The Most Revolutionary Act

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The Most Revolutionary Act

Author Archives: stuartbramhall

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About stuartbramhall

Retired child and adolescent psychiatrist and American expatriate in New Zealand. In 2002, I made the difficult decision to close my 25-year Seattle practice after 15 years of covert FBI harassment. I describe the unrelenting phone harassment, illegal break-ins and six attempts on my life in my 2010 book The Most Revolutionary Act: Memoir of an American Refugee.

How Portugal Ended Its Drug Crisis!

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By Krish Mohan America isn’t unique in its War on Drugs, but it is unique in its racial disparity when it comes to the subject. And it’s true. Think of all the people that decided to make a plant illegal and committed this crime against nature. It’s most been white people. Nixon, Hoover, Regan, Biden, Clinton, are all white people. Kamala Harris and Obama are in the minority of minorities fucking over other minorities. By 2014, half of the 1.5 million arrests were related small marijuana offenses. Only 3% were high level drug traffickers. And these laws did nothing to help the rate of addiction or trafficking. And the CIA is primarily run by white people! Proving even further that white people in power are committing more drug related crimes than your average person of color! Portugal is one of the countries that faced a major drug problem in the late 90s and early 2000s. Portugal, much like America, prosecuted its drug offenders as drug traffickers, which, go figure, didn’t help the rate of addiction & overdoses either. In 2001, Portugal decided that this was a public health crisis and decided to treat the issue as one. All drugs in Portugal are decriminalized, which means using these drugs is not illegal, but trafficking high quantities is. And when those drugs are confiscated from drug traffickers, they are usually burned. Under this new system, if you’re caught with drugs on your person, you have to go to counseling with a sociologist. Portugal has also employed psychologists as community outreach to help people get access to clean and better equipment for their drug use. This has severely decreased the amount of deaths from ODs and also provides a pathway to recovery on the patients own terms. They also provide Mobile Methadone vans. Methadone provides relief from withdrawal symptoms without giving you a high. Rather than make it difficult for people to go through addiction recovery, Portugal is making an effort to get that relief to the people. It’s almost like they decided to treat people like…well people. Currently they spend about 90% of their budget on social services and 10% on drug enforcement. People are also placed into job programs to help build skills and work experience to get them back out into the world. This is what the point of prisons should be; to help people, not demonize them! Drug related deaths went from 400/year to 30/year! But this program is currently in jeopardy considering when the recession hit, social programs like this were cut! It’s interesting that when Capitalism busts, it attacks the social programs that help people first. Programs like these decrease crime, addiction & hospitalizations connected to drug use. So shouldn’t cops be cut first? But instead the programs that drive real change are removed, proving once again, that Capitalism is a system that thrives on inequality and misery. In the Netherlands, psychedelics have been legalized because they realized drugs like LSD, MDMA & Psilopsycibin are very good for mental health. You can actually go to a retreat where, under medical supervision, you can experience these drugs and how they affect your mind. Most people find that helps them reconnect with a part of themselves and nature. Even in the United States there are few wins. States like Colorado are seeing a billion dollar industry emerge with the full legalization of cannabis. In a criminal justice perspective, it’s hard for cartels to sell illegal substances when those substances have been fully legalized and sold at malls and boutique stores. On a legislative level, the Marijuana Opportunity, Reinvestment & Engagement, or MORE Act, is working to undo everything Nixon, Reagan & Biden did with their callous, racist, War On Drugs. This removes cannabis from Schedule 1 and any federal convictions for possession. It’ll also make it easier for dispensaries to be banked and process various different types of payments, just like any other legitimate business. Prohibiting and making marijuana illegal created a criminal justice system that profited off it. It also created a criminal underground to meet the demand of people who want these substances. This happened when booze was prohibited in the 20s, and people still found a way to get drunk. […] Via How Portugal Ended Its Drug Crisis! [FFON 240] — Radical Indian Stand Up Comedian, Writer & Social Vigilante, Krish Mohan

Puerto Rico: A Modern Day US Colony

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Although Puerto Ricans were granted US citizenship in 1917 ...

