December 2016 (State surveillance in Europe) The state of the political battle in Europe over state surveillance and the right to use encryption.

19 December 2016 (Protection of human rights defenders) We Must Find New Ways to Protect Human Rights Defenders. One aspect that the article does not cover is that the US cooperated in establishing some of the regimes that crush human rights defenders — for instance, the one in Honduras.

19 December 2016 (Greece gives pensioners Christmas bonus) In a small act of defiance, Greece gave pensioners a Christmas bonus. The euro-banksters are outraged that their crushing cruelty was diminished even a little. They demand that Greece be totally obedient and treat the Greek people with total contempt. I still believe that Greece should leave the euro zone.

19 December 2016 (Bringing refugees to Australia) The case of Hamid Kehazaei, imprisoned by Australia on Manus Island, shows how Australia set up a system with multiple levels of bureaucratic hurdles against bringing any refugee to Australia, and run by functionaries who put all rules above human life.

19 December 2016 (Imprisoned writers in China) On World Human Rights Day, many writers and officials of PEN called on China to release imprisoned writers. The US and EU also said something similar. In the case of the US, the moral weight of its statements is limited by the fact that its holding of prisoners without trial in Guantanamo, and its association with cruel buffoon Trump.

18 December 2016 (Obama's medical insurance law) If the Republicans cancel Obama's medical insurance law, millions of Trump voters will lose their coverage. Obama's system was a step forward but with serious flaws. It was designed to give people coverage, not to reduce costs, so coverage costs too much. If we want to save money and give all Americans good medical care, we should set up a National Health Service like the one that works well in Canada.

18 December 2016 (Business supremacy) The US government, and US states, are paying almost 100 billion in ransoms to companies so that they won't move jobs to other states or other countries. The states can put a stop to companies' practice of playing one against the other, by forming a union against the companies. I've suggested calling it the United States of America. Stopping this sort of competition with other countries would require a treaty — the Make Companies Pay Taxes treaty. It would be a treaty to assure state supremacy over business, the opposite of a business supremacy treaty.

18 December 2016 (Criticism of Salafi Arabia) The UK foreign minister, Boris Johnson, is considered a semi-Trump buffoon, but he was right on target when criticizing Salafi Arabia.

18 December 2016 (Union president Chuck Jones) [Union president] Chuck Jones Is a Better President Than Donald Trump Will Ever Be. Jones is receiving death threats from Trump's attack dogs, who he trained in the campaign to attack whoever Trump insults. This seems to indicate that Trump aims to destroy unions. Unions are workers' principal real defense.

18 December 2016 (Brazilians protest against austerity) Thousands of Brazilians protested outside Congress, which is busy ignoring them to amend the constitution for crushing austerity. Big cuts in state spending tend to lead to economic collapse. Maybe that will inspire the political changes needed to reverse austerity.

18 December 2016 (Law against homosexuality in Morocco) Two Moroccan girls who faced years in prison for charges of homosexuality were acquitted, but the law that threatened them is still there.

18 December 2016 (Trump may threaten sanctuary cities) Trump may threaten sanctuary cities with cutoff of federal funds. If they cut off a city's funds for the War on Drugs, the obvious response is to pull out of that crazy war. While I have no sympathy for the members of gangs that sell drugs, who may well commit violent crimes too, the War on Drugs does more harm than good overall and we should seize any excuse to drop it.

16 December 2016 (Japanese antiwar movement) The Japanese antiwar movement is campaigning to preserve the provision in the constitution that Japan cannot deploy its army for fighting outside Japan. I don't entirely sympathize with the people of Okinawa that object to US military bases there. It seems they are exaggerating the effect of some very rare dangers. They could have a valid argument if they said that their island bears too big a share of the burden of the bases. If Japan dropped its alliance with the US, it could tell all the US troops to leave. But Japan would have to become much more militarized, or else fall under Chinese dominion.

16 December 2016 (Patriarchal murders in Jordan) Patriarchal murder is surging in Jordan. Various laws facilitate the practice, as do men so cowardly that they can't refuse family pressure to murder their sisters. As was the case with lynching of blacks in the US, the women actually murdered are the tip of the iceberg, since the point is to intimidate millions.

16 December 2016 (Investments in fossil fuels) The European Central Bank is investing billions in fossil fuels.

16 December 2016 (Perception of danger) After 15 years with no major airline accident in the US, many people still perceive flying as dangerous. In the same way, they perceive leaving a child in a parked car with ventilation as dangerous. Don't forget some things that do endanger children in the US: poverty, food insecurity, underfunded schools that prepare them only for Mcjobs, riding in cars, and peer pressure to take foolish risks.

16 December 2016 (Feminism) Feminism is the campaign for equality for women. Individual women who overcome the odds to be very successful are a distraction from that goal unless they help lead the way for all women to join in the equality. It's a mistake to focus disporportionally on the minority of women that have high status, well paid jobs. Most women workers need the same thing that most men workers need: better pay and better working conditions. Since women tend to get less pay for the same work, women need this even more than men do.

15 December 2016 (Working Britons in permanent poverty) Low wages and cuts in welfare benefits have squeezed working Britons against the high rents, so many of them live in permanent poverty. The Tories made all three jaws of this vice, with help from New Labor.

15 December 2016 (Economic warfare in Yemen) Along with the Salafi-US bombardment, Yemen is afflicted by economic warfare.

15 December 2016 (Amazon's new grocery stores) Amazon's new grocery stores do not accept cash. They impose the same surveillance as ordering online from Amazon. In addition, success of this would mean the loss of thousands of jobs. I refuse absolutely to use automatic checkout machines in stores: I insist on going to the human sales agent, not because I desire a conversation, but specifically to defend their jobs. What's more, I often shout out loud, "If you use these machines, you're putting Americans out of work," once when I enter and once when I leave. Please join this movement! Technological "advance" is not an imperative, and it is not always an advance. It is for us to judge whether a technological change is an advance for society. Then society can decide which technologies to use. We can reject harmful technology if we dare to try.

14 December 2016 (Urgent: Free Fomusoh Ivo Feh) Everyone: call on Cameroon to free Fomusoh Ivo Feh, who has been imprisoned for sending a joke mocking Boko Haram via SMS message. What makes the joke so funny is the idea that Boko Haram would want recruits to have western education (i.e., to study from the "boko", books, that it calls "haram", anathema).

14 December 2016 (Urgent: Dismantle NSEERS program) US citizens: call on Obama to dismantle the NSEERS program so that Trump can't use it to register all Muslim visitors.

