Politics

This Popular and Proven Climate Policy Should Be at the Top of Congress's To-Do List

Written by <a href="index.php?option=com_comprofiler&task=userProfile&user=58200">Leah Stokes and Sam Ricketts, Vox</a>

Thursday, 04 February 2021 13:14

Excerpt: "Last year, presidential candidate Joe Biden campaigned on a bold climate plan that included cleaning up America's electricity system by 2035 with a federal Clean Electricity Standard (CES). A national CES, which would require utilities increase their share of renewable and carbon pollution-free electricity, is an old idea. But the ambition - 100 percent clean electricity by 2035 - was new."

A construction worker walks along a dirt road at the Avangrid Renewables La Joya wind farm in Encino, New Mexico, on August 5, 2020. The complex will eventually be equipped with 111 turbines. (photo: Cate Dingley/Getty)

This Popular and Proven Climate Policy Should Be at the Top of Congress's To-Do List

By Leah Stokes and Sam Ricketts, Vox

04 February 21

The case for a national clean electricity standard.

ast year, presidential candidate Joe Biden campaigned on a bold climate plan that included cleaning up America�s electricity system by 2035 with a federal Clean Electricity Standard (CES). A national CES, which would require utilities increase their share of renewable and carbon pollution-free electricity, is an old idea. But the ambition � 100 percent clean electricity by 2035 � was new.

By the end of the campaign, whenever he brought up climate change, which he did constantly, Biden had one year on his mind: 2035.

The new deadline reflects the scientific facts and the economic opportunity. The US must cut emissions by about half this decade to give the world a shot at limiting warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius. Doing this will create millions of good-paying jobs in the American clean energy economy. But to make progress at the pace and scale that�s necessary, it�s Congress who must focus on building a 100 percent clean electricity system.

That�s why we released a major report Thursday, with Evergreen Action and Data for Progress, which shows how Congress can get this done. As two policy experts and advocates who have focused on cleaning up the electricity sector, we think we have the best shot yet to get this policy passed this year.

Clean electricity is the backbone of the energy transition � the critical piece that all the other sectors will slot into. Not only will getting to 100 percent clean electricity directly cut more than a quarter of US carbon pollution, it will also enable large parts of our transportation, building, and industrial sectors to run on clean power. Powering as much of these sectors as we can with carbon-free electricity would allow us to cut US emissions 70 to 80 percent. It would, in short, solve a huge chunk of our climate challenge.

The climate demands it. The president campaigned on it. And 81 million Americans voted for it. It�s now time for Congress and the administration to deliver. Here�s how they can do it.

A proven, practical, and popular approach

Over the past three decades, 30 states � red and blue alike � have passed laws requiring electric utilities to use more clean energy. Since 2015, 10 states have adopted 100 percent clean electricity standards, requiring the transition to fully 100 percent carbon-free power. And six more have committed to that goal. State laws are popping up so fast, it�s hard to keep track. Across the country, 170 cities have policies to get to 100 percent clean. As a result, more than one in three Americans already live in a place that�s committed to reaching 100 percent clean power.

We know this approach is technologically possible. Wind, solar, batteries, transmission lines, and other technologies can replace dirty fossil fuels. Google, one of the largest electricity consumers in the country, is aiming for 100 percent clean power, real-time at all its facilities by 2030.

With all this state and local leadership, it�s not surprising that this approach is popular with the public. In independent polls from both Data for Progress and the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication, run over the past few months, more than two-thirds of voters support the federal government moving the country to 100 percent clean power by 2035.

And once we implement this policy nationally, it should stay popular because clean energy saves customers money.

Researchers from UC Berkeley, GridLab, and Energy Innovation have shown that we could dramatically clean up our electricity system by 2035 and lower electricity bills. Why? Many utilities continue to operate old, uneconomic coal plants. In just three years, these plants cost customers an additional $3.5 billion to keep open � and that�s before we add in all the extra hospital bills for folks breathing in their pollution day after day. Or the cost of destabilizing our climate. Replacing these dirty plants with clean power is not only good for our health; it�s also good for our wallets.

Clean electricity standards are proven, practical, and popular. What�s missing is federal policy, to ensure that every state and utility is switching from dirty energy to clean sources at the accelerated pace that�s necessary. Without a national CES, we know that utilities will not move fast enough � their own plans show that they won�t. This policy must be at the top of Congress�s to-do list this year.

How Congress can pass a CES through the budget reconciliation process

With the election last month in Georgia, Democrats took control of the Senate. However, their majority is slim. The Democrats and Republicans each have 50 seats, and Vice President Kamala Harris can cast tiebreaking votes in Democrats� favor.

To pass meaningful legislation, Democrats have two options. They can get rid of the filibuster, an arcane Senate rule that prevents consideration of a bill without 60 votes. Or they must rely on a unique parliamentary process known as budget reconciliation, which allows some bills to pass with a simple majority.

Most voters think Congress should ditch the filibuster, and we certainly agree with them. But so far, some moderate Senate Democrats have expressed reluctance to do that. That means, at least for the time being, we�re talking a lot about option B.

Reconciliation is complicated. Essentially, it�s a legislative process that allows Congress to expedite bills that relate to federal government revenues (like taxes), outlays (spending), or the debt limit. This process allows legislation to pass with a simple majority in the Senate � just 51 votes. However, there are limits to what types of legislation can be included in this process. The criteria are written in the �Byrd Rule.� And this can�t be done all the time; historically, Congress has only used budget reconciliation once each fiscal year.

In our research for our report, we spent months talking with congressional offices, parliamentary experts, think tanks, climate advocates, and others, and have concluded that it is possible to pass a CES through the budget reconciliation process. In our report, we identify several ways a CES can fit with the Byrd Rule.

Most state clean energy laws create a system of credits that utilities and other power producers can get by producing clean power. These �zero-emissions electricity credits� � or ZECs � allow us to measure progress. Through reconciliation, the federal government could create a system of ZECs that live �on the books,� inside the federal budget. Utilities would earn ZECs by continuously increasing the amount of carbon-free electricity they deliver to customers, or else purchase the credits from the federal program.

