All posts by nedhamson

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

John Kerry: ‘People are going to die because of the decision Trump made’

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The former US secretary of state has looked on as Donald Trump has dismantled the Paris climate agreement. Now, 14 years after losing his presidential bid, he is considering another

To look back at the moment John Kerry entered US public life, addressing the Senate foreign relations committee on 22 April 1971, is to be struck by many things. There are the famous words, of course: “How do you ask a man to be the last man to die in Vietnam? How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?” There is the shock of dark, Beatles-inspired hair, the distinctly British-tinged accent. Above all, there is the self-possession. Even though, as he describes it in his new book, Every Day Is Extra, he had not realised he would be the only witness until he had walked in the door, breathless and young and late; even though he was describing a situation about which he was deeply angry, he did not hurry his delivery.

Perhaps – after the vivid pointlessness of months spent in Vietnam, captaining vulnerable “swift boats” up muddy rivers; after being shot at and experiencing the deaths of friends; after watching a wounded Vietnamese soldier bleed to death in a US medical tent, surrounded by well-meaning soldiers who could not give him the most basic words of comfort in his own language, in his own country – the committee held little fear. Perhaps it was his upbringing, as the son of a state department lawyer and a mother whose extended family owned estates in Brittany, France, and an island off Cape Cod in Massachusetts; as a boy who attended elite boarding schools in Switzerland and the US; as a young man who, while a competitive debater and athlete at Yale, once went to visit a girlfriend (Jackie Kennedy’s half-sister) and found himself sailing with JFK for an afternoon. Or perhaps, as he puts it in his publisher’s offices in London, eyes watchful, tired from jetlag and an appearance on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, it comes from “being a little kid on the train to Berlin, travelling home alone from school”, a kid who by eighth grade had attended seven schools. “It was just – survival. I am confident. I have a confidence about things.”

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Democrat Katie Porter unseats two-time incumbent Rep. Mimi Walters in California’s 45th Congressional District – Los Angeles Times

Porter ran on a progressive platform, touting her support for universal healthcare and vowing to take corporate money out of politics. Her victory in the wealthy, highly educated district including Tustin and Mission Viejo, which had never sent a Democrat to Congress, signals the shifting political landscape in the county.

Source: Democrat Katie Porter unseats two-time incumbent Rep. Mimi Walters in California’s 45th Congressional District – Los Angeles Times

Californians want more funding for public higher education, survey shows

California is where it is now because from the early 1950s to the early 1970’s there was no tuition!!! You could go from BA to PhD and only pay for registration and books!

Most Californians believe higher education should be a top priority for the new governor and support increased funding for public colleges and universities, according to a new survey by the Public Policy Institute of California.

As the state’s public higher education system struggles to recover…

Facebook reportedly discredited critics by linking them to George Soros

Used anti-semitic trope – OMG!

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Facing a string of crises, Facebook hired a PR firm to push conspiracy theories about the billionaire, the New York Times reports

Facebook hired a PR firm that attempted to discredit the company’s critics by claiming they were agents of billionaire George Soros, the New York Times reported Tuesday.

Soros is a Jewish philanthropist who is the frequent subject of antisemitic conspiracy theories. At the same time, the social media company urged the Anti-Defamation League to object to a cartoon used by anti-Facebook protesters over its resemblance to antisemitic tropes.

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Brazil’s new foreign minister believes climate change is a Marxist plot

Clown Fascists in control… except it’s no t a joke and could kill the Amazon and the planet

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Ernesto Araújo has called climate science ‘dogma’ and bemoaned the ‘criminalisation’ of red meat, oil and heterosexual sex

Brazil’s president-elect Jair Bolsonaro has chosen a new foreign minister who believes climate change is part of a plot by “cultural Marxists” to stifle western economies and promote the growth of China.

Ernesto Araújo – until recently a mid-ranking official who blogs about the “criminalisation” of red meat, oil and heterosexual sex – will become the top diplomat of South America’s biggest nation, representing 200 million people and the greatest and most biodiverse forest on Earth, the Amazon.

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How Republican firm’s plan to defend Facebook by attacking rivals backfired

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Revelation that Definers had used George Soros as a target to defend Facebook unleashed an immediate storm of protest

It was a beguilingly simple idea. Take the tricks learned by political campaign managers on how to boost your candidate’s standing while ruthlessly undermining that of rivals, and apply it lucratively to the corporate world.

That was the thinking that led two top Republican operatives – Mitt Romney’s 2012 presidential campaign manager, Matt Rhoades, and Joe Pounder, former senior adviser to Marco Rubio in the 2016 White House race – to set up a Virginia-based partnership called Definers Public Affairs.

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