In yesterday’s press conference held by president Obama, much of the attention was naturally paid to the deal reached with Iran. But for reasons that mystify me, US presidents are often asked about other things that have nothing to do with their role in office and, even more mystifyingly, actually answer them instead of asking why the hell they are being asked such random questions.
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Glenn Greenwald writes that he and First Look Media, the parent company that publishes The Intercept that he and others write for, has announced a $60,000 matching gift to help Chelsea Manning in her legal defense. We should never forget Manning’s heroic actions and revelations that preceded those of Edward Snowden, and had such a major positive impact. Her release of the video that showed a US gunship mercilessly and gleefully mowing down Iraqi civilians in the street in broad daylight horrified the world and exposed the brutality of the US occupation.
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I have been amused by the reactions to the deal arrived at between the P5+1 nations and Iran. Even before the full text of the final deal was released, some people had denounced it, invoking as usual the tired example of Neville Chamberlain at Munich. When reporters have interviewed these critics about it, you may have noticed that they never ask the question “Exactly what sections in the text of the deal are you objecting to and why?”. This is because it is understood that neither the politician nor the reporter have likely read the agreement at all or if they have, they merely skimmed through the document and have not fully understood it.
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One of the things I hate about professional sports in the US is the way that wealthy team owners extort public money for fancy stadiums that not only do not benefit the public but actually siphon money away from much needed and better services that many more people would benefit from. It is one more of the many ways that money is diverted from the poor to the rich.
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The Indianapolis-based Church of Cannabis is giving the New York-based Satanic Temple a run for its money in showing the absurdity of providing all manner of breaks for religious organizations. We already saw that they filed for and were granted tax-exempt status by the IRS. They then filed a lawsuit for the right to use cannabis, using the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) as the basis for their suit.
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The Boy Scouts seem to be slowly inching their way towards modernity when it comes to dealing with gays. After initially rejecting gay scouts, and then having a kind of ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ attitude, they decided in 2013 to accept gay scouts but not gay adult scout leaders. But now they have reversed that policy too. On July 10, the Executive Committee unanimously adopted a resolution that “will allow chartered organizations to select adult leaders without regard to sexual orientation”.
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An article of faith in the right wing of the US is that raising taxes is always bad and lowering taxes is always good. In fact, Grover Norquist has made a good living going around getting candidates to sign a pledge that they will never raise taxes, ever, and woe to anyone who breaks such a pledge.
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A YouTuber known as The Backyard Scientist shows what happens when you pour seven different various molten metals into a fish tank full of cold water to see what happens. Why? Why not? I would definitely not recommend trying this at home.
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The big news today is the announcement of a deal between the P5+1 nations and Iran that would result in the easing of some of the tensions between Iran and the west, with the quid pro quo being restrictions imposed on Iran’s nuclear program in return for a lifting of sanctions. Julian Borger lists what he sees as the key points of the deal.
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The US Supreme Court ruling in the case of Citizens United has opened the floodgates to money in US politics, since it ruled against limiting the amount of money that private groups can spend on elections. There are estimates that the 2016 election will see about $10 billion spent, an obscene amount. The influence of money has always been large but now it is so massive and the Federal Election Commission is so dysfunctional that the head of the FEC has pretty much thrown her hands up in the air and said that she cannot control the abuses anymore.
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