Liberals’ Tea Party and Power Centers within the Fractured Democrats

A Journal of People report

A group of liberals are putting pressure on Democratic Party to move it left.
An AP report said: Amid anti-Trump protests, liberals have begun taking aim at a different target: Their own party.
The “Tea party parallel? Liberals taking aim at their own party” headlined report said:
“Over the past few weeks, activists have formed a number of organizations threatening a primary challenge to Democratic lawmakers who offer anything less than complete resistance to the Republican president.
“‘We’re not interested in unity,’ said Cenk Uygur, the founder of Justice Democrats, a new organization that’s pledged to replace ‘every establishment politician’ in Congress. ‘We can’t beat the Republicans unless we have good, honest, uncorrupted candidates.’”

Bernie Sanders, Nina Turner, Civil Rights Leaders Demand Workers’ Rights at Mississippi Nissan Factory

by Nika Knight, staff writer

Common Dreams | 05 March, 2017

“It is time for justice for working people,” Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) told the Nissan factory workers. (Photo: New Orleans DSA/Twitter)

While President Donald Trump was tweeting from his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, former presidential contender Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) was doing something Trump had promised to do throughout his campaign: advocating for workers.

On Saturday, Sanders and former Ohio state senator Nina Turner, a Democrat, led hundreds of workers in a “March on Mississippi” in Canton, Miss., to demand that Nissan grant factory employees the right to hold a union vote free from fear or intimidation.

Arkansas Lawmaker Introduces Bill to Ban Howard Zinn From Classrooms

by Andrea Germanos, staff writer

Common Dreams | 03 March, 2017

The late, great Howard Zinn. (Photo: Jim/flickr/cc)

This post may be updated.

A Republican Arkansas lawmaker has introduced legislation to ban the works of the late historian, activist, and writer Howard Zinn from publicly funded schools.

The bill from Rep. Kim Hendren, just noted by the Arkansas Times, was introduced on Thursday and referred to the House Committee on Education.

It states (pdf) that any “public school district or an open-enrollment public charter school shall not include in its curriculum or course materials for a class or program of study any book or other material” authored by Zinn from 1959 until 2010, the year in which he died.

Lagarde trial: A business class get-out-of-jail free card 14

CADTM Belgium CADTM France | 23 February, 2017

CADTM

On Monday 19^th December 2016, the French Court of Justice gave its verdict on the Tapie case: French president Nicolas Sarkozy’s former minister and current head of the IMF, Christine Lagarde, is found guilty but is exempted from punishment and her criminal record remains clean (!). The sentence – an incredible feat of legal nonsense – is final as it cannot be appealed against. It simply confirms there’s a special form of justice for senior officials.

Christine Lagarde faced a €15,000 (£12,600) fine and up to a year in prison. She didn’t bother to attend the delivery of her verdict, even though she said she was on leave during the trial, and preferred instead returning to Washington where the IMF is based. It must be said though that suspense was not at an all time high… With a court that exists solely to exempt politicians from ordinary justice, it was predetermined that she would not face a heavy sentence; especially as the public prosecutor’s office had called for the case to be dismissed and requested exoneration. Under these circumstances Christine Lagarde’s defence proved nothing more than a simple formality.

Bicycle Bicentenary Year 2017: Bicycle and Women’s Liberation

by T. Vijayendra

Frontier | 04 March, 2017

Source: Internet

Bicycling and Feminism
One hundred years ago, Alice Hawkins, a suffragette, cycled around Leicester (UK) promoting the women’s rights movement, causing outrage by being one of the first ladies to wear pantaloons in the city. During the fight to win the vote the bicycle became not only a tool but also a symbol for the emancipation of women.

The American civil rights leader, Susan B Anthony, wrote in 1896:
“Let me tell you what I think of bicycling. I think [the bicycle] has done more to emancipate women than any one thing in the world. I rejoice every time I see a woman ride by on a bike. It gives her a feeling of self-reliance and independence the moment she takes her seat; and away she goes, the picture of untrammelled womanhood.”

Robotic Reminder Of What It Is To Be Human

by Susan Darlington

 Morning Star | 04 March, 2017

ROBOTS in art usually want to kill humans or become more like them through artificial intelligence.

But the success of Pipeline Theatre’s Spillikin is that it places a physically and emotionally static robot as the touchstone for a moving meditation on human change.

Designed as a companion for Sally (Judy Norman) by her now-dead husband Raymond, the robot is programmed with memories of her partner.

Struggling with dementia, Sally first resents the imposition and then, as she grows increasingly confused, accepts and crosses the border of acceptability, putting her husband’s glasses on the robot and holding its hand.

Mega-flood on Mars: remnants are there

A Journal of People report

Worcester crater in context © esa.int 

Remnants of a huge flood on Mars have been discovered, according to the European Space Agency (ESA). The space agency has captured phenomenal high-definition photos of one of the largest ‘outflow channels’ on the Red Planet, Mars.
The ESA says a combination of volcanism, tectonics, and surface collapse and subsidence led to a “massive groundwater release” from the Echus Chasma region on Mars around 3.6 to 3.4 billion years ago. These ancient mega-floods have left their mark on the features seen today.
The Kasei Valles channel system extends around 3000 km from its source region in Echus Chasma – which lies east of the bulging volcanic region Tharsis and just north of the Valles Marineris canyon system – to its sink in the vast plains of Chryse Planitia.