America’s Backyard: Puerto Rico

Press TV 2014

Film Review

This Press TV documentary concerns ongoing oppression in America’s best-known colony Puerto Rico. In 1917, all native-born Puerto Ricans were declared US citizens (despite overwhelming opposition on the island), resulting in a disproportionate number being drafted to serve in the two world wars and Vietnam. Although Although Puerto Rico is officially classified as a “self-governing” commonwealth, the US Congress retains the power to overrule decisions of its Senate and Legislative Assembly.

The colony has a heavily suppressed independence movement, targeted both by an FBI’s Cointelpro* operation for surveillance, phone taps and infiltration and by right-wing CIA ant-Castro death quads.

At present, only a minority of Puerto Ricans support independence, with the majority supporting either statehood or continuing colonial status. Although Puerto Rico enjoys a much lower standard of living than the mainland US, it’s significantly wealthier than its Caribbean neighbors. Residents worry independence would seriously harm the Puerto Rican economy.

The US Navy’s fifty-year use of the Puerto Rican island of Vieques for bombing practice remains a sore point for many local activists. In 1999, the accidental bombing of a scenic observation area (killing a local security guard) resulted in a successful nonviolent campaign to stop the bombing practice.

The US continues to drag its feet on a promised toxic cleanup of Vieques, which was also used to dump jet fuel and other industrial wastes. Leakage of toxic chemicals to nearby civilian areas means the island has a 30% high cancer rate than the rest of Puerto Rico.

*Cointelpro is the name given to an FBI counterintelligence program started in 1956 to spy on US political activists. Although it officially ended in 1971, illegal FBI surveillance, infiltration and disruption of union and human rights organizations continue to the present day.

The film can be viewed free at https://www.presstv.com/doc/detail/12956

Nearly Half of U.S. Parents Want More Noncollege Paths

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WASHINGTON, D.C. — According to the Family Voices study — a recent survey of U.S. parents conducted by Carnegie Corporation and Gallup — 54% of parents of children aged 11 to 25 in the United States would prefer that their child enroll in a four-year university immediately after high school. However, 46% of parents say even if there were no barriers to their child earning a bachelor’s degree, they would prefer another postsecondary option.

Parents who are bachelor’s degree-holders themselves (66%), have Black children (67%) or identify as Democrats (70%) are especially likely to prefer enrollment in a four-year university for their child.

Though many community colleges offer associate degrees that develop skills for a specific career path — such as paralegal or dental hygienist programs — parents are twice as likely to say they want their child to complete a noncollege-based skills training program (16%) rather than enroll in community college (8%). Noncollege skills training programs include apprenticeships, specialized technical training and trade school.

The remaining 22% of parents prefer that their child pursue a path that does not explicitly involve formal postsecondary education, such as starting a business, performing volunteer work, joining the military, securing a paid job or taking time off to pursue their interests.

Nearly Half of Current Students’ Parents Want More Options

Among parents whose children are enrolled in middle or high school, 84% say they are “satisfied” with four-year college, two-year college and vocational or technical skills training programs as options for their child. However, in a separate question, nearly half of these parents (45%) agree or strongly agree that they wish there were more options available to their child.

[…]

Via Nearly Half of U.S. Parents Want More Noncollege Paths – by Zach Hrynowski April 7, 2021 — Just Sayin’

Myanmar Seizes George Soros Foundation’s Bank Accounts — The True Defender

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This isn’t the first time Soros has used currency speculation to attack a Southeast Asian country.

vᚻællKᚱᛁᛗvosᛏ's avatarVermont Folk Troth

A coup d’etat occurred after the winner, Aung San Suu Kyi won a landslide victory in the November elections.

According to a report published by Reuters,

“The military junta in Myanmar has detained an official from George Soros’ Open Society Foundations and has frozen the billionaire financier’s bank accounts in the country under the suspicion that the group funded elements opposed to the February coup in the country.” 

“In the immediate aftermath of the coup, during mass civil disobedience in the country, the Global New Light of Myanmar — a military propaganda newspaper — alleged that Open Society Myanmar withdrew $1.4 million from its account at the Small and Medium Enterprise Development Bank, or SMED.”

Afterwards, the money was exchanged into local currency, “without following the necessary rules and regulations.”

