Monthly Archives: June 2018

‘Morally Bankrupt’: After Tax Cuts for Richest, House GOP Unveils $5.4 Trillion Attack on Nation’s Safety Net

The Republican budget’s “extreme cuts to healthcare, retirement security, anti-poverty programs, education, infrastructure, and other critical investments are real and will inflict serious harm on American families.”

By Jake Johnson, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 6-19-2018

Photo: YouTube

With the nation’s attention rightly fixated on President Donald Trump’s horrific treatment of immigrant children, House Republicans on Tuesday quietly unveiled their 2019 budget proposal that calls for $537 billion in cuts to Medicare, $1.5 trillion in cuts to Medicaid, and four billion in cuts to Social Security over the next decade in an effort to pay for their deficit-exploding tax cuts for the wealthy.

“It’s morally bankrupt, patently absurd, and grossly un-American,” the advocacy group Patriotic Millionaires said of the GOP’s budget proposal, which calls for $5.4 trillion in spending cuts from major domestic programs. Continue reading

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Poverty Rampant, Puerto Rico Destroyed, Single Payer “Too Expensive,” and Flint Still Doesn’t Have Clean Water. But You Can Have Space Force!

Trump channels Jim Crow era in announcing more militarized space

By Andrea Germanos, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 6-18-2018

Photo: Nerdiest

President Donald Trump made the demand for more weapons sound not only ridiculous but also implicitly racist on Monday when he announced a new branch of the military—Space Force.

Speaking at a White House meeting of the National Space Council, Trump declared, “My administration is reclaiming America’s heritage as the world’s greatest space-faring nation,” and said he urged his “administration to embrace the budding commercial space industry.” Continue reading

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How Native American food is tied to important sacred stories

File 20180613 32307 1y11v1q.jpg?ixlib=rb 1.1

The First Salmon ceremony being performed. U.S. Department of Agriculture , CC BY-ND

Rosalyn R. LaPier, The University of Montana

The U.S. Supreme Court upheld a lower court ruling, on June 11, that asked Washington state to remove culverts that block the migration of salmon. The ruling has significant implications for Northwest Coast tribes, whose main source of food and livelihood is salmon.

The legal decision stems from the 1855 Stevens treaties when Northwest Coast tribes retained the “right to take fish” from their traditional homelands. Fighting to protect salmon habitat, however, is more than just upholding tribal rights. Salmon is viewed as sacred. Continue reading

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Coalition Ignores Famine Warnings and Continues Assault on Yemen as Critics Question US Complicity

While senators demand answers from the Pentagon, anti-war advocates are calling the attack on Hodeida a failure by the U.S. to stop it and demanding an end to American military support for the coalition

By Jessica Corbett, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 6-16-2018

Yemen Emergency Response Food Assistance. Photo: IRUSA

Ignoring international aid groups’ warnings that an attack on the Yemeni city of Hodeida, which is held by Houthi rebels, could exacerbate hunger in an impoverished and war-torn nation already on the brink of famine, Saudi-led U.S.-backed coalition forces continued a sweeping assault on the Red Sea port city Saturday, reportedly seizing control of an airport.

Since the fighting started earlier this week, thousands of Hodeida’s 600,000 civilians have evacuated and hundreds of people have been killed. The port city is the main conduit through which about 70 percent of international aid reaches Yemenis, many of whom are battling starvation and outbreaks of infectious diseases such as cholera. Continue reading

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‘Historic First’: Nebraska Farmers Return Land to Ponca Tribe in Effort to Block Keystone XL

“We want to protect this land,” said the tribe’s state chairman. “We don’t want to see a pipeline go through.”

By Jessica Corbett, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 6-15-2018

In a move that could block the path of the Keystone XL pipeline, a couple in Nebraska signed over a portion of farmland to the Ponca Tribe. (Photo: @BoldNebraska/Twitter)

In a move that could challenge the proposed path of TransCanada’s Keystone XL pipeline—and acknowledges the U.S. government’s long history of abusing Native Americans and forcing them off their lands—a Nebraska farm couple has returned a portion of ancestral land to the Ponca Tribe.

At a deed-signing ceremony earlier this week, farmers Art and Helen Tanderup transferred to the tribe a 1.6-acre plot of land that falls on Ponca “Trail of Tears.” Continue reading

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‘Utterly Terrifying’: Study Affirms Feedback Loop Fears as Surging Antarctica Ice Loss Tripled in Last Five Years

“The most robust study of the ice mass balance of Antarctica to date,” scientists say, “now puts Antarctica in the frame as one of the largest contributors to sea-level rise.”