Another approach would involve the federal government regularly buying a quantity of ZECs from power companies, through auctions. Essentially, companies would submit bids for how much they would like to be paid for the clean power they are producing. The federal government would set the quantity needed that year � for example, 80 percent clean power by 2030 � and purchase ZECs until that target was fulfilled. This approach would keep the costs of the policy low. Auctions have been used successfully in New York state.

A third approach could involve a twist on either of the first two, but with utilities earning clean energy credits for every ton of carbon pollution that they reduce, rather than for every megawatt-hour of clean electricity that they deliver. This is similar to policy recently adopted in Arizona�s new 100 percent clean electricity standard.

There are other alternatives that come close to approximating a federal CES and could also fit within the Byrd Rule. The federal government could provide funding to states with strings attached to ensure they are adopting carbon-free electricity requirements with the ambitious timelines necessary. Another option is a carbon-intensity standard that penalizes power utilities for failing to reduce their emissions. We could also continue to use the tax code to penalize and incentivize utilities, pushing them toward 100 percent clean electricity by 2035.

Each of these approaches can put us on a path to 100 percent clean electricity, even under the constraints of the Byrd Rule. We are confident there are other CES designs that could fit within reconciliation.

On the road to 100 percent clean electricity by 2035, we need to hit 80 percent clean in 2030. This is a critical target for several reasons. It places the emphasis where it should be: on urgent and immediate progress. And it�s doable with the technology we have now.

Some utilities are already aiming for 80 percent clean by 2030, including practically all the ones in Colorado. These utilities, and others, recognize that it�s time to move off of fossil fuels. NIPSCO, in Indiana, has committed to retiring all its coal by 2028 and will not build new gas.

Focusing on 80 percent clean will ensure that we are not distracted by how to squeeze the last, and most difficult, 10 to 20 percent of pollution out of the electricity system. This target is also important because of congressional rules � the budget reconciliation process typically limits a law�s budgetary impact to 10 years. For all these reasons, a federal CES must include this 2030 target.

Congress and the Biden administration must pass other policies alongside a CES, to drive environmental justice and equitable economic opportunity, and promote good union jobs. We outline a number of them in our report, including long-term federal clean energy investments through tax incentives, grants, and public financing; energy transition support through debt retirement for coal plants and financial resources for fossil fuel communities; speeding up electrification of other sectors, including vehicles and buildings; streamlining clean energy siting and permitting; promoting electricity market competition; intervenor compensation to ensure transition costs remain as low as possible; and policies to address the technology innovation gap.

Realistically, Congress will first tackle Covid-19 relief using budget reconciliation, and only turn to Biden�s clean infrastructure agenda in the months to come, during a second budget reconciliation process. Because Congress didn�t pass a budget resolution last year, there are two opportunities to use reconciliation this year.

The Biden administration cannot wait for Congress to act. In the meantime, it must use existing laws to begin making progress toward 100 percent clean electricity right away. Biden�s Environmental Protection Agency already has a clear legal requirement to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act, because these pollutants endanger Americans� health and well-being. It must also act on other dangerous pollution from fossil fuel power plants, advancing regulations that the Trump administration sat on, and reversing rollbacks made over the past four years.

Clean electricity is the way forward

President Biden and Vice President Harris ran and won on a bold plan for climate action.

As the country faces a terrible economic crisis, and the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, a clean energy recovery is our best opportunity for economic recovery. A CES can create millions of good jobs and drive environmental justice. With a big push on clean power, we could see a net increase of 500,000 to 1 million more good-paying jobs in the energy sector this decade, reaching 2.2 million in the 2030s. If we worked on energy efficiency at the same time, we could get twice as many jobs.

Imagine what it will feel like in 2035, looking back on this moment 15 years from now. If we act now, all of us � everyday people, utility executives, and senators alike � can reflect on this moment and know that when we were called to act, we answered. Solving the climate crisis is possible, if only we are brave enough to see it, if only we are brave enough to do it.

3 comments

FOCUS: Joe Biden's Peace Force? A Multipoint Plan to End War as We Know It

Written by <a href="index.php?option=com_comprofiler&task=userProfile&user=13111">William J. Astore, TomDispatch</a>

Thursday, 04 February 2021 12:43

Astore writes: "When it comes to war, if personnel is policy, America is yet again in deep trouble."

U.S. soldiers assigned load onto a Chinook helicopter to head out and execute missions across Afghanistan in January 2019. (photo: 1st Lt. Verniccia Ford/Department of Defense)

Joe Biden's Peace Force? A Multipoint Plan to End War as We Know It

By William J. Astore, TomDispatch

04 February 21

Once upon a time, the Europeans had the copyright on naming lengthy wars: the Hundred Years� War, the Eighty Years� War, the Thirty Years� War. I suspect, however, that it�s past time for the U.S. to enter that competition. After all, soon after we arrive at September 11, 2021, barring a genuine surprise, this country will have been fighting its twenty-first-century wars unsuccessfully for two decades. In other words, the conflict launched as the Global War on Terror in the days after the 9/11 attacks (the one that then-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld imagined targeting terror networks in up to 60 countries) has never either faintly succeeded or ended. It�s only spread to ever newer realms of death and disaster in distant lands (while bouncing back on this country in ever stranger ways), even as trillions and trillions of taxpayer dollars went down the drain.
Shouldn�t the increasingly riven citizens of this land finally give a name to their military�s wars that are never won and show no sign of ever really ending? The Twenty Years� War is the obvious candidate. Or maybe it would be more accurate � since those European conflicts ebbed and flowed � to call them our Seventy Years� War, starting with the Korean war, Washington�s original �forever war,� which began in June 1950 on a peninsula where peace has yet to be declared.
Retired Air Force lieutenant colonel, TomDispatch regular, and editor of the Bracing Views blog William Astore has a somewhat different suggestion. Isn�t it time, he wonders, whether 70 years later or 20 years later, to begin to use a word that�s more or less fallen out of the American vocabulary in this century: peace?

-Tom Engelhardt, TomDispatch

hen it comes to war, if personnel is policy, America is yet again in deep trouble.