14 December 2016 (Second-hand goods for holiday giving) If your family chooses to participate in obligatory holiday purchasing, try adopting this rule: buy only second-hand goods, with a stated maximum price. The article suggests that books and music ought to "go digital" — meaning, using internet distribution. Beware of that! Don't "buy" DRM-restricted copies or copies with End-User License Agreements. Insist on paying anonymously. For books and music from major publishers, the only digital copies that do not oppress their users are the unauthorized ones.

14 December 2016 (Moving Italy away from the euro) The Five Stars party in Italy wants a referendum on moving Italy away from the euro. Spain and Greece would also benefit from leaving the euro zone.

14 December 2016 ("Fake news") Consortiumnews.com is concerned that it will be labeled as "fake news" for disagreeing with the official line. ISTR seeing articles from Consortiumnews that were biased and one-sided — for instance, they denied that Russia's takeover of Crimea was a military conquest, and appealed to the subsequent Putin-organized plebiscite in the Crimea as proving something about what the inhabitants wanted. I have not seen in Consortiumnews any fabricated factual claims such as we call "fake news". If the labeling system is run honestly, I think Consortiumnews has nothing to worry about. But can we trust it will be run honestly?

14 December 2016 (Digital tracking of seafood) Seafood in the US will require digital tracking to identify where it was caught or grown, and what species it is. I'm in favor of this system, because it it doesn't track human beings. I don't think live fish have a right to privacy, let alone dead fish.

14 December 2016 (Campaign of bull-headed prudery) A national campaign seeks to make all US states prohibit sex between humans and nonhuman animals. This campaign seems to be sheer bull-headed prudery, using the perverse assumption that sex between a human and an animal hurts the animal. That's true for some ways of having sex, and false for others. For instance, I've heard that some women get dogs to lick them off. That doesn't hurt the dog at all. Why should it be prohibited? When male dolphins have sex with people, that doesn't hurt the dolphins. Quite the contrary, they like it very much. Why should it be prohibited? I've also read that female gorillas sometimes express desire for sex with men. If they both like it, who is harmed? Why should this be prohibited? The proponents of this law claim that any kind of sex between humans and other species implies that the human is a "predator" that we need to lock up. That's clearly false, for the cases listed above. Making a prohibition based on prejudice, writing it in an overbroad way, is what prissy governments tend to do where sex is concerned. The next step is to interpret it too strongly with "zero tolerance". Will people convicted of having dogs lick them off be required to live at least 1000 feet from any dogs? This law should be changed to prohibit only acts in which the animal is physically forced to have sex, or physically injured.

14 December 2016 (Trump's phone call to Taiwan's president) Trump's phone call to Taiwan's president was no gaffe. It was a calculated measure, prearranged with lobbyists, probably aimed at profit for his business. Aside from demonstrating once more that Trump is a liar, and that he views the presidency as an opportunity for profit for himself and billionaire cronies, it shows us that Bob Dole has sold out his country by working for a foreign government. Taiwan is a democracy. The US properly treats it as a friend and ally. However, a former US official that represents a foreign government has sold out his country even if that foreign government is a friend and ally. Friendly countries often have different interests, and disagreements. Dole has given his loyalty to Taiwan before the US on those disagreements; that's not what a patriot does.

14 December 2016 (Wells Fargo) Another reason not to keep your money in Wells Fargo bank: it forces its customers into arbitration, which is biased against them. I suggest moving your money out of any of the large US banks.

14 December 2016 (Registered sex offender forced into the woods) Registered sex offender Steven Folster was forced to move into a tent in the woods, or be imprisoned. Either one could kill him, since he is supposed to spend 8 hours a day on an oxygen tank. I don't see how someone in such bad health is likely to be a danger to children, but if he were, living in a tent in the woods would not prevent it. Telling him that his new house was a permissible place for him to live, then deciding the opposite after he had spent the money to move, was a dirty trick.

14 December 2016 (Court orders removal of page from searches) A Canadian court has ordered Google to remove a page from searches world-wide, triggering an appeal on a question of world-wide importance. The article spreads gratuitous confusion by calling this trade secret case an "intellectual property" case. Other so-called "intellectual property" laws are totally different from trade secret law, so associating this case with them can only spread misunderstanding.

14 December 2016 (Global heating wiping out seabird species) Global heating is wiping out some species of seabirds on St Kilda island in Scotland. If the sea life they eat moves north, it is moving away from land. These birds won't find many places to breed up north. Maybe we could save them by creating artificial islands, or floating breeding platforms. But with so many kinds of damage being caused by our CO2 emissions, the only feasible way to stop all the damage is to stop increasing the atmospheric greenhouse gas level.

14 December 2016 (How farms treat animals) Australian politicians are seeking legalistic excuses for preventing public exposure of how farms treat animals. Some US states have already done this with Ag-gag laws. Farmers have two legitimate choices: either treat animals in ways the public finds acceptable, or convince the public to accept more. Finding excuses to stop the public from finding out about farm practices is not legitimate. Now, if only the campaign could convince the public that farms' treatment of animals is a kind of sex…

14 December 2016 (Total tracking of employees) A Rio Tinto mine plans to track employees totally, even when they are off duty, using sensors on lampposts as well as drones. Tracking people this much should be prohibited by law, even employees on duty.

14 December 2016 (Electric cars) Are electric cars really zero-emissions vehicles? That depends on whether the electricity is generated from fossil fuels. This doubt is for the short term. In the long run, electric cars are a step forward because we can generate all our electricity renewably just by ramping up existing technology. The car batteries can serve as load buffers. We have to make sure that recharging electric cars is anonymous.

14 December 2016 (Effect of austerity on UK libraries) Libraries in the UK are hit hard by the effect of austerity on local governments.

14 December 2016 (Dictatorship and poverty in Central Asia) Democracy in Central Asia has turned out to mean dictatorship and poverty. Most people there wish they could have the Soviet Union back.

13 December 2016 (Customer reviews) A new US law prohibits companies from restricting how their customers post reviews of the company's products or services. The article ends with a fatuous statement that companies "should protect" their "intellectual property". That term is so broad that it is fatuous to say that people "should" (or "shouldn't") do any particular thing with it. If we make the subject narrower and concrete by replacing "intellectual property" with something specific, such as copyrights, then it becomes mistake. It is wrong to endorse in a blanket way all the things that companies do to enforce copyrights. Some are legitimate, and some are not.

12 December 2016 (Low pay and precarious jobs in the UK) Unemployment in the UK has gone down, but most people can barely live on the pay of their precarious jobs, and they have no career path to a better job. It's easy to get full employment by letting employers pay people too little to live on. That is not enough to qualify as successful management of the economy. I think the answer to their needs is Corbyn and his supporters, who want to make the Labour Party a real Labour Party again.