By Jessica Corbett, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 6-14-2018

Most serious melting is occuring in West Antarctica, scientists say. East Antarctica has experienced far less melting because the bulk of its ice is above sea level. (Photo: Natalie Tapson/flckr/cc)

Scientists are expressing alarm over “utterly terrifying” new findings from NASA and the European Space Agency that Antarctica has lost about 3 trillion tons of ice since 1992, and in the past five years—as the atmospheric and ocean temperatures have continued to climb amid ongoing reliance on fossil fuels—ice losses have tripled.

This should be a wake-up call, said University of Leeds professor Andrew Shepherd, a lead author of the report. “These events and the sea-level rise they’ve triggered are an indicator of climate change and should be of concern for the governments we trust to protect our coastal cities and communities. Continue reading

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Sounding Alarm Over Possible #GOPTaxScam 2.0, 130 Groups Warn Lawmakers Against ‘Another Massive Tax Cut’ for Wealthy

New letter warns of conservatives seeing “an excuse for still deeper cuts” to social safety net

By Andrea Germanos, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 6-13-2018

A woman holds a sign at a protest of the “Trump tax scam” on Dec.4, 2017. (Photo: CDEL Family/flickr/cc)

With President Donald Trump and fellow Republicans eyeing a second round of tax cuts—with a rollout possible this summer—130 organizations are urging members of Congress to reject them, because, like the first round, they will “primarily enrich the already wealthy” while threatening even deeper cuts to essential services.

“The richest Americans do not need another massive tax cut,” the letter from national groups including the AFL-CIO, Americans for Tax Fairness, Friends of the Earth, the National Education Association, and Patriotic Millionaires states. Continue reading

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Poor People’s Campaign Leaders Among Dozens Arrested Nationwide as Moral Movement Persists

Ahead of Capitol Hill forum, Rev. William Barber and Rev. Liz Theohalis reportedly still in police custody

By Julia Conley, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 6-12-2018

Rev. Liz Theohalis was among the community leaders who were arrested on Monday on Capitol Hill, while demonstrating as part of the Poor People’s Campaign. (Photo: @UniteThePoor/Twitter)

A day after being detained for leading a Poor People’s Campaign demonstration on Capitol Hill—just two of the dozens of arrests of anti-poverty advocates at protests across the country on Monday—Rev. William Barber and Rev. Liz Theoharis were set to speak at a forum on inequality and poverty in Washington, D.C. on Tuesday.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Rep. Elijah Cummings called the meeting in order to hear from Americans who are demanding that Congress address economic inequality and persistent poverty in many parts of the U.S.—amid the implementation of cruel policies like last year’s tax law, the benefits of which mainly went to the richest Americans. Continue reading

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Senator: “Let Me Repeat… The US Helped Bomb A DOCTORS WITHOUT BORDERS CHOLERA TREATMENT FACILITY”

“Whether intentional or a result of negligence, it is totally unacceptable,” said the medical aid group in a statement

By Jon Queally, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 6-11-2018

A newly constructed cholera treatment center run by the international medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) in Abs, Yemen, was bombed the Saudi/UAE/US coalition on Monday. (Photo: MSF)

After the international humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières on Monday announced that a newly constructed cholera treatment center in Yemen was bombed on Monday, Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.)—who has led the fight in the U.S. Senate to end the U.S. military’s key role in assisting Saudi Arabia’s assault on its war-torn and poverty-stricken neighbor—lashed out in disgust and anger on social media.

Continue reading

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‘Anyone Surprised?’ Kinder Morgan Pipeline Leak Two Days Before Trudeau Buyout Was 48 Times Larger Than First Reported

“With accuracy like that, we should all be very, very worried.’

By Jake Johnson, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 6-10-2017

Thousands march in opposition to the Kinder Morgan Pipeline expansion. (Photo: MeanwhileinCana/Twitter)

Just two days before Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced that his government would purchase Kinder Morgan’s faltering and widely opposed Trans Mountain pipeline, British Columbia’s Ministry of Environment said 100 liters of crude oil had leaked at a Kinder Morgan pipeline pump station north of Kamloops—but the company initially refused to confirm the severity of the spill.

On Saturday, with its bailout from the Canadian taxpayer confirmed by Trudeau, Kinder Morgan declared after an investigation that, actually, 4,800 liters of crude oil had leaked during the May 27 spill—48 times more crude than first reported. Continue reading

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