As retired Army Major Danny Sjursen recently pointed out at TomDispatch, when it comes to foreign policy, President Joe Biden�s new cabinet and advisers are well stocked with retired generals, reconstituted neocons, unapologetic hawks, and similar war enthusiasts. Biden himself has taken to asking God to protect the troops whenever he makes a major speech. (How about protecting them by bringing them home from our pointless wars?) �Defense� spending, as war spending is generally known in this country, remains at record levels at $740.5 billion for fiscal year 2021. Talk of a new cold war with Russia or China (or both) paradoxically warms Pentagon offices and corridors with yet more funds. The only visible dove of peace at Biden�s inaugural was the giant golden brooch worn by Lady Gaga. So what exactly is to be done?

Peace-driven progressive policies will not emerge easily from the rainbow kettle of hawks Biden has so far assembled, but his inaugural speech did mention leading and inspiring others globally �not merely by the example of our power but by the power of our example.� It would have been an apt rhetorical flourish indeed, if not for this country�s �forever wars� in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yemen, and elsewhere across the Greater Middle East and Africa. America�s harsh war-fighting reality suggests that �the example of our power� still remains standard operating procedure inside the Washington Beltway. How could this possibly be changed?

I have a few ideas for Biden � a 10-point plan, in fact, for turning his softball rhetoric into hardball reality. Consider, Mr. President, the following powerful examples you could set as America�s latest commander-in-chief:

1. Stop the U.S. from building new generations of nuclear weapons and downsize the vast existing American arsenal, while launching global negotiations to work toward the elimination of all such arsenals. The U.S. military is set to spend well over a trillion dollars in the coming decades to �modernize� its nuclear triad of bombers and land-based and submarine-launched missiles. Such a staggering �investment� can only move the world closer to nuclear Armageddon. If America is to lead by example when it comes to the ultimate power on this planet, why not begin by cancelling this trillion-dollar-nightmare as part of a new global anti-nuclear initiative? Why not commit us, long term, to the elimination of all nuclear weapons everywhere, while moving to adopt a �no-first-use� policy?

2. When it comes to President Biden�s commitment to slow climate change and clean up the environment, why not do something in military terms? America�s armed forces have an enormous appetite for fossil fuels. The Pentagon also has a sordid record when it comes to the poisoning of the environment. (Consider the legacy of Agent Orange in Vietnam, or the military�s burn pits in Iraq and Afghanistan, or the birth defects and severe health problems that were linked to the munitions its forces used in assaulting the Iraqi city of Fallujah in 2004.) If the president wants to set an example when it comes to demilitarizing this over-armed, over-polluted planet of ours, reducing both the military�s fossil-fuel emissions and its poisonous munitions would be a powerful way to start.

3. End this century�s forever wars and radically downsize this country�s unprecedented global network of military bases. Driving the colossal size of today�s military is what my old service, the Air Force, likes to call its �global reach, global power� mission. At least in theory, that mission, in turn, helps justify the sprawling network of 800 or so overseas bases, a network that costs more than $100 billion a year to maintain. Such bases not only consume resources needed here in the U.S. and help stoke those forever wars, but they present high-value targets to opponents and incite ill-feeling and resistance from �host� countries. So, downsizing that global base structure would be an act of peace � and fiscal sanity.

4. Make major cuts in the country�s war budget. Fewer bases and fewer or no wars should translate into a far lower defense budget. Somewhere in the neighborhood of $400 billion annually to defend this country and cover its real �national security� interests seems reasonable for the self-styled lone superpower. The money saved (roughly $340 billion based on this year�s budget) could then perhaps be partly rebated directly to American families in need in this pandemic. Perhaps every American family earning less than $50,000 a year could see a rebate on their taxes directly attributable to downsizing that budget and America�s imperial footprint overseas. Taking a page from Donald Trump, President Biden, as America�s thrifty and giving commander-in-chief, could even have his name put on those rebate checks. Call it a long-delayed peace dividend. Regular Americans, after all, need such �dividends� far more than giant defense contractors like Boeing or Raytheon. And don�t get me started on the need to invest in rebuilding this nation�s infrastructure at a moment when the extremities associated with climate change threaten to devastate parts of the country.

5. Create a Department of Peace (here�s looking at you, Dennis Kucinich) with influence at least approaching that of the so-called Department of Defense. Currently, the U.S. military is all about power projection, domination of the global battlespace, and similar buzzwords that add up to exporting violence abroad, special op by special op, drone by drone. You are what you do and the U.S. military does permanent war with plenty of �collateral damage.� (Picture mutilated black and brown bodies and flattened and poisoned cities and towns.) If the U.S. government can create a Space Force just to fulfill the fantasies of Donald Trump, then why not a peace force, too? (America�s current, humble Peace Corps asked for $401 million for Fiscal Year 2021, roughly the cost of four underperforming F-35 jet fighters.) Peace, much like war, doesn�t just happen. You have to work at it � and that would be precisely the mission of the Department of Peace.

6. Pay attention, for once, to President Dwight D. Eisenhower�s 1961 farewell address and exert rigorous oversight and zealous control over the military-industrial complex. That means ending the 2001 AUMF, the authorization for use of military force that Congress passed in a climate of panic and revenge in the immediate aftermath of 9/11 (though it was only to be against those associated in some fashion with those terror attacks), and the second one Congress authorized in 2002 in preparation for the Bush administration�s invasion of Iraq. They have been misused and abused by presidents ever since. Furthermore, end any conflict that hasn�t been authorized by a direct Congressional declaration of war. That means withdrawing all U.S. troops from Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, and elsewhere across the Greater Middle East and Africa. America�s security is not, in fact, directly threatened by those countries. As a self-declared democracy, the United States should set an example by not fighting wars disconnected from the people�s will and the true needs of national defense.

7. And speaking of President Eisenhower, America needs to embrace his lesson that military spending represents a theft from Americans who are hungry, sick, and need help. For its �national security,� this country needs more hospitals, better education, safer food, a cleaner environment, and, most of all, clean water and fresh air. Eisenhower knew that warships and warplanes were simply not the answer to the American people�s real and pressing needs.

