All posts by nedhamson

Activist, writer, researcher, addicted to sharing information and facts.

Florida coronavirus: State hiding total number of cases in nursing homes | WFLA

It’s clear COVID-19 can spread like wildfire inside a nursing home. That’s why 8 On Your Side has fought to get the state to release data on COVID-19 cases in those facilities. Now, a Sarasota attorney says the state is not telling us the whole story.

Source: Florida coronavirus: State hiding total number of cases in nursing homes | WFLA

Florida coronavirus: State tallies 2,581 more COVID-19 cases, largest spike recorded | WFLA

TAMPA (WFLA) – The Florida Dept. of Health reported over 2,500 more positive cases of COVID-19 Saturday, the largest single day spike of cases since the department started counting. New numbers released by state health officials Saturday morning show the state has a total of 73,552 cases, up 2,581 since Friday. Florida has seen an increase of […]
— Read on www.wfla.com/community/health/coronavirus/florida-coronavirus-state-tallies-2581-more-covid-19-cases-48-deaths/

I could have been George Floyd but I lived: Former Detroit police chief

If my uniform, badge and education cannot protect me from anti-black violence, what can? Now is the time to get to the heart of the matter: There must be a major effort to fundamentally restructure police departments so that they actually do what they promise: Serve and protect all people.

This should include a change at all levels. Here’s what we must do to get started:

►Require higher aptitude and fitness standards for incoming recruits.

►Require regular mental health check-ups to deal with the stress and challenges of law enforcement.

►Develop a nationwide database of all officers to prevent bad officers from jumping departments to avoid marks on their permanent record.

►Stop promoting officers to become supervisors who have multiple disciplinary complaints, particularly, to positions of first-line leaders like sergeants and lieutenants.

►Rehabilitation within police unions. Their intransigence makes it almost impossible to fire and hold officers accountable for breaking the law and the public’s trust.

Source: I could have been George Floyd but I lived: Former Detroit police chief

Lawmakers Push to Invest Billions in Semiconductor Industry to Counter China

Corporate welfare again! First, they gave green light to fly from US to China to avoid labor unions, environment and human safety laws. So along with tax breaks, aka-bribes, relaxed rules on: labor unions, environment and human safety next?

New legislation aimed at supporting the semiconductor industry is a sign of shifting consensus in Washington, where industrial plans are now in vogue

Saturday Night Live alum Jay Pharoah says LA police kneeled on his neck | US news | The Guardian

“I was just trying to exercise,” he said. “It could have easily turned into another situation if I wasn’t who I am. And the point is that being black in America is just that, being black in America. Other people can’t level with the same fears I have. Leaving the house, we should not have to fear going to the grocery store, going to get some gas, running down the street. It’s called human civility. That’s what it is. It’s called being a human. That’s why everyone is out protesting. Corona put us in the house, and George Floyd took us out of it.”

Source: Saturday Night Live alum Jay Pharoah says LA police kneeled on his neck | US news | The Guardian

As one of Oxford’s few black professors, let me tell you why I care about Rhodes | Simukai Chigudu | Opinion | The Guardian

Rhodes’ imperialism gave rise to a pattern of settler colonialism in Southern Africa predicated on racial domination in political, economic and social spheres. In Rhodesia, 8 million disenfranchised black people eked out a living at subsistence level or below it, while 250,000 white people, barely 3% of the population, owned more than half of the country’s available land, and virtually all of its business and industry, before independence from colonial rule in 1980. Education, healthcare and housing were all segregated, with white people enjoying levels equivalent to those in western Europe or the United States.

Rhodes’ statue, then, is no mere physical artefact. It is imbued with a noxious history.

Source: As one of Oxford’s few black professors, let me tell you why I care about Rhodes | Simukai Chigudu | Opinion | The Guardian