Friday, September 17, 2021

Howie Hawkins

Update on the Prince Andrew story, 



BBC NEWS reports:

A judge has ruled that Prince Andrew's US lawyer can be served with legal papers in a sexual assault case filed by Virginia Giuffre in New York. It follows a dispute over whether the prince has been formally notified of the civil claim against him. New York judge Lewis Kaplan ruled Ms Giuffre's lawyers could take the US route to serve papers on the prince. Ms Giuffre, 38, claims she was sexually assaulted by the prince at three locations including New York City.



Now here's Howie Hawkins.



That's his weekly video.  Howie was the 2020 presidential nominee for the Green Party.  And this is from a column he has at CounterPunch about the Democratic Party's Freedom to Vote bill in the Senate:

The bill eliminates the Presidential Election Campaign Fund on December 31, 2021. That is the fund which Green Party presidential candidates have used to qualify for presidential primary matching funds. That funding has been crucial in paying for petitioners to qualify the Green Party for state ballots under the onerous signature requirements of most states. No major party candidates used primary matching funds in 2020 because it limited total primary spending to $50 million, which is not enough for the corporate party candidates these days. So they are eliminating it because only the Green Party still uses the program.

The money from the Presidential Election Campaign Fund will be transferred to a new State Election Assistance and Innovation Trust Fund for two programs of public funding of House candidates. One is a voucher program where voters who ask for it can get a $25 “Democracy Credit” they can then send to House candidates in increments of at least $5.

The other program is a matching funds program. To qualify, a candidate must have at least 1,000 contributors and raise at least $50,000 in contributions of $200 or less. Democracy Credit contributions count toward this total. Qualified candidates then receive a 6-to-1 match for qualified contributions.

The problem for third party upstarts like the Green Party is that this qualifying threshold is prohibitively high for most such candidates. A review of 544 Green House candidates from 1994 to 2020 found that only one for sure and maybe one or two others would have qualified under this qualifying threshold.

So the Freedom to Vote Act’s public financing program cuts out the Greens and provides its funding only for major party candidates.



 

 

This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"

 

 Friday, September 17, 2021. Elections, elections.


Starting with the failed recall in California.  Wasn't planning to go back to that but everyone wants to find lessons.  And they don't know what they're talking about.  These are the same people who tried to convince people that Larry Edler had a chance at becoming the next governor of California.  Granted, whores have to turn tricks so the press needs to create drama and tension to keep their jobs but that was no excuse for some of the lunacy that made it into 'informed' 'commentary.'


The recall was the ninth proposed recall.  


Only one ever made it to the ballot and that was in 2003.  It's also the only one thus far that has been successful.  Gray Davis was the governor.  He had no personality and was so bland he appeared to have stumbled into the job.  And might have kept it in less angry times.  But he made many angry.  The rolling blackouts were a source of rage.  Arianna Huffington would attempt to run for governor but before that she was already charging that Gray was influence by corporate money and ties to the energy industry.  His efforts to address California's energy crisis were seen as too little and too late.  His bland appearance and demeanor added to the anger because he seemed indifferent to the issue even when he attempted to speak passionately.  


Gray was elected because he was the Democratic Party nominee.  He had no natural constituency.  He had failed to live up to promises from the campaign trail that could have led groups to stick with him.  And he never did anything brave in office though he'd been in office for most of his life.

So a recall was held and he lost.  


The lie the gasbags told you in the last weeks as they hyped this nonsense was -- in 2003! The governor got recalled! And California ended up with a Republican! And it's going to happen again!


California ended up with a Kennedy.  Let's not pretend that Larry Elder was anything like the eventual winner.  Ahnuld was a movie star.  As such, he had name recognition.  He grinned a lot and seemed thick headed so he could seem well intentioned but misinformed.


Especially when he had Maria Shriver.


It's amazing that Susan Sarandon is still blamed for Hillary Clinton's loss in 2016 (Hillary's loss is on Hillary) and a bunch of little nobodies acting on partisan fealty feel attacking Susan makes them seem informed and insiders.  They're just trash at the door trying desperately to be let in but they never will be.


If they meant what they said, we'd hear about Maria Shriver constantly.  Because Maria did what Susan's didn't do.  Maria turned that election and she did so with lies.

The argument she made was: I'm a Kennedy (Shriver) and you know my family (I'm flying them in to campaign) and you know our politics so you know Ahnuld really isn't a Republican.  Trust me, I'm close to my Uncle Teddy (trust me, but don't get in a car with me).  