According to the Financial Times, a picture of Suu Kyi with Soros was also published. The photo was taken back…

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“Wipe out China!” US-funded Uyghur activists train as gun-toting foot soldiers for empire

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The CIA-linked National Endowment for Democracy (NED) has been central to the rising international prominence of the Uyghur separatist movement. In 2020, the NED boasted that it has given Uyghur groups $8,758,300 since 2004 (including $75,000 in annual funding to the UAA) and claimed to be “the only institutional funder for Uyghur advocacy and human rights organizations.”

barovsky's avatarThe New Dark Age

31 March, 2021 — The Grayzone

Ajit Singh

Cultivated by the US government as human rights activists, Uyghur American Association leaders partner with far-right lawmakers and operate a militia-style gun club that trains with ex-US special forces.

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Dozens of Plaintiffs Demand Day in Court Against Monsanto as Bayer Tries to Reassure Investors

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Lawsuits allege Roundup weed killers cause non-Hodgkin lymphoma.

Bayer says it is bringing closure to the costly Roundup litigation through settlement deals totaling more than $11 billion, but new Roundup weedkiller cases are still being filed.

Moll, a Chicago-based personal injury attorney, has dozens of lawsuits pending against the former Monsanto Co., all alleging the company’s Roundup weed killers cause non-Hodgkin lymphoma, and he is now preparing several of those cases for trial.

Moll’s firm is one of a handful that have refused settlement offers made by Monsanto owner Bayer AG, deciding instead to take the fight over the safety of Monsanto’s glyphosate-based herbicide products back into courtrooms around the country.

Though Bayer has assured investors it is bringing closure to the costly Roundup litigation through settlement deals totaling more than $11 billion, new Roundup cases are still being filed, and notably several are positioned for trial, with the earliest set to start in July.

“We’re going forward,” Moll said. “We’re doing this.”

Moll has lined up many of the same expert witnesses who helped win the three Roundup trials held to date. And he plans to rely heavily on the same internal Monsanto documents that provided shocking revelations of corporate misconduct that led juries to award hefty punitive damages to the plaintiffs in each of those trials.

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Trial set for July 19

One case with a trial date looming involves a 70-year-old woman named Donnetta Stephens from Yucaipa, California who was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) in 2017 and has suffered from numerous health complications amid multiple rounds of chemotherapy. Stephens was recently granted a trial “preference,” meaning her case has been expedited, after her lawyers informed the court that Stephens is “in a perpetual state of pain,” and losing cognition and memory. The case is set for trial July 19 in San Bernardino County Superior Court in California.

Several other cases have either already been granted preference trial dates, or are seeking trial dates, for elderly people and at least one child suffering from NHL the plaintiffs allege was caused by exposure to Roundup products.

“The litigation is not over. It is going to be a continued headache for Bayer and Monsanto,” said Andrew Kirkendall, whose Texas-based firm is helping represent Stephens and other clients seeking speedy trials.

Kirkendall said his firm has lawsuits moving forward to trial in California, Oregon, Missouri, Arkansas and Massachusetts.

“This has the potential to be the next asbestos litigation,” he said, referring to decades of lawsuits brought over asbestos-related health problems.

[…]

Via https://childrenshealthdefense.org/defender/monsanto-bayer-roundup-litigation/

Disposable face masks pollute oceans with dangerous microplastics

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Disposable face masks are being dumped into the oceans, potentially releasing harmful microplastics into the atmosphere and our food.

This month marks the one-year anniversary of San Francisco enforcing the first face mask law in the United States. During the COVID-19 pandemic, almost all states have mandated the use of masks. By October, 93 percent of Americans said they wear a mask or face covering when they leave their home and are unable to socially distance themselves.

“Humanity is going through 129 billion face masks a month, which works out to three million a minute,” according to Big Think.

With large populations of the world using masks regularly as a health precaution against coronavirus, it has had an unintended consequence – pollution.

The Ocean Conservancy released new data detailing how personal protective equipment has polluted beaches and oceans all over the planet. Volunteers who were cleaning beaches all over the world tracked the number of PPE they found on the shore. From late July until December 2020, volunteers collected 107,219 items of personal protective equipment from beaches and waterways worldwide.

