(2023-04-25). The War on Free Speech Is Really a War on the Right to Criticize the Government. dissidentvoice.org Since when have we Americans been expected to bow submissively to authority and speak with awe and reverence to those who represent us? The constitutional theory is that we the people are the sovereigns, the state and federal officials only our agents. We who have the final word can speak softly or angrily. We can …
(2023-04-25). Aggression, Guns, and Marcuse. dissidentvoice.org Better not knock on the wrong door or drive into the wrong driveway, you may get shot. Kids are afraid to go to school for fear of getting killed, as the body count from mass shootings climbs every day. Hate crimes are increasing, and just driving to work is potentially dangerous. Think of tailgaters honking …
(2023-04-25). The Lifeblood of Democracy. dissidentvoice.org 
Two cornerstones of democracy—freedom of expression and freedom of information—are under concerted attack, in the United States and around the world. In the US, for example, reactionary elected officials seek to ban books in schools, often in the name of protecting children; and government agencies, including the Department of Homeland Security, seek to curb online …
(2023-04-25). Monster Heat Hits 1/3rd of World Population. dissidentvoice.org It has started, and it's fierce… Monster Heat! "It's a 'monster heat spell like none before," according to climatologist and weather historian Maximiliano Herrera, describing Asia's heatwave as the worst in history. (Source: "Extreme Heat Scorches Asia, Affecting at Least a Third of the World's Population," The Verge, April 19, 2023) Global warming is hitting …
(2023-04-25). Blood, Golf, and Saudi Arabia. dissidentvoice.org The recently concluded LIV Tournament in Adelaide was a matter of bread, circuses and golf. It was something of a triumph for the chief sponsor: the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and, more notably, the Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Critics, and criticism about the regime and the blood spattered House of Saud, were generally forgotten. …
(2023-04-25). What Does Biden's Executive Order on Environmental Justice Mean for Frontline Communities? democracynow.org 
As President Biden officially announces his reelection bid for 2024, we look at his recent executive order establishing a new Office of Environmental Justice within the White House and requiring all federal agencies to weigh the environmental impact of policies on marginalized communities. Environmental groups welcomed the announcement but cautioned that Biden remains a major supporter of fossil fuels, including the controversial Willow project in Alaska, and that he has approved drilling projects on federal land faster than Trump did during his first two years in office. For more, we speak with Jade Begay, direc…
(2023-04-25). Headlines for April 25, 2023. democracynow.org 72-Hour Ceasefire Appears Shaky as It Takes Effect in Sudan, Ukraine's Military Advances to East Bank of Dnieper River, China Disavows Senior Diplomat's Comment Questioning Sovereignty of Ex-Soviet States, U.S. Was World's Top Military Spender and Arms Exporter Again in 2022, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris Announce 2024 Reelection Bid, Fox News Abruptly Fires Far-Right Host Tucker Carlson, CNN Fires Don Lemon Amid Claims of Sexism, Atlanta DA to Announce Indictments This Summer over Trump-Related Election Fraud, Jury Selection Begins in Civil Trial Accusing Trump of Rape and Defamation, Clarence Th…
(2023-04-25). Jeffrey Sachs on China's "Historic" Push for Multipolar World to End U.S. Domination. democracynow.org 
China is taking an increasingly assertive role in world affairs, helping to broker a restoration of relations between Iran and Saudi Arabia, offering a 12-point peace plan for Ukraine, and strengthening its relationships with European and Latin American powers. Last week, China continued its diplomatic outreach by offering to hold talks between Israel and Palestine. "China doesn't want the United States to be the preeminent power. It wants to live alongside the United States," says economist Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University and president of…
(2023-04-25). Why Did Fox Fire Tucker Carlson? Far-Right Host Helped Fox Mainstream Hate, Conspiracies to Millions. democracynow.org 
In a surprise announcement, Fox News said Monday it was cutting ties with its top-rated host Tucker Carlson, effective immediately. Although a precise reason wasn't given, the move came just days after the cable network settled a $787.5 million defamation suit brought by Dominion Voting Systems over lies propagated by the cable network about the 2020 presidential election. Since taking over the primetime slot in 2016, Carlson has also spread far-right talking points about immigrants, Black people and the LGBTQ community. For more, we speak with Madeline Peltz of Media Matters for America, where she has help…
(2023-04-25). Talk World Radio: Nuclear Nincompoopery Needs Nullification Now. davidswanson.org
(2023-04-24). Cross-border passenger train on track to boost trade, relations with Laos. ecns.cn What can a high-quality railway bring to a less-developed region? China has answered that question with decades of efforts to build railways across the country, and those efforts have borne fruit.