8. Reject threat inflation, including the heightening talk of a �new cold war� with Russia or China or of an ongoing �generational� war on terror. Eliminate talk of a new Red Menace, of likely wars with Iran or North Korea, or of America�s backwardness in cyberwarfare research and development. Terrorism is nothing new and will always be with us in one form or another (including, vis-a-vis the Capitol on January 6th, domestic terrorism). Indeed, since war is terror, a war on terror should truly be considered an oxymoron. Terrorist acts are mostly the recourse of the weak when taking on the strong. The United States isn�t going to stop them by getting stronger yet. Nor are China and Russia about to invade this country. (This isn�t Red Dawn.) Iran is not coming to impose Sharia law and North Korea is not about to launch nukes against us. As for cyber-attacks, don�t worry: no matter what you�ve heard, no country does cyberwarfare better than the U.S.A.

9. End the practice of foreign aid taking the form of military aid. When taxpayers give aid to foreign countries, it should be in the form of food, medicine, and other essentials, not cluster bombs, F-16s, and Hellfire missiles.

10. Learn from Abraham Lincoln. In President Biden�s recent Inaugural Address, as a call to national unity, he made reference to Lincoln�s initial inaugural appeal to �the better angels of our nature.� But he should have focused on Lincoln�s Second Inaugural Address, the finest speech ever given by any president. As Lincoln put it then, when it came to ending the American Civil War:

�With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation�s wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan � to do all which may achieve and cherish a just, and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations.�

Lincoln was unafraid of speaking of and seeking a just and lasting peace. In this century, until at least the Trump years, Americans often heard their leaders speak of this nation�s �exceptional� nature. What could be more exceptional, more laudable, than seeking a lasting global peace?

Biden, like me, is Roman Catholic. My Catholic bible (Matthew 5:9) tells me that Christ said, �Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God.� Instead of beseeching God to protect the troops that American presidents have continually sent into harm�s way, Joe Biden might ask for blessings for America�s peace activists. To echo Lincoln again, that would indeed be a case of right making might, instead of the might-making-right vision that a militaristic America has grown far too comfortable with.

An Alert and Knowledgeable Citizenry

So long ago, President Eisenhower spoke of the importance of having an �alert and knowledgeable citizenry.� Isn�t it time for mainstream media outlets to foster real, critical, investigative journalism that would truly inform those very citizens about America�s wanton military spending and endless wars, while providing educators with crucial material to teach their students about the horrific costs of militarism? This country needs to free its collective mind from the prevailing forever-war narrative. To paraphrase Crosby, Stills, and Nash, if we teach the children well, perhaps they won�t repeat their father�s hell.

In his song �Imagine,� John Lennon asked us all to imagine a different world and said that it�s easy if you try. Lennon got the first and most important part right, but the second part sadly doesn�t apply, at least to this country in this century. Nowadays, Americans are so immersed in a culture driven by war, profit, and exploitation that it�s no longer easy to imagine anything but war. If Americans truly paid attention to war, up close and as personal as they could get, they�d begin to grasp the folly and wickedness of it and so perhaps relinquish what I�ve come to think of as their prisoner-of-war mentality in relation to it. They might actually begin breaking down mental barriers to peace.

Don�t count on Congress doing it, though. Congress is incestuously part of what should be renamed the military-industrial-congressional complex. Don�t count on the military doing it either. Its most senior men and women have been carefully selected, groomed, and promoted because they believe in the system, which includes incessant lobbying for more weaponry and exaggerating the threats to this country to get it. They exist to wage war; the rest of us should be willing to fight for peace.

Change, if and when it comes, will have to be driven by people like us.

It won�t be easy, but it is necessary for America�s survival. And it�s unlikely to come without campaign finance reform and the public funding of elections. In a �pay-to-play� oligarchy disguised as a democracy, the giant weapons-making corporations simply pay much more than you do and so speak through megaphones, leaving you with a dead mic. Unless the corporate dominance of our politics is curtailed, ordinary Americans will continue to be outshouted and overwhelmed by the bellicose and the greedy, leaving the country forever at war.

It won�t be easy to work for peace, but it sure is worth the try. It sure as hell beats the alternative of guns, bombs, and missiles being produced like so many sausages in a militaristic country that ever more resembles George Orwell�s nightmarish image of the future as �a boot stamping on a human face � forever.�

America�s new president has called for us to lead with the power of our example rather than just the example of our power. I can�t think of anything more exemplary and powerful than a strong commitment to making war no more.

Follow TomDispatch on Twitter and join us on Facebook. Check out the newest Dispatch Books, John Feffer�s new dystopian novel Frostlands (the second in the Splinterlands series), Beverly Gologorsky�s novel Every Body Has a Story, and Tom Engelhardt�s A Nation Unmade by War, as well as Alfred McCoy�s In the Shadows of the American Century: The Rise and Decline of U.S. Global Power and John Dower�s The Violent American Century: War and Terror Since World War II.

William Astore, a retired lieutenant colonel (USAF) and professor of history, is a TomDispatch regular and a senior fellow at the Eisenhower Media Network (EMN), an organization of critical veteran military and national security professionals. His personal blog is Bracing Views.

8 comments

FOCUS: After Years of Outrage Politics, RepubliQans Have Surrendered to the Neo-Nazi Conspiracy Theorists

Written by <a href="index.php?option=com_comprofiler&task=userProfile&user=51519">Juan Cole, Informed Comment</a>

Thursday, 04 February 2021 12:00

Cole writes: "Now, the party cannot summon any outrage for the Big Lie. Republican Senators will not impeach Donald Trump for inciting a mob that included armed white terrorists to kill them."

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) (photo: Katherine Frey/The Washington Post)

After Years of Outrage Politics, RepubliQans Have Surrendered to the Neo-Nazi Conspiracy Theorists

By Juan Cole, Informed Comment

04 February 21

rom Sarah Palin�s alarmist and mendacious charge of death panels in the Affordable Health Act to Benghazi, where the smarmy Mike Pompeo tried to hang a terrorist attack around the neck of secretary of state Hillary Clinton (who was not in charge of military or intelligence decisions), the brand of the Republican Party in recent decades has been a mixture of the Big Lie and outrage.