11 December 2016 (NYC Thug layers prosecute protesters) New York City Thug Department lawyers specially prosecute protesters, to pressure them to make deals that include admissions such that would stop them from suing the city for their false arrests.

11 December 2016 (Murderous, violent men) Why Does a Woman Stay with a Violent Man? Sometimes, to Save Her Life. Women are most likely to be murdered by men just after leaving them.

11 December 2016 (Export-Import Bank) The US congress protected many ecosystems by refusing to resuscitate the Export-Import Bank. The Export-Import Bank has funded lots of fossil fuel projects and getting rid of it is substantial progress. The danger is that Trump will bring it back next year.

11 December 2016 (EU wildlife protection directives) A public campaign forced the EU's plutocratist president to give up on a plan to "reform" wildlife protection directives to serve business.

11 December 2016 (Egyptian women's rights activist arrested) Azza Soliman, Egyptian women's rights activist, has been arrested, and her NGO shut down. "Detained" is a fashionable euphemism for "arrested". I never use it, because I think we should call an arrest an arrest.

11 December 2016 (Thousands of geese dead in Montana) Acid water in an old open pit mine in Montana killed thousands of migrating geese that found no other place in the area to stop in. It goes to show that we need to clean up old mines — putting up "danger" signs is does not make them safe. Cleaning up the mine has to be treated as part of running the mine. Indeed, starting to operate a mine should require posting a bond for the expected costs of cleanup.

11 December 2016 (Trump fires crony's son) One small positive step: Trump fired a crony's son for spreading the false "Pizzagate" accusations against Clinton. This in itself isn't much, but just maybe it will develop into something more. We will see.

11 December 2016 (Koch brothers' links to Trump) Many of Trump's choices for cabinet offices are closely linked with the Koch brothers.

11 December 2016 (Assange answers Swedish prosecutor) Julian Assange has published his answers to the Swedish prosecutor's questions, in effect daring the prosecutor to either charge him for real or let the issue drop so he can leave the Ecuadorian embassy. Assange says they can't actually charge him because the evidence offers no legal grounds to do so. I don't know what went on between Assange and the woman, but I do see that the prosecutors are using the charges as an excuse rather than really concerned about them. If they were serious about the alleged sex crime, they would have made the formal commitment not to send Assange to the US, and he would have gone to Sweden to face the legal proceedings.

11 December 2016 (Democrats) "Democrats must become progressive or get out of the way." I disagree with one background point: Trump did not win the election. Rather the Republican Party stole the election through voter-suppression. The Crosscheck scheme denied a million Americans the right to vote. With this unjust advantage, Trump didn't need to actually win; it was sufficient for him to get within stealing range. He did that against Clinton because of her nonprogressive policies. Sanders might have won by a bigger margin, beyond stealing range.

11 December 2016 (Facebook Presence) If you feel your organization needs a "presence" in Facebook.

11 December 2016 (Shuafat refugee camp) Israel calls Shuafat refugee camp a part of Jerusalem, but it is surrounded by walls and some residents are in effect imprisoned by them. They have to pay taxes for city services that they never get. Israeli thugs enter only to arrest people or demolish buildings. Aside from that, they protect the drug dealers that operate near a checkpoint in the walls. Residents estimate that 1/3 of the people are addicts of this drug, which leads some of its users to suicidally attack Israelis with knives. This gives Israeli thugs an excuse for illegal collective punishment: blowing up the family's house.

11 December 2016 (Disinformation) Disinformation, Not Fake News, Got Trump Elected, and It Won't Go Away.

11 December 2016 (Censorship) Replacing printed newspapers with digital distribution turns out to make censorship easier. For a while it was the opposite, but that was before states began trying in earnest to censor.

11 December 2016 (Dictator Maduro) Accusing Venezuela's president Maduro of becoming a dictator. It seems pretty much true to me. Chavez held real elections, and really won them. Maduro doesn't do that. While it is true that Chavez started some of the policies that are today causing economic problems, he did so to correct other economic problems (poor people had trouble buying necessities of life). I think he would have corrected the details of those policies if they had caused big problems while he was president.

11 December 2016 (Jihadis welcoming Trump) Jihadis boast that Trump will play into their hands, by spreading bigotry and thus provoking hatred from other Muslims. I fear it may be true.

10 December 2016 (Neonicotinoids) When neonicotinoid pesticides were banned in Europe, farm yields have not decreased. There is no reason to hesitate about banning them to save the bees.

10 December 2016 (Airline pricing) Personalized Pricing in the Air? Why Consumers Should Be Wary of a New Airline Pricing Proposal.

10 December 2016 (Risk management) [Global heating] Threatens Ability of Insurers to Manage Risk. This is a consequence of increases in extreme weather of various kinds. Each instance of extreme weather has some chance of causing lots of damage.

10 December 2016 (Government waste) If Republicans Want to "Cut Fat", They Might Start at the Pentagon. For plutocratist politicians, "cut fat from the budget" means "cut spending that goes to the non-rich." Paying businesses to build arms or run prisons never counts as "fat."

10 December 2016 (Privatizing native lands) Trump's advisors want to privatize indigenous peoples' land in order to deregulate drilling for fossil fuels. Privatization of tribal lands has been used in the US as a means to take it away. Once an individual, rather than the tribe, can sell the land, desperate poverty is likely to make that happen. The result is that the tribe's members end up just as poor, and without land. And in some cases poisoned by toxic releases from the wells.

10 December 2016 (Presidential war powers) Obama's latest report says that terrorist suspects must have proper trials in real courts, and that that the Authorization for Use of Military Force does not permit attacking any and all suspects of terrorism no matter where they are. Publishing a good policy so late in Obama's term of office is unlikely to restrain Trump very much. If he had published these decisions in 2008, and put them fully into effect, the US would be more respectable and more respected today, and it would be politically harder for a subsequent president to go against them.

10 December 2016 (Child soldiers) Dominic Ongwen was kidnaped at age 10 by the Lords Resistance Army and forced to be a soldier, then became a brutal leader. Was he a victim, or a war criminal? Clearly he started out as a victim; the question is to what extent he later became culpable. When children are forced to become soldiers, we can't hold them responsible for what they are forced to do. No 10-year-old can be expected to have the force of will needed to stand up to such pressure; few adults could do it. If the same person continues to do similar crimes when older, in a predatory army that punishes soldiers for not doing them, I think it is still senseless to put that person individually on trial. However, when a solider becomes a leader, and orders others to commit crimes, at that point I think person becomes responsible for them and cannot plead coercion.

