What the US did during World War II and the Korean war

We now know much about the horrors inflicted by the US on Vietnam during that war. It is sometimes suggested that the atrocities committed by the US during that war were an aberration of some kind, a deviation from its usually honorable behavior in wars such as in ‘good’ wars like World War II. But this investigation from Reveal discusses how in that war, US soldiers committed a war crime when they rounded up German prisoners of war in a field and machine-gunned them. General George S. Patton called it a murder but none of the people involved were punished.
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The rise of black women freethinkers

It has rightly been pointed out that while atheists span the entire spectrum of the population, the atheist movement itself, in the sense of the leadership of organizations and the most visible atheists in the media, has been dominated by white men. This is fortunately changing and Christopher Cameron in an article titled Black atheists matter: how women freethinkers take on religion reports on those developments. In doing so, he addresses the often-raised question of why the horrors of slavery did not result in the wholesale discrediting of religion in the black community since religion was often used not only to justify slavery but to encourage black people to passively accept their situation in return for their reward in heaven. He says that support for religion in the black community ebbed and flowed depending on the contemporary situation.
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Kareem Abdul-Jabbar also picks up the baton of The Heritage

In my series of posts about Howard Bryant’s book The Heritage, I discussed the book’s thesis of how the responsibility of successful black athletes to speak out on issues of injustice that was started by Paul Robeson, and carried on by Jackie Robinson, John Carlos, Tommie Smith, and Muhammad Ali, went into decline with the arrival of extremely successful athletes like OJ Simpson, Michael Jordan, and Tiger Woods who wanted to do nothing that would endanger their lucrative corporate endorsements.
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People do not necessarily ‘suffer’ from diseases

Actor and strong science advocate Alan Alda recently revealed that he has had Parkinson’s disease for the last three years.

The 82-year-old told the CBS This Morning show he was diagnosed three-and-a-half years ago but had only decided to speak about it now.

“The reason I want to talk about it in public is… I’ve had a full life since then,” he said.

“You still have things you can do,” he went on, revealing he was “taking boxing lessons three times a week.”

Parkinson’s is a progressive condition in which the brain becomes damaged. It can lead to tremors, difficulty moving, speech changes and eventually memory problems.

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Medicare For All would be good in so many ways

Ryan Grim and Zaid Jilani report on a new study that finds that adopting the Medicare For All plan advocated by Bernie Sanders that is increasingly supported by politicians and the public would not only improve the availability and quality of health care and cut costs but also result in increased wages for people. But what is noticeable is that this study was not done at some leftists but by a former Bush administration economist and issued by a conservative think tank.
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A more truthful Facebook ad

I have deleted my Facebook account that I never used and so was not aware that the company has been running ads apologizing for some of the things that have been revealed recently about its practices. John Oliver exposes the disingenuous nature of the ‘apologies’ and runs a more truthful ad.

How to detect a pedophile

In a segment on his latest show Who Is America?, Sacha Baron Cohen, in his adopted persona as an Israeli anti-terrorism expert, interviews failed Alabama senate candidate Roy Moore and demonstrates a new device supposedly invented by the Israeli army that can detect pedophiles, something that Moore has been accused of being. The interview does not go well.


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