Now, the party cannot summon any outrage for the Big Lie. Republican Senators will not impeach Donald Trump for inciting a mob that included armed white terrorists to kill them.

The Republican members of the House refused on Wednesday evening to take Marjorie Taylor Greene off the Education Committee even though she had until recently branded major school shootings as false flag attacks staged by gun control advocates. (Yes.) She also actively harrased Parkland survivor David Hogg. She also believes that Trump is a divine agent appointed to break up a high Democratic Party pedophile ring that drinks children�s blood, and that a Jewish-funded space laser set the California wildfires.

David Corn at Mother Jones broke the story on Wednesday that Greene moderated a whole Facebook group characterized by racist slurs and death threats. She is still listed as a moderator, at a site where posters speak of taking a hammer to the heads of Democrats and going Punisher on them.

House minority member Kevin McCarthy has perfected the art of hunting with the hounds and running with the hares. He denounced Greene�s beliefs and those of the QAnon cult to which she belongs, but refused to take any action against her. This, despite the precedent of having stripped Steve King (R-IA) (the R stands for Racist) of his committee assignments after he defended the terms �white nationalism� and �white supremacy.� King was a model citizen compared to Greene.

McCarthy is hoping against hope that he can talk the talk without having actually to walk the walk.

Greene spoke Wednesday evening to her Republican colleagues.

About half of the Republic representatives rose to their feet and applauded her.

They gave her a standing ovation.

I guess they thought her space laser idea was really great, not to mention her call to hang Barack Obama or her liking of a Facebook post advocating shooting Nancy Pelosi in the head.

McCarthy also engaged in some whataboutism, trying to draw an equivalence between Greene and Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN), who got into trouble for pointing out that the AIPAC lobby exists and funds politicians� campaigns. I somehow don�t think that is exactly like alleging Jewish space lasers burning 5 million acres or asserting that Muslim immigration to Europe and the US is a Jewish billionaire plot against white Christian workers.

The Democrats in the House are determined now to remove her from her committee assignments and to make their Republican colleagues vote publicly on the issue. If McCarthy were any kind of leader at all, he would have spared his party this debacle.

The House Republicans have experienced this embarrassing loss of spine, which has reduced them to floundering slugs, because Trump is still the leader of their party and he supports Greene. Some three-fourths of the party faithful, moreover, are with Trump. So voting against either one of them bears an uncanny resemblance to resigning ostentatiously from Congress, since they will likely be primaried and lose the 2022 election even before they can enter it. For those relative newbies still not well connected enough in Washington or back home, such an unceremonious departure could mean loss of millions in future lobbying gigs.

So the real problem here is what the Republican Party has become. There are still normal people in the party, but even they are mostly congenial to the white supremacists, the Nazis, and the tin foil hat conspiracy theorists. The Republican base gave us Trump, as they rejected over a dozen better qualified and eminently more sane alternatives in the 2016 primaries. Watching Newsmax and One America and even what they view as inexcusably socialist Fox, listening to outrage 24/7 on radio, following Twitter and Facebook feeds of the Aryan race and the anti-vampirism activists, treasuring each attack on a wealthy Jew they can find, rank and file Republicans have become something ugly and un-American, and party leaders like Kevin McCarthy have decided not to make a stand against it.

The Republican Party backed Greene�s run for Congress. Party bigwigs campaigned for her. The party faithful apparently would be happy to make Greene president in future.

They are now the RepubliQan Party.

13 comments

A Mother's Path to Insurrection

Written by <a href="index.php?option=com_comprofiler&task=userProfile&user=46386">Ronan Farrow, The New Yorker</a>

Thursday, 04 February 2021 09:25

Farrow writes: "Before the pandemic, Rachel Powell, a forty-year-old mother of eight from western Pennsylvania, sold cheese and yogurt at local farmers' markets and used Facebook mostly to discuss yoga, organic food, and her children's baseball games."

Videos show Rachel Powell, seen here in a pink hat and sunglasses, using a battering ram to smash a window and a bullhorn to issue orders during the Capitol riot. (photo: Lev Radin/Pacific Press)

A Mother's Path to Insurrection

By Ronan Farrow, The New Yorker

04 February 21

How claims by Rudy Giuliani and Alex Jones spurred a parent of eight to become one of the Capitol riot�s biggest mysteries, and a fugitive from the F.B.I.

efore the pandemic, Rachel Powell, a forty-year-old mother of eight from western Pennsylvania, sold cheese and yogurt at local farmers� markets and used Facebook mostly to discuss yoga, organic food, and her children�s baseball games. But, last year, Powell began to post more frequently, embracing more extreme political views. Her interests grew to include conspiracy theories about COVID-19 and the results of the Presidential election, filtered through such figures as Donald Trump, Rudy Giuliani, and the Infowars founder Alex Jones. On May 3, 2020, Powell wrote on Facebook, �One good thing about this whole CV crisis is that I suddenly feel very patriotic.� Expressing outrage at the restrictions that accompanied the pandemic, she wrote, �It isn�t to late to wake up, say no, and restore freedoms.� Several days later, she posted a distraught seven-minute video, shot outside a local gym that had been closed. �Police need to see there�s people that are citizens that are not afraid of you guys showing up in your masks. We�re going to be here banded together, and we�re not afraid of you,� she said. �Maybe they should be a little bit afraid.�

On January 6th, during the storming of the United States Capitol, Powell made good on that threat. Videos show her, wearing a pink hat and sunglasses, using a battering ram to smash a window and a bullhorn to issue orders. �People should probably co�rdinate together if you�re going to take this building,� she called out, leaning through a shattered window and addressing a group of rioters already inside. �We got another window to break to make in-and-out easy.�

In recent weeks, as journalists and law-enforcement officials tried to identify participants in the assault, she came to be known as �Bullhorn Lady� and �Pink Hat Lady.� She appeared on an F.B.I. �Wanted� poster, was featured in cable-television news segments, and became an obsessive focus of crowdsourced investigative efforts by laypeople and experts. Forrest Rogers, a German-American business consultant who is part of a Twitter group called the Deep State Dogs, recently identified Powell and reported her name to the F.B.I. She is now being sought by law enforcement.