10 December 2016 (Personalized pricing) Online sales, with tracking and surveillance of customers, enables businesses to show different people different prices. I protect myself from tracking and surveillance by paying cash in stores.

10 December 2016 (Urgent: Preserve Medicare) US citizens: call on Congress to resist Trump and Ryan by preserving Medicare.

10 December 2016 (Agents that murdered an exile in the US) The Chilean agents that murdered exile Orlando Letelier in the US in 1976 have been living safely in the US since then. Now Chile will try to extradite them.

10 December 2016 (Human rights lawyer missing in China) UN Human Rights Experts Demand Answers from China over Missing Lawyer. Reportedly they suspect he was imprisoned for meeting with someone from the US.

10 December 2016 (Israel excludes people for peaceful criticism) Israel denied entry to the general secretary of the World Council of Churches because she advocates boycott and divestment of Israel. A state that excludes people for peaceful criticism is moving towards tyranny. Israel calls itself the "only democracy in the Middle East", but it is getting too repressive to qualify any more.

10 December 2016 (Registered sex offenders) Courts in three US states have ruled that broad restrictions on the lives of registered sex offenders are unconstitutional. There may be some convicted sex criminals that are so dangerous to children (or, in some cases, to adults) that we need to prevent them from having a chance to attack anyone. But it's absurd to do this by putting most work, most education, and many civic activities off limits for them based on broad and dumb criteria. Surely there are smarter ways to achieve the goal — perhaps achieve it more completely — without forbidding them from walking around town. It would be better to sentence a few who are likely to commit more crimes to lifelong prison or parole, rather than impose such restrictions on a far larger number of people.

10 December 2016 (Carbapenem-resistant bacteria found in farm) Bacteria resistant to carbapenem antibiotics have been found in pigs in a US farm. When this resistance spreads to human environments, we will be left with no antibiotics that bacteria can't resist. Thanks to the practice of giving regular doses of antibiotics to all pigs, you'll be able to buy cheaper pork, and you'll die if you get an infection.

10 December 2016 (Snowden deserves to be treated better than Petraeus) General Petraeus leaked more sensitive secrets than Snowden, and did so for his own personal benefit. He got a slap on the wrist and now is considered for cabinet positions. Snowden, who risked imprisonment go give the public vital information, ought to be treated better than Petraeus.

10 December 2016 (Unions) What workers need, for a better life, is a union. Politicians that are sincere about helping working people will support laws making unions stronger and helping workers form unions and remain in them.

10 December 2016 (Helping poor people become self-supporting) "Poverty graduation" enables poor people in Bangladesh to become permanently self-supporting for years. It costs $100 per family.

10 December 2016 (Another Brazilian politician indicted) Another important Brazilian politician, the president of the Senate, has been indicted for corruption.

10 December 2016 (Taxing companies with higher-paid CEOs) Portland, Oregon, is considering an extra tax on companies whose CEOs are paid more than the median salary of workers. I hope this takes into account workers that are hired through temporary agencies or obligated to act as "independent contractors". I also hope it is not limited to companies whose headquarters are in Portland. It needs to include all companies that have any business activity located there.

10 December 2016 (Attack on Washington DC pizzeria) An armed man attacked a pizzeria in Washington DC to "investigate" fabricated stories that it Hillary Clinton was holding "child sex slaves" there.

10 December 2016 (Private prisons) Private Prisons Are Really Bad, But Good Enough for Immigrants, Concludes Homeland Security Report.

10 December 2016 (UN peacekeepers suspected of sexual abuse) The UN has identified 41 peacekeepers active in the Central African Republic as suspects for sexual abuse.

10 December 2016 (Land rights for indigenous peoples) Why Land Rights for Indigenous Peoples Could Be the Answer to [global heating]. I quibble with one point in the article, where it asks, "How do you compensate industries reliant on the agriculture that entails deforestation?" Why should they get compensation, rather than punishment?

10 December 2016 (CETA) The European Parliament will have to vote on CETA. If it does not reject that business-supremacy treaty, it will strengthen the right-wing "populist" parties.

9 December 2016 (Uber's price covers only 40% of its cost) The price of an Uber ride is only around 40% of its cost. This shows how intensely much the company is running at a loss. The only way this can be rational is if Uber plans to greatly increase its fees (perhaps after destroying its competitors) or else greatly reduce costs (by getting rid of drivers). Either way, let's not help Uber bring that future about.

9 December 2016 (Cognitive ability and time spent with mother) A study has found that a child's cognitive ability correlates with how much time they spend with their mothers in ages 3-7. This may or may not be true for fathers too; the study did not get much data about fathers. In other words, pushing parents back into full-time work could impose a lasting handicap on their children.

9 December 2016 (Australia using up carbon budget) Australia is racing through its carbon budget from now to 2050. At this rate, it will use all of that up by 2032.

8 December 2016 (Trump's association with antisemitism) Jews in New York protested against Trump's association with antisemitism, and against pro-occupation Jewish organizations that cozy up to Trump by turning a blind eye to antisemitism.

8 December 2016 (Sea Shepherd) Sea Shepherd faces credible accusations of lying about the sinking of the Ady Gil. However, it has been very effective, first against whaling and second against illegal fishing.

8 December 2016 (Today's right-wing trumpery) Recommending books that shed light on today's right-wing trumpery, and on why America's working poor are so mind-numbed by their lives that they don't try to organize politically to make it better.

8 December 2016 (Tories advocate surrender to business) Tories say that leaving the EU is an opportunity for more "free trade" in Britain. In other words, they advocate face-planting surrender to business, this time supported by Britain's remaining naval power. Plus selling arms to regimes that don't deserve support. The main problem with the EU is that it surrenders to business. There is no sense leaving the EU except to stop surrendering to business.

8 December 2016 (Permission for current DAPL route denied) The US Army denied permission to finish the Dakota Access pipeline on its current planned route, and will consider rerouting it. This could be a victory for protecting the local water. But if the pipeline crosses the Missouri somewhere else, it will only move the threat to a different backyard. Meanwhile, its contribution to increased global heating will be unaffected by changes in its route. The only real victory would be to stop the pipeline completely. The decision about the route also requires a proper environmental impact statement. Maybe that will provide an opportunity to stop it completely.

8 December 2016 (Europe's repressive right-wing candidates) Europe is in danger of choosing the not-quite-extreme repressive right wing as a lesser evil than the extreme repressive right wing. Both of them, like Trump, scapegoat immigrants for economic setbacks that most people experience as a consequence of concentration of wealth, and neither one proposes to end that concentration process.

8 December 2016 (Eliminating land-based nuclear missiles) Mattis has suggested eliminating land-based nuclear missiles. This could be a good idea, since it would reduce the hair-trigger readiness as well as saving lots of money.