(2023-04-24). ChatGPT craze drives domestic innovation. ecns.cn China's natural language processing (NLP) development is expected to see rapid development as Microsoft-backed ChatGPT has taken the tech world by storm. But additional joint efforts are needed for more homegrown breakthroughs.
(2023-04-24). Premier calls for advancing ties with Cuba. ecns.cn Premier Li Qiang called on Monday for strengthened strategic coordination and pragmatic cooperation between China and Cuba to make joint efforts to build a China-Cuba community with a shared future.
(2023-04-24). Foreign Ministry: China respects sovereign status of all countries. ecns.cn China has always respected the sovereign status of all former Soviet republics and this position has not changed, Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning said on Monday, after recent remarks on the issue by Chinese Ambassador to France Lu Shaye.
(2023-04-24). Xi meets new envoys, urges joint efforts. ecns.cn President Xi Jinping reiterated on Monday China's commitment to peaceful development, saying that the nation will create more opportunities for the world with its own development and work with other countries to jointly deal with global challenges.
(2023-04-24). EU-China relations should not be tied to the Ukraine crisis: Chinese envoy to EU. ecns.cn The EU should not view the China-EU relations through the "prism" of the Ukraine crisis and should not sacrifice the China-EU relations and the interests of China as the cost to develop its relations with the U.S.
(2023-04-24). Sufficient travel urged to break 'vicious cycle'. ecns.cn Scholars from the United States and China expressed hope during a seminar for robust travel between the two countries to resume, and said both sides should remove obstacles to the process.
(2023-04-24). The Left and the Ukraine War. dissidentvoice.org To be a leftist in the United States is a dispiriting experience, but in the last year one of the more dispiriting things has been to see the attitude of many leftists themselves on a subject of crucial importance: the war in Ukraine. The consensus of the Washington establishment remains that the U.S. must support …
(2023-04-24). Borrell and His Likes Should Avoid Leading Europe into a Ditch. dissidentvoice.org 
The European Parliament just spent a whole week discussing China, and the High Representative of the EU for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell will convene foreign ministers from across EU on April 24 local time to discuss the same topic. In anticipation of this meeting, Borrell published a column on April 22 urging …
(2023-04-24). The 75-year Thievery of Joint Tax Returns. dissidentvoice.org Another tax season has ended, and more than 50 million returns arrived at the Internal Revenue Service marked "Married filing jointly". Few of the filers had any idea that joint returns—created in 1948 and modified in 1969—may be the oldest tax inequity in America. They've been picking various pockets for 75 years, and there's little …
(2023-04-24). Interview with Garland Nixon. dissidentvoice.org 
Events continue to unfold at a quickening pace. Facing an alarming escalation in tensions around the world, we asked Garland Nixon for his current thoughts. We focus here on the realities of the international power struggle unfolding in real time, specifically addressing the role of the U.S. in the tensions and its capacity to reduce …
(2023-04-24). Barry Humphries: Misunderstood Anarchist of Culture. dissidentvoice.org He was always a step ahead, his mind geared not only for the next move, but the next sequence. He also smelt it, anticipated the audience reaction, shaped the prejudice in context for consumption. He created an antipodean version of dada art. He confused, baffled and enraged audiences with his polymathic, panoramic reach. The genius …
(2023-04-24). Labor Market and Mainstream Economics. dissidentvoice.org 
Market and labor in market are crucial questions both to capital and labor. The questions have been discussed and answered by economists, from the mainstream, and also from the camp of labor. "Markets", writes Michael D. Yates in his Work Work Work: Labor, Alienation, and Class Struggle (Monthly Review Press, 2022), "act as a veil, …
(2023-04-24). Norwegian Refugee Council: Violence, Climate & Poverty Are Fueling Migration from Central America. democracynow.org 
We continue our conversation with Jan Egeland, secretary general of the Norwegian Refugee Council, who has just returned from Honduras. He calls on the international community to do more to help in Central America, where one in three people are in urgent need of humanitarian aid, and gangs, drug trafficking and violence are forcing many to flee north. North Americans, says Egeland, must "honor the legitimate asylum applications for protection of people" from their "own neighborhood."…