He was coasting to victory when his harassment came out.  Everyone knew about it.  Even Maria.  But she put on her lie face and publicly insisted that this was no true, all these women were liars, all of them, she knew her husband and we knew her.


She's a bitch.


That's what she is and what she always was.  


When her faithful husband ended up having a child with the house keeper, laughter was heard across the country because Maria finally got what she deserved.  A power hungry woman who was afraid to grab the reigns for herself lied and whored for her husband and then she got publicly humiliated.  She got what she had coming.


And if you don't believe that, look at what she did to Sondra Locke.  Sondre was her best friend.  They were on the phone multiple times daily.  They saw each other at least once a week they vacationed together, they did this together and that together.  Clint Eastwood dumps her and so does Maria.  Maria can't be bothered to return Sondre's calls.  She has to dump her, she insists because, well, Ahnuld.


So she dumped a friend -- didn't reach out to her when Sondra had her cancer scare, didn't do a thing to help her or comfort her -- because her husband asked her to (he was good friends with Clint).  She stabbed Sondre in the back.  Maria got publicly humiliated?  Good.  That's the kind of woman she was.  Clint cheats on Sondre and has a baby with another woman and Maria doesn't care and won't maintain her friendship with Sondre.  Then the bitch wants sympathy a few years later when the shoe's on the other foot?


She got what she deserved.


And if people were really upset that someone  fixed an election for a Republican, they'd be mad at Maria.  But they won't take on a Kennedy (Shriver) because they're only going after Susan because she's not a Democrat.


Larry was not Ahnuld.  He didn't have the name recognition.  He didn't have an image to most and the image he did have was as right-wing and political.  That wasn't going to fly currently in California.  


Elder is anti LGBTQ and anti-abortion.  He has a long history of making sexist remarks about women.  He wasn't going to be the next governor.  Even if the recall had succeeded -- and it didn't and wasn't going to as was obvious weeks before it took place -- Larry would not be governor of California.  


Alexandra Datig's charges of abuse and the past harassment accusations against him -- which he himself once found worth discussing -- meant he wasn't getting to the governor's mansion.


Ahnuld wouldn't have if he hadn't had Maria lying to the state and pulling him across the finish line.  


Since we're on the recall.  E-mails to the public account said that in Wednesday's snapshot I attacked THE CONVO COUCH and Rose McGowan.


A) I didn't attack THE CONVO COUCH.  I noted that they hated Gavin Newsom.  I noted that I posted every video they did against Gavin.  I did not use this site (misuse it) to promote Gavin.


B) I didn't attack Rose.  I noted that I was accused of censoring her because I didn't carry her endorsement of Larry.  That's all I said besides her endorsement came far too late to make any difference.  I didn't bring up the abuse of women and harassment and ask, "How could you, Rose!"  I didn't do that because Rose can make up her own mind.  I'm sure she knew of the charges.  She may have looked into them and found them to be questionable or not real. She's a grown woman, she can make her own evaluations.  


What she said of Gavin's wife?  Bothered that she felt she could accuse someone based upon a story she presents as a woman (Gavin's wife) calls her, says one sentence to her and Rose, by her story, hangs up on the woman.  Then Rose goes on to tell that story with the motives  behind the call -- from one sentence, mind you -- known by Rose and the motives being pure evil.


It seems a bit much.  If Rose wanted to characterize the phone call, then maybe she should have stayed on it long enough to find out what it was about?

(I'm concerned about Rose but as a mutual friend said, "After [the story about the phone call with Gavin's wife] I'm scared to death to call her.")


That's not an attack on Rose -- I think that's common sense advice to anyone.


I am not upset with Rose.  She's been under intense pressure and a lot of people have worked to destroy her.  It's natural that she's going to inspect every interaction.    She needs to center herself.  Since THE KATIE HALPER SHOW appearance, I've been worried about Rose.  She kept talking over Katie -- and she continues to do that in every appearance.  Why is that?


She doesn't feel heard.  I understand that.  But you watch and she is being heard.  Katie, Jimmy Dore, the others are listening and trying to have a conversation.  She's been wronged repeatedly since coming forward.  But she needs to center herself because not everyone's out to destroy her.  


Rose is a great actress and she's shown true bravery.  If she continues as she is at present, she's going to burn herself out.  That's my concern for Rose.  And I don't hate her, I don't dislike her, and I'm not attacking her.  I'm proud of her and I want to know she's going to find joy and happiness again.  