In her first public comments since the riot, Powell acknowledged her role in the events at the Capitol. During a two-hour telephone interview, she claimed that her conduct had been spontaneous, contrary to widespread speculation that she had acted in co�rdination with an organized group. �I was not part of a plot�organized, whatever,� Powell, who was speaking from an undisclosed location, told me. �I have no military background. . . . I�m a mom with eight kids. That�s it. I work. And I garden. And raise chickens. And sell cheese at a farmers� market.� During the interview, she reviewed photographs and videos of the Bullhorn Lady, acknowledging that many of the images showed her, and offered detailed descriptions of the skirmishes they depicted. She declined to comment on some of her conduct�including smashing windows and shouting orders to fellow-rioters�that could carry criminal charges. �Listen, if somebody doesn�t help and direct people, then do more people die?� she said. �That�s all I�m going to say about that. I can�t say anymore. I need to talk to an attorney.�

Powell was born in Anaheim, California, and grew up on what she described as �the really bad side� of Fresno. She was raised by her mother, who worked at a local shop, and by her stepfather, a plumber. �It was rough, but she didn�t do without anything,� her mother, Deborah Lemons, who has had a strained relationship with Powell for the past several years, said. �She always had clothes. She always had food.� Lemons said that, when Powell was a child, she and her stepfather were the victims of a carjacking. Powell was held at gunpoint and her stepfather was kidnapped for several hours by their assailant. �Knowing what that feels like, I am just absolutely amazed that she would participate in something like this and not consider or have a lot of compassion for the people who were inside that building,� Lemons said, referring to the riot. �She well knows what it�s like to wonder if she�s gonna lose her life.�

When Powell was fifteen, her family moved to West Sunbury, in western Pennsylvania, to care for an ailing relative of her stepfather�s. The town was typical of declining Rust Belt communities. �There were a lot of steel mills that closed even since I lived there,� Powell told me. She told me that she had married young, and her mother said that Powell had her first child at sixteen. After graduating from high school, she remained in Pennsylvania. Three years ago, Powell separated from her husband. Since then, she has worked various part-time jobs to support her children, who range in age from four to their mid-twenties. She told me that she has a certification as a group fitness instructor, and has taken a course in alternative medicine. �She�s very granola, very crunchy,� a friend, who asked not to be identified, told me. �Does yoga, eats vegetarian, homeschools all their kids.�

Powell said that, before the election of Donald Trump, in 2016, she held a wide range of political opinions. �My views kind of fall all over the place,� she said. �I guess you could say that I�m more libertarian at heart.� Though her county supported Trump by wide margins in both 2016 and 2020, Powell told me that she didn�t vote for him in his first run, and her social-media posts during that time include sharp criticism of him. �Trump makes me uncomfortable as a presidential candidate,� she wrote in a Facebook post that linked to a piece about Trump�s lack of civility. �What disturbs me is that so many people support this type of person.� She also told me that she took issue with his environmental policies. During his tenure in the White House, however, she embraced Trump and, eventually, the misinformation that he nurtured about the coronavirus and election fraud.

Those political views began to have various impacts on her life after the pandemic hit. Paula Keswick, who co-owns a local creamery that sold Powell cheese and yogurt, said that Powell was barred from working at some events after she refused to obey pandemic restrictions. �She was just adamant she was not going to wear a mask,� Keswick said. (Powell said that she now works part time at a local bookstore.) Last summer and fall, Powell said, she attended various protests, including anti-mask rallies. �If there was a protest in Harrisburg, I was there for almost all of them,� she told me. On July 4th, she drove for four hours to join members of several far-right groups, some of them armed, who gathered at the Gettysburg National Military Park, purportedly to protect Civil War monuments from desecration. At the rally, a man wearing a Black Lives Matter shirt was surrounded and aggressively questioned by about fifty demonstrators. In a video posted online, Powell is among the group, holding an iPhone with the same Kate Spade Hollyhock Floral case that she was later photographed carrying at the Capitol. Powell also told me that she attended rallies in Washington, D.C., on dates she could not recall, including one attended by members of the far-right group the Proud Boys, where Alex Jones, who has falsely alleged that the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting was faked, spoke. (Powell said that Jones is not her �favorite person,� but that she considers him to be �another journalist to listen to�he has interesting things to say.�) She told me that she did not share the racist views espoused by some on the far right. (In 2013, she tweeted, �what�s up, my niggas?� Powell defended the use of the N-word, saying, �My favorite book is �Gone with the Wind,� and it uses that term freely.�)

Last November, Powell voted for Trump. �It was a little bit of a hard decision for me, and I didn�t make that decision to vote for him till two months before the election,� she said. �I appreciate his business mind. Economy-wise, he has it going on. He loves America.� Ultimately, she concluded, she �couldn�t vote for the other person. I really don�t think Biden or Harris will be good for the country.�

Concerns about mask requirements, which she called a �liberty issue,� were instrumental in her decision. She claimed that the risks of the coronavirus had been overstated by public-health officials, saying that she had not seen many deaths in her county. On November 5th, 2020, she wrote in a Facebook comment directed at a friend, �I won�t get a vaccine either. I hear what you�re saying about the whole world being in on the conspiracy as far as the corona virus goes.� On December 27th, she posted, �I�m unashamedly a �super spreader,� � attaching photographs of crowded, mask-free holiday and birthday parties. That day, she uploaded a video of a large maskless meal, during which several children said, �No masks,� and Powell could be heard saying, �The masks are total bullcrap. You guys just need to get out there and live. Get arrested�it�s fine.�

Powell connected her beliefs about the coronavirus to claims promoted by Trump and his allies that he had won the election. The day after the election, she shared a screenshot of a graphic claiming that several states had more votes recorded than they did registered voters, information that Facebook flagged as �partly false.� In the accompanying text, Powell wrote, �I�m sitting here thinking about how everyone has been so complacent during COVID.� She went on, �The government knows exactly how far you can be pushed because the population has been successfully tested.�

