At any rate, this is from Wednesday's All Things Considered (NPR):
MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST: People who are fully vaccinated can now safely shed their face masks in many situations. That is what the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said last week. In changing its rules, the CDC is making a tacit gamble that easing mask rules will inspire more people to get their shots, but will it? Or will many people just rip off their masks regardless of their vaccination status? NPR's Yuki Noguchi talked to people who study behavior about how they predict people will react.
YUKI NOGUCHI, BYLINE: Katherine Milkman is fully vaccinated, but masks have become a protective habit, so she still feels uneasy about exposing her entire face.
KATHERINE MILKMAN: I feel like, oh, my God, I came outside naked if I don't have my mask on.
NOGUCHI: Milkman is an economics professor at Wharton School of Business. She wrote a recent book about how to change people's behavior, so she's also thought a lot about how people might react to the CDC's rollback of its mask guidance.
MILKMAN: What the CDC is betting on is that people care about their own health and they're going to be nervous. Holy moly, you know, I better keep my mask on because I didn't get the vaccine, and maybe I'd better get a vaccine.
NOGUCHI: But it's a gamble and one without historical precedent. The risk, of course, is that unvaccinated people will no longer feel compelled to wear masks at all. But Milkman says the new mask guidelines put the incentives on the unvaccinated, and that's the right place.
MILKMAN: The only people who are hurt by this change are the people who aren't doing the right thing and aren't getting the vaccine. I do think it's going to move people toward vaccination.
NOGUCHI: Swarthmore College assistant professor Syon Bhanot says he thinks relatively few people are ideologically opposed to vaccination. Most of the people hesitant to get the shots are likely willing, he says, if not exactly eager.
SYON BHANOT: A lot of the early data was people just kind of waiting and seeing.
NOGUCHI: So what's the best way to motivate them? Is this change in guidelines the best incentive? Bhanot says probably not. He says a local bar offering free drinks to those with proof of vaccination is a stronger sell.
Another thought? Maybe this is where we stress that it's not "an exact science"? Hopefully, lessons learned during this will lead to a smoother plan if there's a next time in our lifetime.
This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"
Thursday, May 20, 2021. Turkey continues to terrorize Iraq, Mustafa al-Kadhimi remains inept one year later, and much more.
At WSWS, Andre Damon observes:
Around the world, millions of people are shocked and outraged at the brutal terror bombings, ethnic cleansing and communal violence being carried out by Israel, a US client state, against the people of Gaza.
Two hundred and twenty-seven people, including 63 children, have been killed in Israel’s ten-day-long assault on Gaza, a figure nearly 20 times higher than the number of Israelis killed in the conflict.These crimes are committed using American armaments, funded by American tax dollars, and with the approval of the American government. They are facilitated by arms deals and military alliances created behind the backs of the American population and orchestrated to facilitate the predatory interests of the US financial oligarchy.
On Monday, after a week of murderous bombardment of the Gaza’s civilian population, US president Joe Biden began a telephone discussion with Israeli President Benjamin Netanyahu by declaring, in the words of the official readout, “The President reiterated his firm support for Israel’s right to defend itself against indiscriminate rocket attacks.”
When on Tuesday Biden visited Dearborn, Michigan, the city with the nation’s highest percentage of Arab American residents in the United States, he was greeted by thousands of people protesting the crimes Israel is committing with US support.
Asked if he would take a question on the conflict from a reporter as he was test-driving a new Ford truck, Biden replied, “No, you can’t. Not unless you get in front of the car as I step on it.”
Journalists laughed at his comments. They sucked up hard. They should have been disgusted. But they throw their itty-bitty, baby egos out the window when the insult comes from one of their higher ups. At that point, they just lick the boots.
So busy spit polishing, they never seemed to grasp just how offensive Biden's remarks are. The Israeli government is terrorizing the Palestinians. Can Joe be asked a question? Only if you're willing for him to drive you down in the vehicle he's in.
The way, right before the start of the Iraq War, Rachel Corrie was killed? That's how she was killed on March 16, 2003. She was protesting on behalf of the Palestinian people and an Israeli miliatry bulldozer ran over her.
Is that what Joe's threatening?
Oh, by all means, laugh it up.
How embarrassing.
How shameful.
Tom Elliott Tweets:
As you watch these reporters giggle in delight at Biden's playing with this car, remember - regardless of your view on Israel/Palestine - that there's a savage war going on for which Biden bears direct responsibility. Seems, at least, to be bad optics to being playing with toys.
So that's one point with regards to Andre Damon's article.
The second point?
Is WSWS ever going to note the Kurds in Iraq? Is their hatred of the Kurds just going to mean they continue to be silent?
More 'reports' of Turkey 'neutralizing' Kurds in Iraq. Murdering them. Claiming they're terrorists. Invading Iraq on the ground and dropping bombs from war planes.
How did we get to the point where the Israeli government could so openly and wantonly murder Palestinians? By people looking the other way for years. By the press ignoring the realities.