8 December 2016 (Need for humanitarian aid growing) As the need for humanitarian aid around the world keeps growing, wealthy countries' governments have ceased donating what is needed. The need increases because of global heating effects, population growth and degraded natural systems. The reason governments no longer donate what is needed is that neoliberal policies have cut taxes on the rich and on business. These are the things we need to change.

7 December 2016 (Punishing unemployed people in the UK) A former UK "job adviser" says the purpose of her job was to find opportunities to punish unemployed people for any failure to go through the all the required steps. Even being in the hospital was not accepted as an excuse.

7 December 2016 (Foreclosed over 27 cents) Steven Mnuchin's bank foreclosed on an old woman's house because of a 27-cent error in her mortgage payments.

7 December 2016 (Punitive Medicaid plan) Trump's choice to administer Medicare and Medicaid designed Indiana's Medicaid plan, which was intended to shaft poor people.

7 December 2016 (Dangerous drivers who kill) The United Kingdom plans to sentence drivers to life in prison if they kill someone by driving while speeding or holding a phone, or while drunk, etc. If the goal is to discourage drivers from doing those dangerous things, this approach is big on harshness but low on effectiveness. Only a tiny fraction of people that today drive speeding, holding a phone, or drunk, will cause actual harm and be punished for it. The rest tell themselves, "Nothing will go wrong", so they don't worry about what the penalty would be if something did go wrong. The effective way to discourage those dangerous behaviors is to apply a small punishment more often. If 10% of the people who did one of these things on any given day were sentenced to one night in jail, almost all of them would soon learn not to do it any more. Even 1% might be enough, since everyone would know people who were caught.

7 December 2016 (Veterans protecting protesters) 2000 unarmed US military veterans are headed for Standing Rock to act as human shields for the pipeline protesters.

7 December 2016 (Jill Stein's recount efforts) Trump Allies in Battleground States Rush to Stop Jill Stein's Recount Efforts. There is no possible legitimate reason to oppose a more careful count of the ballots. The reasons they give are trivial. We know what the unstated motive is: "If there's a mistake in our favor, we don't want you to find it!"

7 December 2016 (Urgent: Stop siege of protesters) US citizens: phone the White House at (202) 456-1111 and call on Obama to stop the siege of pipeline protesters. Thugs are cutting off supplies and ambulances; if the thugs attack again and injure more protesters, they could lose organs or die due to this.

7 December 2016 (Concealed guns) Trump wants to pass a law allowing people to carry concealed guns anywhere in the US if they get approval in some (any) state. If all states had strict standards, this might be ok.

7 December 2016 (Brazil's graft scandal) Brazil's lower house used the plane crash of a football team as cover for passing a bill to eliminate penalties for corruption of officials. Of the 513 members of the lower house, 450 voted for this.

7 December 2016 (Global heating denialism) The denialist-controlled House Science Committee claimed that world temperatures are decreasing. They are paid to repeat that message; they feel no shame about its obvious falsehood.

7 December 2016 (Online gambling) The habit of online gambling affects more teenage boys in the UK than drugs or alcohol. If they need it to unwind, could a game which doesn't cost money give them the same sensation? For me, it could.

7 December 2016 (US sanctions on Iran) The US Senate voted to continue sanctions on Iran. Iran says this violates the nuclear agreement. Can anyone find an expert analysis of whether that is true? I can't take either side's word about the matter.

7 December 2016 (Immigrant detainees) Why Is the Obama Administration Opposing Rights for Immigrant Detainees? Some will have a good case, and some will have a bad one, but each immigrant should have the chance to present the case to a judge.

7 December 2016 (Australia's offshore drilling) Australia rejected Greenpeace's freedom of information request for details of offshore drilling plans based on a laughable excuse — that Greenpeace might use the information to oppose the plans.

7 December 2016 (Hiring immigrants illegally) If the US really wanted to reduce illegal immigration, then rather than building walls or imprisoning deporting people, it would only need to punish employers that hire immigrants illegally. I am not strongly concerned about the number of unauthorized immigrants. As a US citizen, though, I object to the requirement for employees who are US citizens to prove they are. I would have no difficulty proving it, but I resent being required to do so.

7 December 2016 (Barrett Brown released) Barrett Brown has been released from prison. The court convicted him for Anonymous's cracking of Stratfor's systems. It now appears that the US government suppressed evidence that he was reporting on the cracking but not participating.

7 December 2016 (Partial blindness) People who are almost blind, but not 100%, face a lot of misunderstandings. The right-wing theocratic rule that limited use of embryonic stem cells impeded research into treating retinitis pigmentosa with stem cells to restore people's sight. Their objection was based entirely on religious irrationality. Obama eliminated this restriction; will Trump impose it again?

7 December 2016 (New oil pipeline) The Canadian government has approved a new oil pipeline, to be built by the company we could call Unkind Warmin', but Canadians are determined to stop it anyway.

7 December 2016 (Returning to Jalawla) Most of the inhabitants have returned to the town of Jalawla, liberated from PISSI in February, but there is no money to rebuild what was destroyed. Meanwhile, the Kurds and the Iraqi government dispute control of the town.

7 December 2016 (Jailed for loitering) One of the ways the US legal system systematically squeezes the poor is jailing women because a thug suspects they are prostitutes. As far as I can tell, the only motive for prohibiting prostitution is that some people find the idea disgusting. What kind of justification is that?

7 December 2016 (Gleeful hedge fund managers) A hedge fund manager says he feels "glee" that Trump has "conned the voters" by promising to curb hedge fund profits and now, when elected, heading in the opposite direction.

7 December 2016 (Loss of US grassland) US grassland is being rapidly converted to farmland. This releases lots of carbon that grasslands store up.

7 December 2016 (Keeping jobs in the US) Trump's method of "keeping Carrier's jobs in the US" was to offer the company a tax subsidy. As Sanders put it, the company "took Trump hostage and won" — a victory over the US government. We can't afford to pay thousands of companies to keep jobs in the US. We can afford to make them pay to move jobs out of the US.

7 December 2016 (FBI gag orders) A series of court decisions have made "national security letter" secret subpoenas less secret and easier to challenge.

We need to give the state power to subpoena specific information with specific grounds. To keep them from becoming oppressive, we must insist on narrow and specific subpoenas only, with concrete justification each time.

7 December 2016 (Hawking on inequality) Stephen Hawking: politicians must reduce inequality if humanity is to work together to deal with the global challenges that endanger the survival of civilization.

7 December 2016 (Netanyahu rants) Netanyahu accused a critical journalist of "brainwashing" the Israeli people for publishing stories about possibly corrupt activities in his family.