(2023-04-24). Sudan Will Be "Nightmare Beyond Belief" If Conflict Grows, Warns Humanitarian Leader Jan Egeland. democracynow.org 
As fighting continues in Sudan between the military and the paramilitary group known as the Rapid Support Forces, we speak with Norwegian Refugee Council head Jan Egeland, who says humanitarian work in the country has been paralyzed as a result of the power struggle. "There is hardly any humanitarian work in large parts of Sudan," says Egeland, who adds that the conflict has already devolved into a war that "will be impossible to stop if it lasts for much longer."…
(2023-04-24). What's Next in Legal Fight over Mifepristone? Supreme Court Protects Access to Abortion Pill for Now. democracynow.org 
The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday halted a ban and other restrictions on the abortion medication mifepristone, keeping the nation's most popular abortion method available for now as an appeal of the nationwide ban on the pill plays out. The ban was issued earlier this month by the Trump-appointed Texas Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, who ruled the Food and Drug Administration's 23-year-old approval of the drug was invalid. The case is likely to end up before the Supreme Court again after making its way through a lower appeals court. We speak with Mary Ziegler, law professor at the University of California, Da…
(2023-04-24). Sudan: Death Toll Tops 420 as Fear Grows That Fighting Between Rival Generals Could Lead to Proxy War. democracynow.org 
The United States and other countries moved to evacuate diplomats and citizens from Sudan over the weekend amid fighting between rival military factions that's killed at least 420 people and injured over 3,700 more, in a crisis that began on April 15 when the Sudanese military and the paramilitary group known as the Rapid Support Forces began exchanging fire in the capital Khartoum, further dashing hopes of a return of civilian rule in the country. CNN reports the powerful Russian mercenary group Wagner has backed the RSF by providing the paramilitaries with surface-to-air missiles. Wagner founder Yevgeny P…
(2023-04-24). Headlines for April 24, 2023. democracynow.org Diplomats Lead Sudan Exodus as Sudanese Reel from Intense Fighting, Food and Power Shortages, SCOTUS Keeps Abortion Pill Mifepristone on Market While Challenge to Ban Proceeds, Peru's Ex-President Alejandro Toledo Detained, Facing Corruption Charges Following U.S. Extradition, Kenya Exhumes Bodies of 47 Cult Members Who Starved Themselves to Death, Burkina Faso Attack Near Malian Border Kills 60 People, Thousands of Asylum Seekers Make Their Way Up Mexico to Protest Migrant Abuse, Mississippi GOP Expands State Control Over Police and Courts in Majority-Black Jackson, Rasheed Williams AKA "Koka Da Doll…
(2023-04-24). Building unity in the fight for reproductive justice. cpusa.org 
The following updated report was given to the National Board of the Communist Party USA on April 19th, 2023. When the Supreme Court overturned Roe last June, it said it was done with abortion cases and was leaving it to the gerrymandered state legislatures to decide on abortion law. States controlled by extreme-right GOP …
(2023-04-23). Learning to Speak One-Percent. dissidentvoice.org 
Review of Succession (contains spoilers) In ancient Rome, at one point, they wanted to make all the slaves wear something so they could identify them. Like a cloak or whatever. But then they decided not to do it. And do you know why? Hmm? Because they realized if all the slaves dressed the same, they …
(2023-04-23). El Nino Threatens Unparalleled Heatwaves. dissidentvoice.org Can the world handle a climate that exceeds the far-reaching excesses of 2022 when the entire world turned upside down with unprecedented flooding, fires, and drought? NOAA and climate researchers in Germany and China believe an El Niño, starting in 2023-24, is the works. El Niños equate to more heat throughout the planet. Buckle-up! El …
(2023-04-23). The Second Cold War Is More Dangerous than the First. dissidentvoice.org Twenty years ago, Noam Chomsky published a bestselling book called Hegemony or Survival. Since then, the stark choice he posed has only become more urgent. Depending on how humanity responds to the challenges of ecological destruction and imperialistic war, in the coming decade that terrifying question "Hegemony or survival?" may well be answered. Modern history …
(2023-04-23). Having Enemies Is a Choice. davidswanson.org