That post, like others reflecting Powell�s increasingly extreme views, was met with positive reinforcement online. �The dumbing down and fattening up of America has been very successful,� one person wrote in response to the election-fraud conspiracy theory. �It may be too late if ever they wake up.� Earlier posts protesting mask-wearing prompted comments such as �Truth!!!� and �Wake up people!!!!�

Powell said that she derived her beliefs �a little bit from everywhere,� and that she was not a follower of any mainstream news source. �You can go online, go on Facebook now, and dig up a thousand different links about it,� she said, of the election-fraud conspiracy theories. She said that Rudy Giuliani, Trump�s personal attorney, had been a significant source of information, and that she had watched remarks he gave in Gettysburg, on November 25th, during a widely discredited state-senate committee hearing in which he and several witnesses made baseless claims of voter fraud. �That was pretty moving to me,� she said. �I learned a lot from Giuliani and people�s testimonies.�

Joan Donovan, a scholar of media manipulation and extremism, who serves as the research director of Harvard�s Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics, and Public Policy, told me that Powell�s process of radicalization was increasingly common. �You don�t have to go to the dark corners of the Web to find this anymore,� she said. �Through these influencers, through these political propagandists, it�s all brought in through your news feed, through your home page.� Donovan said that friends� comments often provide an echo chamber for misinformation, and that every click on extremist content can prompt social-media algorithms to produce more of the same. Giuliani, in particular, has proved to be a popular entry point into the world of misinformation. �There were a lot of people like her in that crowd,� Donovan told me, referring to Powell�s participation in the Capitol riot. �They�re going to figure out ways to get back online and to keep communicating with each other. And, if Trump does figure out a way back on platforms where he can build power in the way he did before, this group of people is going to continue to be dangerous and menacing.�

At the July 4th demonstration in Gettysburg, Powell met Kevin Lynn, the founder of a group that advocates for the hiring of American workers in the U.S. technology industry. Last August, after Lynn�s group placed ads pressing Trump to restrict the outsourcing of jobs overseas, Lynn met with Trump at the White House. Lynn told me that he had attended the Gettysburg protest to document the event, and that he interviewed several participants, including Powell. Afterward, the two stayed in touch. �I would say we�re friends,� he said. Before Trump�s �Stop the Steal� rally in Washington, D.C., Powell told Lynn that she planned to attend, and they agreed to go together. On January 5th, Powell and Lynn met near Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and drove to Washington in his car. At least two other friends, the owners of the bookstore where Powell works, drove in another car. (The bookstore owners did not respond to a request for comment.) At the rally, on the morning of January 6th, Powell helped Lynn operate his camera. Trump urged attendees to �fight like hell.� He added, �We�re going to walk down to the Capitol. . . . Let�s walk down Pennsylvania Avenue.� Powell said that Trump�s words weighed �partially� in her decisions that day. �It�s good he did ask the American people to come and let their voices be heard for what they believe in,� she told me, �but it was definitely not the sole reason that I came.�

Both Powell and Lynn said that, as they marched to the Capitol, they were separated. Lynn told me that he did not enter the Capitol and that he was �shocked� by the footage of Powell in the thick of the violence.

At the Capitol, Powell said that she found herself in an increasingly violent confrontation between rioters and Capitol police. Powell appeared to be wearing a jacket designed specifically for the concealed carrying of a gun, but said she did not carry one, �unless you count a L�rabar and bottle of water as a weapon.� In one video, her pink hat is briefly visible in a crush of bodies during a skirmish near an entrance on the west front of the Capitol which is reserved for members of Congress and staffers. �That�s where the pileup was,� she told me, after reviewing the video. �The people were wedged so tight.� She said that she heard a woman�s cries growing gradually quieter beneath the crowd and claimed ultimately to have seen her dead body. (The New Yorker was unable to confirm whether a woman died there.) Powell added, �I was beaten with a baton, and sprayed and gassed.�

In another video, Powell and other rioters are seen using a makeshift battering ram to shatter one of the Capitol�s windows. She pulls the heavy, pipe-shaped object back and throws her weight forward against it repeatedly. (�That�s one of those things I can neither confirm nor deny,� she said. �I just need to talk to an attorney. If you look at that video, people are just going to make their own assumptions.�) In yet another video, she stands outside a broken window, shouting instructions through the bullhorn to rioters inside. Powell says, �I�ve been in the other room,� and appears to outline a plan involving breaking a pane of glass to get into another part of the Capitol. Powell said, regarding her knowledge of the building�s layout, �Anything that was said was figured out as time went on. It wasn�t like there was a map or anything.�

After the riot, Powell said, �I was by myself�I didn�t rendezvous with a bunch of people . . . I didn�t meet militias.� Lynn said that Powell did not join him for the drive home. Powell declined to answer questions about how she returned to Pennsylvania, or with whom.

Forrest Rogers, who reported Powell�s name to the F.B.I., at first thought he had identified a ringleader in a premeditated campaign to invade the Capitol. �The initial footage showed a woman, an apparent insider with an understanding of the Capitol layout, shouting commands to a bunch of unknowns through a bullhorn,� Rogers said. �This created a perception that she was one of the conspirators with an extensive network.� John Scott-Railton, a researcher at the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto, who has been involved in crowdsourced efforts to identify participants in the riot, said that he also independently confirmed Powell�s identity: �It became clearer over time that her actual role might be different, but still important to understanding what brought a person like that to the Capitol.�

Lemons, Powell�s mother, expressed astonishment at her daughter�s conduct and said that she condemned the violence during the riot. �The whole family is, in a way, just devastated,� she said. �It�s a thing you never expect, that your child is going to be on some F.B.I. �Wanted� poster.� Powell said that her only regrets were the possible repercussions for her children. Asked whether she would have acted differently, given the chance, she said, �I try not to think about that. There are some things that are just worth blocking out.�

10 comments

Written by <a href="index.php?option=com_comprofiler&task=userProfile&user=58195">Mansoor Adayfi, Moazzam Begg, Lakhdar Boumediane, Sami Al Hajj, Ahmed Errachidi, et al., New York Review</a>

Thursday, 04 February 2021 09:24

Excerpt: "We write to you as former prisoners of the United States held without charge or trial at the military detention facility at Guant�namo Bay who have written books about our experiences."