7 December 2016 (Sexting) Want to Know Why Young People Are Sexting? Try Asking Them.

7 December 2016 (Texas fetus burials) The Texas requirement to bury or cremate fetuses as if they were human beings is extremely cruel to women who have abortions — or miscarriages.

And if the women have to pay for this sick ceremony, it will put some of them out on the street.

Perhaps hospitals and abortion clinics can arrange to bury 100 fetuses at a time — at least that way it won't cost much, and the women won't be required to come and dwell on the situation.

7 December 2016 (Trump's army of bullies) Gamergate, in 2014, was the training campaign for Trump's army of bullies.

The other Trump supporters provide a sea of people in which the bullies can swim. They disapprove of the bullying, but they never go so far as to make the bullies go away.

7 December 2016 (Video blackmail) Adolescents and adults fall victim to manipulative strangers that pressure them to make nude videos, and then threaten to post those videos on the net unless the victims pay.

The blackmailers are doing something very nasty, and I'm glad if they are imprisoned for their crime. However, what enables them to get money this way is the prudish prejudice of the victims' friends, family and actual or potential colleagues. If not for this, the victims would only laugh at the demand for money.

7 December 2016 (Tracking of users' movements by Uber) Uber has started tracking users' movements before and after rides. It is unacceptable for a ride service to localize identified people ever. The fact that Uber knows passengers' names is already inexcusable.

7 December 2016 (Our low expectations of airlines) We don't expect airlines to behave decently, so it is news when one does. Airlines' reduction of seat space tends to provoke air rage, and that it follows that airlines share the culpability for it. Most people take for granted, in such cases, that the culpability must fall on one or the other; that assumption means letting one or the other off the hook.

7 December 2016 (Right-wing "political correctness") Right-wing bullies stretch the term "political correctness" to present any disapproval as mere narrowminded ideology. The pressures criticized as "political correctness" do exist. The term "trigger warnings" is used by people who ask for them, even demand them. "Microaggressions" and "cultural appropriation" derive from schools of thought that use them for actions that they disapprove of. They are meant to criticize acts seen as mistreatment of those who are weak or hurt. I agree with them on some issues, but on some points I think they go too far. For instance, telling people to say "black" instead of "negro" (which was not a pejorative word), then to say "African-American" instead of "black", then to say "people of color" instead of "African-American", led me to decline to follow them. ("Of color" is so clumsy that using it strikes me as conspicuous subservience.) I stuck with "blacks". (Then I learned Spanish, in which they are called "los negros", which means "the blacks".) I feel vindicated now that blacks have come around to using the term "black" again. What right-wingers have done is apply the label of "political correctness" to any disapproval of anything — even substantive condemnation of a nasty actions. Trump uses this distortion (see examples in the first article) when he bullies the weak, to imply that disapproval of bullying is mere "political correctness".

7 December 2016 (Wildfire in Tennessee) A wildfire in Tennessee entered the city of Gatlinburg and destroyed buildings. For wildfires to be dangerous almost at the start of winter is shocking. Part of the cause was drought. That this is the hottest year humans have ever experienced is probably pertinent.

7 December 2016 (Syrian army soldiers bombed by mistake) The Pentagon recognizes it bombed Syrian army soldiers in September by mistake.

7 December 2016 (Punishing unemployed people) The Tories have never tried to verify whether punishing unemployed people for every failure to carry out the job search dance really led to more of them in employment. I'm not surprised that the Tories have not tried to measure the "effectiveness" of these punishments in achieving their supposed goals, because the goals don't make sense anyway, and I don't think the Tories were honest about their goals. I think the Tories' real motive for these punishments is to demonize the unemployed and the disabled (often labeled as capable of working, through a carefully arranged system of excuses to disregard their medical evaluations) and to make it seem they don't deserve any help, which in the long term serves as an excuse for ceasing to help them. That will "save" money, making it possible to further cut taxes or increase welfare payments for the rich. As for the non-rich unemployed and disabled, with no state help they won't live many more years, and the Tories will say, "Mission accomplished." "The Tories are lower than vermin" — Aneurin Bevan.

7 December 2016 (EU's plan to cut energy use) The EU has a plan to cut energy use and stop subsidizing coal by 2030. Clearly these officials do not understand the gravity of the problem. They should have eliminated coal subsidies 10 years ago, but since they didn't, they should eliminate the subsidies tomorrow.

6 December 2016 (Fracking) High officials directly altered an EPA report about how fracking can poison water supplies. The report was written by scientists who said that the danger is real, but was altered to deny the danger.

6 December 2016 (Message of hate) Boys and young men seem especially susceptible to Trump's message of hate and bullying.

6 December 2016 (Trump announcement) Trump made a splashy announcement that on Dec 15 he will announce some way of distancing himself from his business. Why tell us only that he will tell us later? This media manipulation leads me to suppose he will announce some inadequate step, such as letting his children run it for him.

6 December 2016 (White-supremacists) The Associated Press has decided to explicitly identify US white-supremacists as such, rather than let them use "alt-right" as a mask.

6 December 2016 (Schoolyard settlers) Israelis that have taken houses in Hebron have now started building in a Palestinian school's yard.

If they keep going, they will eventually force all the Palestinian students to leave the school, on the grounds that some of them might someday attack Israeli colonists.

6 December 2016 (Misunderstandings) Arabs in Israel can be prosecuted for sarcastically condemning crimes such as arson, "because someone might misunderstand".

Yes, there is a chance someone might misunderstand. I've sometimes asked people to rewrite certain statements to avoid the risk that someone will misunderstand them and draw a meaning that is the opposite of what was intended. I've also occasionally written statements that some people have misunderstood, because I didn't make them clear enough.

Suggesting clarification is one thing; prosecution is another.

6 December 2016 (University in Occupied Territory) A university in an Israeli colony in Palestinian territory invited foreign speakers on the false pretense that it is located in Israel. Gush Shalom informed the speakers of the error, and at least one cancelled participation.

6 December 2016 (Fake News) Right-wing fake news is sometimes attributed to fake journalists. No lie is too sleazy for the US right wing today.

4 December 2016 (Haitians protest election rigging) Haitians protested massively, claiming the presidential election was rigged. With just a million people voting out of a population of 10 million, the election was surely no good. The previous "president" Martelly was imposed by the US, not honestly elected. I would guess that Moïse was also imposed by the US.

4 December 2016 (Racist incidents after the US election) In the 10 days after the election the US had a high rate of racist incidents. It's clear that the bulk of them were inspired by Trump.

