Unfortunately I do not have access to the full article but the abstract of this study titled Judgments About Fact and Fiction by Children From Religious and Nonreligious Backgrounds reports findings that do not surprise me in the least.
[Read more…]
The latest assault by Israel on Gaza has furthered the process in which Israel is losing support worldwide and also among Jews in the US, especially among the young, who do not buy in to the idea that Israel faces some existential threat that requires massive and disproportionate attacks on Palestinians. Instead what they see is a reactionary government backed by the US that is using its massive military power to oppress people that they have displaced from their homes.
[Read more…]
The arrival of young children from Central America seeking refuge in the US has caused a problem for the xenophobes in the US. On the one hand they hate the idea of more non-white people coming to the US. But the members of the elite media and political classes also do not want to appear as heartless as their allies, the people gathering in groups on the border yelling angrily at the children. So they play a double game that Stephen Colbert parodies perfectly.
[Read more…]
The rising anti-government sentiment in the US is spiraling out of control The Republican party is whipping it up in order to stymie any of president Obama’s initiatives but they run the real risk of these sentiments resulting in a lawless nation in which people feel entitled to break the law because they think that powerful segments of the government approve of such actions and that they will protect them from repercussions. I have written before about how such things can easily lead to mob violence.
[Read more…]
The influence of the Israel lobby in the US is most clearly visible when that country engages in massive onslaughts on Palestinians that threaten to arouse widespread anger and disgust. Then it whips into action to blunt criticism in the US media and prevent any action against it. As Palestinian casualties in Gaza mount to over 300, one fifth of whom are children, and the destruction of a hospital, the Israel lobby has its work cut out for it.
[Read more…]
The Daily Show commented on the Hobby Lobby case and had as their guest Dahlia Lithwick to discuss the implications of that case and also the inconsistent way that the US Supreme Court views free speech rights and buffer zones.
[Read more…]
The boom-bust nature of the American economy has now spawned ‘ghost tenants’, people who are essentially high-end house sitters. It works like this. Suppose you have a huge luxury house that you need to move out of and want to sell. You don’t want to leave the house empty or with a caretaker because houses are easier to sell if there is someone actually living in them. But you don’t want to rent it out either because that creates other problems.
[Read more…]
The editor of the Guardian has an excerpt of an interview with Edward Snowden where he seems remarkably calm about his fate and says that he is even resigned to being sent to Guantanamo. He also says that the people working for the NSA routinely shared amongst themselves embarrassing photos that they found while snooping on people.
The full interview will be published later today.
Back in 1983 in Sri Lanka, a group of Tamil separatists were conducting a low-level guerilla war against the government that the government was, typically, trying to quell militarily without addressing the political issues. Since almost all members of the military belonged the majority Sinhala community, this conflict took on an overtly ethnic coloration. In July of that year, the guerillas pulled off their biggest attack, blowing up a convoy of army trucks and killing over twenty soldiers.
[Read more…]
Glenn Greenwald reports on how NBC News has withdrawn from Gaza Ayman Mohyeldin, its reporter in the region who covered the killing by Israeli planes of four Gazan boys aged 9 to 11 as they played soccer on a beach in broad daylight. The reporter had been playing soccer with the boys just minutes before their deaths and posted chilling details.
Update: Here is an NBC News report on the bombing.