On this 112th day of living under the pall of COVID-19 combined with the plague of genocidal U.S. regime “leadership,” where one headline reads “Trump killed plans for a national testing strategy because COVID-19 ‘hit the blue states hardest,’” to calm and settle my thoughts I have been reading When Paris Went Dark by Ronald C. Rosebottom. Why? Because Paris under Nazi occupation reminds me of the United States-of-COVID , but in comparison with Paris, it’s a much more sinister occupation because it’s by our own “government” regime.
In Rosebottom’s account, hundreds of voices weave their tapestry of what Paris felt like under Nazi occupation. Here is Camus, author of La Peste (The Plague):
“It was… the feeling of exile—that sensation of a void within [that] never left us, that irrational longing to hark back to the past or else to speed up the march of time, and those keen shafts of memory that stung like fire. Sometimes we toyed with our imagination, composing ourselves to wait for a ring of the bell announcing somebody’s return, or for the sound of a familiar footstep on the stairs, but…that game of make-believe could not last….We realized that the separation was destined to continue, we had no choice but to come to terms with the days ahead. In short, we returned to our prison-house, we had nothing left us but the past, and even if some were tempted to live in the future, they had speedily to abandon the idea…once they felt the wounds that the imagination inflicts on those who yield themselves to it.” The Nazi occupation lasted 4 years.
I walk my city’s empty streets, avoid the occasional passersby, masked or unmasked, yielding the sidewalk or unyielding, witness boarded up store fronts, boarded up churches, boarded up businesses, I know each stretch of sidewalk, count the pebbles, the fallen leaves, the curbside leavings of those evicted, know just which streets I will take, what paths I will follow, what benches offer shade and sites for meditation under the trees, for breathing in oxygenated air, and which paths and which streets I will take to return home. I know which patches of grass will offer bedding for the homeless man to catch some sleep, and where the despairing man, head bent, will sit for hours contemplating what for him must be road’s end.
And for the bang-bang, car chase and mayhem so craved by many American movie watchers, if I want, I can scan footage of federal forces wielding their death machines, tear gassing the streets of Portland from daylight far into the night as protesting crowds of unarmed young people call for justice in one voice.
How incredibly courageous they are to hold justice above their own safety, braving the risks of this pandemic to cry out: “Enough. We have had enough of wanton killing, No more!” Now we’ve found our courage at last, we must expand that cry to include people of color everywhere, world over, in Egypt, Libya, Afghanistan, Iran, Yemen, Somalia, in Cuba, Venezuela, and Bolivia, and in all countries whose people suffocate under the knee of the U.S. government’s police bully brutality. That is what Peace! and the cry for Peace means, an end to brutal policing, not just at home, but throughout the world.
Add your name: We need a fundamental shift in U.S. foreign policy that prioritizes diplomacy over militarism.
Act now to stop the racist federal prison lockdown.
Demand Pelosi reject the GOP’s giveaway to the Pentagon of COVID-19 relief.
Bass Ackwards Bestiary
Stop Gestapo in Portland, escalating NYPD violence.
Oppose stealing from Social Security and Medicare during the pandemic.
Support wearing a mask during the pandemic should be a national mandate.
INFECTIO
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Chart showing probability of infection relative to masking
Drop charges against Julian Assange.
Demand Senate fund the Postal Service.
Read Law Enforcement Exposed: massive blue leaks, police Pentagon papers.
In Spain, Canada, France and Italy, laborers opposed to the ongoing war in Yemen in which 85,000 children have died of starvation, refused to load weapons onto ships sailing to Saudi Arabia. and track the passage of trains and ships carrying such weapons.
The World Health Organization (WHO) reconvenes Emergency Committee after COVID worldwide upsurge.
Cuba has not recorded any deaths from COVID over two weeks.
Australia fell U.S. it has no intention of damaging important China ties.
Venezuela wins right to appeal ruling barring access to its gold reserves.
‘Our obligation is to defend democracy’: Bolivians join mass marches and mobilizations against election delay by right-wing coup government. (think we could describe ours any differently?)