What's it going to take for the press to wake up to what the Kurds are doing?
Most of them covered for nearly 100 years -- covered for Turkey, looked the other way with regards to the Armenian genocide that Turkey carried out.
Steve Sweeney (Australia's GREEN LEFT) reports:
Hundreds of Kurdish villagers have been forced to flee their homes in the semi-autonomous Kurdistan region of Iraq due to Turkish bombing — and are being replaced by jihadists imported from Syria.
An agricultural worker from Barwari Bala in the mountainous Duhok province, which borders Turkey, told the Morning Star that he had abandoned his land and home due to the intensity of the aerial bombardment.
“Every day, every night, for the past weeks we are being bombed. Our lands are being destroyed: we cannot grow our crops,” he said.
“Nearly all of us have left — there is nothing for us. Our future is being destroyed, and they give our homes to Daesh [Isis].”
“We are civilians: farmers, children. Why are they doing this? The world does nothing to help because we are Kurds. Everyone wants to kill us.”
He insisted that there had been no guerilla fighters in the villages — Turkey’s pretext for invasion — but added that the people supported the banned Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which Turkey deems a terrorist group, as the only force preventing a genocide.
“If I see them, I hug them,” he said. “Without them, Turkey would kill us all.”
Turkey’s illegal invasion of Iraqi Kurdistan, codenamed Operation Claw Lightning, started on April 23, the anniversary of the start of the Ottoman Armenian genocide in 1915, during which 1.5 million men, women and children were systematically exterminated.
Why the silence from WSWS? Were the Kurds anti-Trotsky or have some long ago beef with SEP? Maybe Eric London could write an article about that -- another long winded confusing article, as Mike pointed out.
The Kurds are being attacked. This is genocide. Turkey is carrying it out in Iraq and Syria as well as within the Turkish borders.
The United Kingdom's Boycott Turkey notes:
Podcaster Peculiar Blend wonders:
To hear the Turkish government tell it, they never kill or injure civilians in Iraq. It's always terrorists, according to them. To hear the Turkish government tell it, the Armenian genocide never happened. Cableee3 points out:
Turkish soldiers on 18 May reportedly shot Şahap Şendol, a 23 old shepherd and Celil Ekinci, aged 17, in the Derecik district of Turkey’s eastern province of Hakkari (Colemerg), which borders Iraq.
The incident took place at around 07:00 am on Tuesday in a rural area near the village of Hacı Bey. The soldiers on duty along the Turkey-Iraq border reportedly fired on Şendol and Ekinci ‘without warning’.
As both were wounded by the gunfire, they were taken to a hospital in Iraqi Kurdistan. Whilst Şendol was wounded in his hand and released from hospital, the treatment of 17-year-old Ekinci, who was wounded in his stomach, continues.
The Peoples’ Democratic Party’s (HDP) MP for Hakkari Sait Dede announced the incident in his social media posts, sharing the footage that was recorded at the scene of the incident.
Turkey gets away with it. They get away with attacking anyone. Even Americans on US soil. Barack Obama was president then and he looked the other way. Sorry, Barack, diplomatic immunity does not cover assaults. Those people should have been charged and put on trial. They should not have been allowed to slip out of the country.
Meanwhile, Mina Aldroubi (THE NATIONAL) reports:
Weapons in Iraq are not the solution to the crises the country is facing, Prime Minister Mustafa Al Kadhimi said as he encouraged citizens to participate in the upcoming elections to create a change for the better.
Iraq faces serious issues, from a dilapidated healthcare system, corruption and war-battered economy, to the task of reining in armed groups that operate outside the state's authority.
The country has witnessed dozens of assassinations and targeted killings of activists and reporters in recent months by unknown gunmen, the latest was Ihab Al Wazni who was murdered last month in the southern city of Karbala.
"There is anarchy in Iraq’s planning system that has caused the accumulation of a large number of problems. The use of weapons is not the solution, rather elections and a large voter turnout is needed to change for the better,” Mr Al Kadhimi said during a visit to the southern governorate of Wasit.
Anarchy, huh?
Well, Mustafa, you've had a year and what have you done?
It was May 7, 2020 that Mustafa became prime minister. A year later, what can he claim to have accomplished?
No killed of activists has been brought to justice. The report, the government report, remains suppressed, he's the one refusing to release it -- despite repeated, public promises. The Iraqi people continue to suffer.
Turkey has set up a base in Iraq and Mustafa won't address that. He was supposed to be a one term prime minister -- by his own statements -- but instead he's trying to get a second term -- even going so far as to form a conditional alliance with cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.
What has he accomplished?
Lawk Ghafuri noted May 6, 2020 what Mustafa was planning:
The highlights of Iraqi PM-designated Mustafa al-Kadhimi’s cabinet agenda:- - Improve Iraqi security forces - Improve #Iraq’s economy - Develop diplomatic ties - Fighting corruption
What has he done? You could say "develop diplomatic ties" if you ignored that fact that his recent flurry of phone calls have to do with his attempts to shore up support for a second term.
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