Government thuggery on full display

Ray McGovern is a 27-year veteran of the CIA who worked at high levels in the White House of George H. W. Bush, but who has since become a vocal critic of what he sees as the wrong policies of the CIA and the US government. See what happens to him when he protests at the hearing for torture-lover and war criminal Gina Haspel’s nomination to head the CIA. The brutality and sheer excessive force shown to a 78-year old man simply for speaking out is disgusting to see.
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True democracy put to the vote in Maine

You would think that an election system that allows people to vote for the person who most closely represents their views would be the one that is preferred. A system that comes close to this ideal is the preferential voting system where people rank order their votes for the candidates. After the first round of counting of only first place votes, if no candidate gets an outright majority of 50% plus one vote, the candidate with the lowest number of votes is eliminated and the second choice votes of those who gave that person their first choice are then added to the totals of the remaining candidates. This process goes on until one candidate wins a majority. In this system, no vote is ‘wasted’ in the sense of people voting for someone who has little chance of winning, because their other preferences still count.
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If I were Roman Polanski …

… I would keep my mouth shut and hope that people just forget about me. Polanski is the film director who pleaded guilty to unlawful sex with a 13-year old minor after drugging her, and then fled abroad to escape serving his punishment. Following the recent spate of charges of sexual harassment, abuse, and rape, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has expelled him, along with Bill Cosby. Why it did so long after his conviction is clear. Cosby was recently found guilty for his actions and expelling him while keeping Polanski would have raised awkward questions.
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Larry Krassner leads the way on prosecutorial reform

I have railed many times against the fact that police, prosecutors, and even judges far too often see getting a conviction of anyone at all as more important than finding the actual guilty person, even if that results in an innocent person being put to death while the actual criminal walks the streets freely. Very often this is due to the fact that in many jurisdictions in the US, prosecutors and judges and some law enforcement officers are elected positions and being seen as ‘tough on crime’ and boasting of how many people they have put in prison plays positively with voters.
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Striking without harming the public

The right to unionize and to strike has been fundamental in improving the lives of all of us. It is the only counterbalancing weapon that low-level workers have against the power of their bosses. But the downside to strikes, apart from the fact that workers suffer loss in wages during it, is that the general public also suffers. So when for example, teachers go on strike, students and their parents are inconvenienced and teachers need their support and understanding to prevail. The situation becomes harder for nurses where striking means leaving patients without adequate care.
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The Afghanistan war is now on autopilot

For most of the American public, once US troop stop dying in significant numbers, then the wars that the US is involved in have effectively ended, even though the US continues to rain havoc on those countries and inflict immense misery on its people using its firepower. Andrew Cockburn has been covering the many wars that the US is involved in and writes in the April issue of Harper’s magazine (subscription required) that the war in Afghanistan is now effectively on autopilot, with the US continuing its bombardment with no end in sight. The same strategies are tried over and over again based on the same rationales. The fact that the strategies have not worked in the past and the rationales go counter to the actual evidence seems to have no effect on the policy makers back in the US or the commanders in the field.
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