Sidebar, Rose took on Harvey Weinstein and deserves immense credit for that.  I am not noting David Swanson this week.  He's in the penalty box.  For the record, I'm not required to note him or anyone.  I don't really like him (because he forwarded an e-mail response Rebecca sent him to someone else -- he was too stupid to realize he'd included her on the forward -- Rebecca's moved beyond it, I haven't).  I usually post his stuff here because he's always e-mailing the public account.  And I don't read it because he doesn't use any language that would raise flags.  I read the first e-mail of the week because "feminist" was in the title.


I'm not in the mood for that s**t.  He's attacking "White feminists."  He doesn't write about women, he doesn't write about feminism, he's never written about Rose's bravery.  A non-White feminist has a beef and it's probably a valid beef.  But her beef is not with feminism.  It's with what would probably be termed "liberal feminism" today.  How many times have Ava and I said -- since 2005, that we present a feminist view of the media at THIRD -- "a" -- not "the" because there are many branches of feminism.  I'm really not into race-based attacks.  Then David wants to note a Harvey Weinstein led campaign.


That's what it was.  People on the left, some brave and strong , to be sure, took money from Harvey and used their names -- such as they were -- to attack a film.  That is what brought Harvey down.  Rose wouldn't have gotten traction without Harvey's history of turning the Academy Awards into a blood sport.   Everyone knew he was a monster who assaulted women and time and again the stories were killed because he had friends who could call in favors.  After a long history -- starting with his attacks on Ron Howard's film -- the industry had felt Harvey had crossed certain lines and no one was going to protect him anymore.  


I'm sure David wasn't paid off by Harvey.  He wouldn't have been seen as 'powerful' enough.  In that attack, Harvey primarily employed Iraq War veterans to attack the film David mentions in his column.


But David doesn't know what he's writing about.  And I'm damn sick of men who ignore women over and over until they're ready to attack us.  


I'm not noting him this week.  I may or may not note him next week.


Staying with elections but moving to Iraq where national elections are supposed to take place October 10th.  


A powerful mix of insecurity and traditional prejudice against more liberal female politicians put Awatef Rasheed off running for parliament when she returned to Iraq in 2014 after years abroad.

Seven years later, with Iraq less unstable, Rasheed has decided to contest a Oct. 10 election for the assembly, even if abuse and intimidation of women would-be lawmakers persist.

    Today, she is one of the 951 women, representing close to 30% of the total number of candidates, running for election to the country’s 329-seat Council of Representatives.

Passing a new domestic violence law, and more representation for women in the executive branch of government, are among the goals of some of the would-be female lawmakers.

For Iraq’s women politicians, elections can be an excruciating experience.

Rasheed scrolled through her smartphone and looked at pictures of one of her campaign banners that had been ripped up, with the tear precisely crossing the image of her face.

“Out of 38 banners we put up in my city of Basra, 28 were damaged and four disappeared”, she said. 


THE DENVER GAZETTE runs photos of candidates Nada al-Jubori, Awatef Rasheed, and Ola al-Tamimi.



Ten months ago, ALJAZEERA filed that report and it remains true.  Few expect change via the elections and turnout may be as low as 30% according to some observers.  


Which brings us to Mina.  Oh, Mina.  You could be an independent journalist.  Maybe some day.  She's filed another oen of those pieces that reads like a US government press release.  She co-wrote this one.  Read it if you want.  She and her co-writer mainly focus on a protester who thinks it's possible to speak for everyone -- you knew he was a man, didn't you?  Yeah.  So he wants to tell you what protesters think because, having a penis, he knows everything.  The protest movement behind The October Revoltuion was a diverse group of Shi'ites but leave it to a man to speak for all of them.  The only thing worse than that self-important and deluded man is the two writers who should be noting up front that some leaders of that revolution have called for boycotts of this election.


Now the press initially reported that as "the leaders."  We never did that here.  We said "some" because it's a diverse movement.  Now the press is finding -- or those in the press who owe favors to the US State Dept are finding people who will rally the vote.  Lots of luck with that.


Khazan Jangiz (RUDAW) reports:                


The leader of the European Union’s election observation mission on Thursday urged Iraqis to vote in this year’s parliamentary elections, saying not participating will make turning Iraq into a democratic country difficult.

“All the voters who still have doubts and might not go and take part in the elections will only make it more difficult for Iraq becoming a real democratic country ... I know it is sometimes difficult to understand - I’m a politician myself - for voters “why shouldn’t we go, if I don’t go it doesn’t make a difference” but I can tell you it makes a difference,” mission leader Viola Von Cramon said at a press conference in Baghdad.

“I would like to force each and every voter, each and every citizen, to think twice before you stay at home, rather go and make a good choice for this country,” she added.

                                                         



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