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Via  Disposable face masks pollute oceans with dangerous microplastics — Headlines 360 news

The Rise of Hindu Nationalism in India

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In Search of India’s Soul Part 2

Directed by Bruno Rosso (A Jazeera) 2020

Film Review

Part 2 of this series looks at significant triggers leading to the rise of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), a once-obscure Hindu nationalist party. The first were December 1992 riots that occurred following the demolition of the Babri Masjid mosque by Hindu activists from the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS).* The mosque was built in the 16th century on the site of a Hindu temple demolished by Mogul occupiers. Two thousand people would be killed in the ensuing riots.

The second trigger was a long running TV adaption (starting in the 1980s) of the Ramayan.**

The third involves a court case that overturned a Muslim divorce,*** In 1986, then prime minister Rajiv Gandhi sponsored a law, which proved extremely controversial among women’s rights and Hindu activists, vacated the court ruling.

The final trigger was a February 2002 incident in which Hindu activists set fire to a train of Muslims returning from the Burbury Mosque. After allowing Hindu activists to parade the 38 charred corpses through the streets, local police stood by as a thousand people (75% Muslim) were killed in riots that ensued. As president of the state of Gujurat, future Indian president Narendra Modi was barred from visiting the US for 10 years, following his failure to intervene in the riots.

The film also includes an illuminating segment about Hindu attacks on Indian Christian communities. In 2008, 40,000 Christians came under attack, with their hospitals and schools being burned, and several nuns being raped.

For me the most interesting segment concerns a recent trend for Hindu Dalits (Untouchables) to convert to Islam to escape the discrimination and exploitation they experience under the Hindu religion.****

At the film’s conclusion journalist (and narrator) Aatish Taseer is stripped of his Indian citizenship owing to an article critical of Narendra Modi he published in Time magazine.

*The RSS is the largest civil society in the world fighting for Hindu supremacy.

**The Rāmāyan is one of the two major Sanskrit epics of ancient Indian history, the other being the Mahābhārata.

***Under Muslim law, a man can divorce a woman (and absolve himself of any responsibility for child support or spousal maintenance) by repeating three times “I divorce you.”

****Hinduism is the only religion in the world that purposely enforces Inequality based on circumstances of birth.

 

‘No Thanks’ to Bill Gates Plan to Block Sun With Chalk Dust, Scandinavia Says

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SCoPEx intends to release around a kilogram of calcium carbonate, essentially chalk dust, from a propelled balloon-gondola rig.
By Patrick Mazza

Three Swedish environmental groups joined the Saami Council, which defends the rights of the reindeer-herding people from Norway to Russia, in opposing the Gates-funded project to release chalk dust from a balloon 12 miles up in the atmosphere to block solar radiation.

The first stratospheric test of geoengineering research technology, funded by Bill Gates, has been suspended under pressure from the indigenous people over whose heads it would take place, the Saami of northern Scandinavia. It may be moved back to the United States.

At the recommendation of the project’s Advisory Committee, the scheduled June test has been called off. That became public March 31.

When Bill Gates’ $4.5 million investment in geoengineering research came to light in 2010, one of the scientists he put in charge of the project, Ken Caldeira, said the money was not funding any field experiments. But as the project has grown and moved to Harvard, that line was crossed.

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The Stratospheric Controlled Perturbation Experiment — SCoPEx for short — intends to release around a kilogram of calcium carbonate, essentially chalk dust, from a propelled balloon-gondola rig 12 miles up. Particles would cover the equivalent of 11 football fields and test the material’s potential to block a portion of solar radiation, countering the heat-trapping effects of carbon dioxide. The June test would not have released any particles, only tried out the rig’s technologies.

Last December SCoPEx announced it was moving the rig test to Sweden because of the pandemic. It was to have been in Arizona and New Mexico. The new test site was to be Swedish Space Corporation’s launch center at Kiruna near the Arctic Circle, the Saami homeland. Trouble was, nobody had talked to the Saami or much anyone else in Sweden.

The Saami Council, which defends the rights of the reindeer-herding people from Norway to Russia, on Feb. 24 sent a letter to the SCoPEx Advisory Committee opposing not only the experiment, but the entire premise of geoengineering research outside an international consensus. It was co-signed by leaders of the Swedish Society for Nature Conservation, Friends of the Earth Sweden and Greenpeace Sweden. Environmental groups had previously weighed in on their own.

[…]

Via https://childrenshealthdefense.org/defender/no-thanks-bill-gates-scandinavia-says/