4 December 2016 (Snowden) Former congressional staff, participants in the Church Committee's investigation of CIA crimes, called on Obama to make a deal for Snowden to return to the US.

4 December 2016 (Trudeau approves additional pipeline) Trudeau has approved an additional pipeline to transport tar sands oil to the Pacific coast for export. Once new fossil fuel supply infrastructure is built, it makes reduction of fossil fuel use much harder. The pipeline owners always pressure for it to continue to be used. "We have a right to return on our investment", they say. Not at the cost of millions of lives, they don't! Note how Trudeau justifies his decision based on assuming that oil extraction in Canada will increase. In other — in other words, assuming that we won't avoid disaster. That's defeatism.

4 December 2016 (The nuclear agreement with Iran) Brennan, head of the CIA, warned Trump that cancelling the nuclear agreement with Iran would be disastrous.

4 December 2016 (Trump's proposed secretary of education) Trump and his proposed secretary of education wish to undermine and destroy public education. The result would be great for the private owners that squeeze money out of cheap private schools at the expense of children and teachers.

4 December 2016 (Nazism gaining support) Nazism and comparable right-wing parties are gaining support in various European countries.

4 December 2016 (Carrier to keep 1000 jobs in Indiana) Trump convinced Carrier to keep 1000 jobs in Indiana. It will move 1000 other jobs to Mexico as planned. He has done some good, but I doubt it will last more than a couple of years. Once people forget, the company could move the jobs just as they planned.

4 December 2016 (Romney gives Trump effusive praise) Is there anything Mitt Romney won't do, to get appointed Secretary of State? Apparently not much; he has just given Trump effusive praise. One of the worst effects that Trump has is to normalize the practice of sucking up to him and denying his faults. People do this for various reasons, but none of them can excuse it.

1 December 2016 (Blue Lies Matter) The thugs that attacked pipeline protesters subsequently lied about what they had done. If we are ever to be safe, we have to make those bullies pay for their lies. Blue Lies Matter!

1 December 2016 (Assange questioned) Assange has been questioned in the Ecuadorian embassy. If Swedish prosecutors really want to prosecute Assange in Sweden, they will be able to do so with little further ado provided they give the formal assurances they won't send him to the US. Their refusal to do so shows that they are not really interested in the crimes alleged against him, and only interested in an excuse to send him to the US. Soon we will see what the Swedish prosecutors' next maneuver is.

1 December 2016 (Economic reforms in Cuba) Raúl Castro has made some economic reforms in Cuba but has not increased human rights. I think Cuba deserves human rights, but must be careful about how far to permit private business. Cubans deserve democracy but have no experience in running democracy. They could easily fall into the plutocrats' trap. Even US voters, with much more experience have made the mistake of electing politicians such as Clinton, Dubya and Obama that have surrendered their countries to global business. How, then, to lead Cuba to a democracy that won't allow multinationals to take power?

As long as businesses are small, and have no political power, they are safe and useful — though it is necessary to police them carefully so that they don't think they can get away with stealing workers' pay and other abuses. Perhaps the Cuban constitution should prohibit in a broad way the operation of foreign companies in the country. Buying and selling foreign goods, ok; letting a large multinational actually operate in the country, no.

30 November 2016 (Homelessness in Australia) It is starting to appear that "homelessness [in Australia] is not just caused by government policy, it is government policy."

30 November 2016 (The Great Barrier Reef) It will take 15 years for the Great Barrier Reef to recover from massive coral death (caused to ocean temperature among other things). More likely it will never recover, because even broader coral deaths will follow during that period.

30 November 2016 (Carbon tax in the US) Economic modelling says that a revenue-neutral carbon tax in the US would create jobs and economic growth, and increase the income of working people, as well as accelerating the reduction in CO 2 emissions. The crucial point is that the tax increases every year, and investors know that it will increase every year. This means that the pressure on investors to avoid future fossil fuel use is very strong. The model for this study was revenue-neutral, but I don't think that a carbon tax has to be revenue-neutral. Perhaps the state should keep some of the money to spend on useful things such as infrastructure; that too puts the money back into circulation.

30 November 2016 (US churches offer sanctuary to non-citizens) 300 US churches have recently offered sanctuary to non-citizens without visas. "Help the downtrodden" is the good side of Christianity. The bad side shows in Trump supporters those who wish to persecute someone. Keep in mind that Obama has deported over 2 million unauthorized immigrants, in some cases because they committed minor crimes decades ago. If Trump wants to adopt a harsher policy, what will he do? Deport jaywalkers?

30 November 2016 (Storytelling) Will Self: "Are humans evolving beyond the need to tell stories?" Reading the article, I think it is only speculation that this change (which affects a large fraction of young people but not all) is a pathway to any new capability. It seems more likely to me that it is a pathway to cognitive discapacity.

30 November 2016 (Tunisia proposes new national ID card) Tunisia is considering a new form of national ID card, which would be used for unspecified forms of tracking and surveillance. Even nastier, a citizen would be punished for trying to decrypt the data in per own ID card.

30 November 2016 (Privacy rights) The UN Human Rights Council continues to extend its support for privacy rights. However, it is advocating insufficient measures — data "protection" rather than banning the accumulation of personal data.

30 November 2016 (Arrogance towards the truth) The supporters of taking the UK out of the EU condemned a neutral agency that reports facts and estimates, because it didn't distort them to suit that side. Their arrogance towards the truth resembles Trump's.

30 November 2016 (Spanking in US schools) Schools in many southern US states still spank or beat students. It has bad effects on students, both in the short term and the long term.

29 November 2016 (Media control techniques) Trump's Seven Techniques to Control the Media. I think the etymology of "news media" given in the article is not quite correct — I think "media" refers to "medium of expression", in this case used to present news.

29 November 2016 (False memories) Elizabeth Loftus received a prize for standing by science against the illusions of people who had been led to invent and believe, as adults, false memories of child abuse that never happened.

The victims of real child abuse generally don't forget about it, and don't need the help of a "recovered memory" practitioner to remember that it happened to them. (They may wait many years before they decide to talk about it — but that's not forgetting.)

On the other hand, it is not hard to convince a person to "remember" imaginary abuse (or other imaginary events), using repeated sessions and various techniques of manipulation. Thus, we should be skeptical of criticizing anyone based on "recovered memories".

29 November 2016 (Emissions tests) EU countries are surrendering to car manufacturers that want to continue cheating on emissions tests.

The purpose of the state is to make companies like that bow to the people's needs. The EU is, evidently, inadequate.

29 November 2016 (Bolivia's water supply) Global heating has taken away Bolivia's water supply.

This problem is not of Bolivia's making — the US has done far more to cause it — but to cope with it will require Bolivia to convince people to have fewer children.