Hooded and shackled detainees at the since-shuttered Camp X-Ray, located at the US Navy base at Guatan�mo Bay, Cuba. (photo: Getty)

An Open Letter to President Biden About Guant�namo From Former Prisoners

By Mansoor Adayfi, Moazzam Begg, Lakhdar Boumediane, Sami Al Hajj, Ahmed Errachidi, et al., New York Review

04 February 21

President Bush opened it. President Obama promised to close it, but failed to do so. President Trump promised to keep it open. Now, it is your turn to decide.

e write to you as former prisoners of the United States held without charge or trial at the military detention facility at Guant�namo Bay who have written books about our experiences.

First, we welcome your presidential orders to reverse many unjust and problematic decisions made by your predecessor. We appreciate your repeal of the �Muslim ban,� which will now allow nationals from the Muslim-majority countries previously targeted into the United States, therefore bringing relief to families torn apart by this order.

Despite some positive developments, including the repeal of the Muslim ban, there is another deeply flawed and unjust process that has continued through five US presidential administrations spanning two decades: Guant�namo Bay prison. Guant�namo Bay has existed for over nineteen years and was built to house an exclusively Muslim male population.

We understand that your faith is important to you and helps to guide your vision of social justice. During our incarceration, we often reflected on the story of the Prophet Joseph (Yusuf) in the Quran and his years of wrongful imprisonment. It�s the same story in the Bible and one that reminds us that justice is not only divine, but timeless. That is why we are writing to you.

Although most of us were released under President Bush, everyone was hopeful that President Obama would follow through with his executive order to close Guant�namo in 2009. While some of us were released under Obama, however, it became clear during his tenure as president that ending imprisonment at Guant�namo was not a promise he could fulfill.

Many of us were abducted from our homes, in front of our families, and sold for bounties to the US by nations that cared little for the rule of law. We were rendered to countries where we were physically and psychologically tortured in addition to suffering racial and religious discrimination in US custody�even before we arrived at Guant�namo.

Some of us had children who were born in our absence and grew up without fathers. Others experienced the pain of learning that our close relatives died back home waiting in vain for news of our return. Waiting in vain for justice.

Most of the prisoners currently or presently detained at Guant�namo have never been to the United States. This means that our image of your country has been shaped by our experiences at Guant�namo�in other words, we have only been witnesses to its dark side.

Considering the violence that has happened at Guant�namo, we are sure that after more than nineteen years, you agree that imprisoning people indefinitely without trial while subjecting them to torture, cruelty and degrading treatment, with no meaningful access to families or proper legal systems, is the height of injustice. That is why imprisonment at Guant�namo must end.

There are only forty prisoners left in Guant�namo. We are told that the cost of each prisoner is $13 million per annum. That means that the United States spends $520 million a year on imprisoning men who will never be charged or convicted in a US court. Aside from the moral, legal, and public relations disaster that is Guant�namo, some of this money could be easily spent on programs to resettle prisoners and help them to rebuild their lives.

President Bush opened it. President Obama promised to close it, but failed to do so. President Trump promised to keep it open. It is now your turn to shape your legacy with regards to Guant�namo.

At your inauguration, you told the world: �We will be judged, you and I, by how we resolve these cascading crises of our era. We will rise to the occasion.� It is therefore our suggestion that the following steps are taken to close Guant�namo:

All those cleared for release are immediately repatriated to their home countries, as long as they are safe from arbitrary imprisonment and persecution.

The office for the special envoy is reopened and suitable countries are sought to restart the resettlement process for those unable to return to their homes.

Appropriate measures are taken to ensure that former prisoners are granted the means to start a meaningful life in the new country and are afforded protections from violations of those measures by the receiving state.

The concept of �forever prisoners� is rescinded, and those not facing charges under the military commissions are repatriated or resettled (as above) following appropriate security arrangements.

Repatriation/resettlement should not take place by force, and prisoners are not resettled where they will face arbitrary imprisonment once again.

Periodic Review Board reports should be superseded by the imperative to close Guant�namo and not obstruct the above measures.

The military commissions should be scrapped, and those facing charges should have their cases tried in accordance with the law.

Where appropriate and practicable, mechanisms are put in place whereby those convicted of crimes can serve their sentences closer to home.

Guant�namo causes deep distrust in what America says and stands for. Prisoners from forty-nine different countries once occupied Guant�namo�s cells. Those prisoners look to America as a nation of laws and freedoms and see little of either. For two decades, the world has observed Guant�namo and noted that it is a bipartisan project, carried out by both Republicans and Democrats. That is what you must contend with and change.

Despite the abuses, after detention, many of us befriended and welcomed into our homes former US soldiers who guarded us. We�ve always believed there was another way.

During your tenure as vice president, America freed senior Taliban leaders from Guant�namo. Today, they head negotiations with top US officials to bring about peace in Afghanistan. During your inauguration speech you said, �Every disagreement doesn�t have to be a cause for total war.� We agree. In fact, as Obama once said, Guant�namo �should never have opened.� We believe you can close Guant�namo before its looming twentieth anniversary.

It is our sincere hope that you do.

Mansoor Adayfi (author, Yemen)
Moazzam Begg (author, UK)
Lakhdar Boumediane (author, France)
Sami Al Hajj (author, Qatar)
Ahmed Errachidi (author, Morocco)
Mohammed Ould Slahi (author, Mauritania)
Moussa Zemmouri (author, Belgium)

4 comments

More Articles...

<< Start < Prev 211 212 213 214 215 216 217 218 219 220 Next > End >>

Page 211 of 3432

THE NEW STREAMLINED RSN LOGIN PROCESS: Register once, then login and you are ready to comment. All you need is a Username and a Password of your choosing and you are free to comment whenever you like! Welcome to the Reader Supported News community.

Name:	*
Username:	*
E-mail:	*
Password:	*
Confirm password:	*
Fields marked with an asterisk (*) are required.