‘Our lungs are under attack’: tribes call for an immediate moratorium on Amazon extraction.
South Africans push back against 5 G towers in their backyards.
As lists of Israeli targets leaked, Tel Aviv fears worst in ICC investigation of Israeli war crimes.
Iran opens supermarket in Venezuela with high-tech COVID defenses. (Why can’t we?)
After more than 200 years, California’s Esselen tribe rightfully regains ancestral lands.
Seventy-five groups slam GOP effort to use COVID funds for weapons of war.
U.S. to pull nearly 12,000 troops from Germany, costing billions (to reposition them on the Russian border.)
Pressured by climate activist groups, Deutsche Bank ditches drilling in the Arctic.
With dirty energy crashing, nearly 70 groups urge fed to stop buying up wasteful fossil fuel industry debt.
New Mexico Public Regulation Commission embraces 100% renewable future for Four Corners, probably the most exquisite site on Earth.
In wake of recent pipeline victories, Standing Rock activists carry on with renewed hope.
ACLU analysis of crime data shreds GOP’s argument against decarceration during pandemic.
Coalition of over 500 faith leaders demand utility shutoff moratorium during pandemic.
Citing fears a defeated #45 won’t go quietly, Warren calls on cabinet officials to end deployment of federal agents against protests.
Calling it ‘unacceptable and Un-American, 6 mayors demand Congress block federal agents from U.S. cities.
Law enforcement exposed with massive blue leak from websites and fusion centers proving that police identify protesters and any government critics nationwide as terrorists justifying violence.
Alameda police chief out after top cop arrests black man for dancing in the street. (no card playing on Sundays either.)
Oakland City Council approves task force to defund OPD.
Federal agents to leave Portland says governor.
Hours after #45 says they won’t leave Portland, Fed announce withdrawal from Portland (who’s on top?).
Following lawsuit, #45 administration backs down from deporting migrants detained at Texas hotel.
Portland anti-racist protesters hold firm after 2 months.
‘This order is vital to our national health’: Court blocks #45 administration’s ‘public charge’ rule.
Even jerks have their limits: top Republicans reject #45’s suggestion to delay election.
Mental health experts issue dire warning: another 4 years of tin-pot dictator, #45 would stop at nothing.
Thanks to parents and activists, House passes Child Care is Essential cat and Child Care for Economic Recovery Act, ensuring $50 billion fund for child sector.
During NWC”S annual National Whistleblower Appreciation Day, Chuck Grassley proposes new amendments to False Claims Act encouraging government contractors accept liability for fraud.
After 17 years of organizing, 45,000 childcare workers now have a union, CCPU under SEIU and AFSCME.
Calling it a ‘red line for a humane society,’ more than 360 DNC delegates vow to oppose democratic platform if it doesn’t include Medicare for all.
Watchdog groups demand probe into joyless ‘voter suppression tactics’ by postal service chief, and major #45 donor, Louis DeJoy.
25 civil rights groups condemn #45 over election delay threat, and demand Congress fund voting protections.
Progressive coalition urges Biden to curb excesses of corporate power by ending White House revolving door.
Sanders campaign co-chairs applaud DNC delegates for continuing Medicare-for-All fight.
House passes increased public media funding.
In N.Y. State thousands of police discipline records kept secret for decade now published.
Denver judge prohibits use of ‘chemical weapons’ on peaceful protesters.
Eight Minneapolis City Council members announce their intention to disband the Minneapolis Police Department and replace it with community-led system to guarantee the community’s safety.
In Richmond, white supremacists arrested trying to amplify protest violence.
In plans for decades, House passes bill creating National Museum of the American Latino.
Major teachers’ union will back ‘safety strikes’ to block unsafe school reopenings.
Activists deliver 130,000 petition signatures to call on the FTC & Congress to investigate and curb Facebook profiting from voter suppression (and why you should boycott Facebook).
N.Y. State on verge of banning glyphosate for good.
Federal appeals court overturns Boston marathon bomber Dzhokar Tsarnaev’s death sentence.
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