29 November 2016 (Replacing diesel with solar) A small island in American Samoa has replaced 100,000 gallons per year of diesel fuel with solar power. With batteries, no more fuel needs to be burned.

American Samoa plans to end fossil fuel use by 2040. But I think that is not soon enough, if it is to be a leader for the rest of the world to get off fossil fuels fast enough.

29 November 2016 ("Flynn facts") Michael Flynn has a history of making untrue claims about facts.

The article also includes actions that violated government security rules more than Clinton did. (It may not really have been harmful in Flynn's case, or in Clinton's case. Rather, there was a risk in each case that it would be harmful.)

With Trump, the only standard is a double standard. Nothing is objectively right or wrong, for him, only an opportunity to praise someone (if that is his wish) or to condemn someone (if that is his wish).

29 November 2016 (Refugees denied healthcare) Australia says that the boat people it stores in Manus Island will be moved to Australia for medical care if their illnesses require this. Leaked documents show that bureaucrats work very hard to deny that this is necessary.

29 November 2016 (Homophobia) Thug departments in the UK (and, I suppose, the US) are rife with bigotry against homosexuals, but they pretend not to be.

29 November 2016 (US election security) The way to determine whether US election security was cracked is to check the ballots by hand. It's too bad that the article uses the term "hack" as a synonym for "break computer security", but that doesn't alter the validity of the point. The article advocates insisting on voting with paper because that system is the best. I agree. The author asks us not to call him a Luddite — but this is precisely what Luddism means. Luddites believe we can reject technological "advances" when they are harmful. We reject the assumption that these harmful "advances" are inevitable and that resistance is useless (technological defeatism). The use of "Luddite" as an insult is an indirect way of presuming technological defeatism. If we pander to that, it will will undermine our opposition to harmful technologies. We must be proud to oppose harmful "advances" in technology, proud to call ourselves Luddites. Fellow Luddites, stand tall with me!

29 November 2016 (Chinese subcontractors) Even workers at factories in China are afraid of being employed by Chinese subcontractors.

29 November 2016 (Trump's bullying and bigotry) Trump's campaign focused on bullying and bigotry as much as on economic losses for working class Americans.

29 November 2016 (Republican legislators) Republican legislators in North Carolina seem to plan to override the voters' choice of a Democratic governor. The party is now spreading FUD to make it look less bad. The voters didn't really choose those legislators, either: their districts have been gerrymandered. In effect, they intend to rig all elections for all state offices forever.

29 November 2016 (US naval defenses vulnerable) Global heating has made the US naval defenses vulnerable. Of course, this is small potatoes compared with the danger of global heating itself. But it might get through the think heads of some denialists.

28 November 2016 (Urgent: Support vote audit) Everyone: call for auditing the vote in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Michigan. This is to double-check that the computers were not rigged.

28 November 2016 (Urgent: Stop the Dakota Access pipeline) US citizens: phone the Army Corps of Engineers to ask it to stop the Dakota Access pipeline. phone numbers:

Main: 202-761-0011, press 9

Regulatory (permits) office: 202-761-5903

Hello, my name is ________. I'm calling from {city, state, county}. It is your duty to pull the permits for the Dakota Access pipeline immediately. Police are violently attacking peaceful water protectors, putting their lives in danger by blasting them with water cannons in freezing cold weather. You must stop this pipeline now. It is dangerous in the long term, but right now, this very second it is a threat to the lives at Standing Rock.

28 November 2016 (Putinism) Putinism means considering nationalist legends so important that they should not be "besmirched" by historical facts. I expect that many soldiers in Panfilov's division fought heroically. After all, they stopped the German advance on Moscow, and that could not have been easy. Does this need to be exaggerated? Isn't that victory good enough?

28 November 2016 (Attack on Palestinians stuck in cars) Israeli soldiers watched passively as fanatical Israelis attacked Palestinians stuck in their cars while stuck at the soldiers' checkpoint. The violence could easily have killed some Palestinians.

28 November 2016 (Cryin'air) Cryin'air is heading towards air fares of zero. It could be very convenient for those who can afford to take time off work at all — if we ignore what the CO 2 from those planes will do.

28 November 2016 (Registered sex offender) A registered sex offender is dying of Alzheimer's disease in a hospice, but he has been ordered to leave because it is too close to a facility for children. The offender's crime, 30 years ago, did not involve children.

28 November 2016 (Protests across Canada against pipeline) There were protests across Canada against a proposed new pipeline. The Canadian government isn't as delusionist as Trump, but it is trying to keep the CO 2 flowing as much as it can.

27 November 2016 (New UK censorship rules) The UK government doubles down on its proposed new censorship rules, proposing to block access to sites that show certain kinds of "unconventional" sex.

There is no obvious motive except bureaucratic rigidity. But perhaps this is tactical. To undermine the fight against imposing censorship level 1, propose censorship level 2. If the opposition fights that, censorship level 1 can be the "compromise".

27 November 2016 (East Aleppo captured by Assad) Assad's army has captured part of eastern Aleppo.

Assad is guilty of many atrocities, and the rebels (mostly Islamist) are likely to repress all groups other than Sunnis if they get a chance. It's possible that Assad is the lesser evil.

27 November 2016 (Thunderstorm asthma) Global heating is making grass pollen more allergenic. Combine this with a thunderstorm and it can kill people with asthma, even if they never had asthma before.

27 November 2016 (Duterte's peace initiative) Philippine President Duterte is trying to negotiate peace with a leftist armed rebellion that has gone on for years.

The article is mistaken in saying that Duterte is the first to reject military ties with the US. After Marcos fell, the Philippines closed large US military bases. If I recall right, all of those bases were closed.

27 November 2016 (Depending on GPS) Depending on GPS navigation systems to find your way could cause the hippocampus to atrophy.

It will take some time for experiments to test this theory, but other short-term effects are a good enough reason to get out of that.

27 November 2016 (7 degrees C) A new analysis says that we have underestimated the likely amount of global heating &emdash; suggesting 5 to 7 degrees C is what we are heading for if we do not greatly curb emissions. 7C of heating would make large areas of the Earth's surface fatal to humans.

27 November 2016 (Plans to replace gas tax with "road use tax") Planet-roasters in Australia think it's bad that gas-guzzlers pay more tax than efficient vehicles. This disparity threatens to reduce sales of fuel. So they plan to replace the gasoline tax with a "road use tax" that would treat gas-guzzlers "fairly". It occurs to me that the road use tax could offer the state a bonus: an excuse to track where cars actually go, as occurs now in London. Whatever it takes to keep the CO 