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Joe Biden

Biden Would Need His Pound Of Flesh From Assange

June 23, 2023 Joe Lauria, Consortium News. , , , , , ,
Following the decision by High Court Judge Sir Jonathan Swift this month to reject Assange’s application to appeal his ordered extradition to the United States to stand trial on espionage charges, Assange’s legal team filed a new application to the High Court last week.  The decision on this application could come any day. If it is refused, Assange will have run out of legal options in Britain, and could only be saved by the intervention of the European court. There is also still a chance of a plea deal in which President Joe Biden would need to exact punishment of Assange to cover his political posterior.

Biden’s Asylum Policy Continues Tradition Of US Cruelty To Haitians

June 23, 2023 Marjorie Cohn, Truthout. , , , ,
As the repressive Trump-Biden Title 42 asylum policy ended on May 11, migrant rights advocates hoped that humane asylum rules would follow. Title 42, which allowed the U.S. government to expel asylum seekers with no due process, led to nearly 3 million expulsions since Donald Trump initiated the ill-conceived policy in 2020. The Biden administration, however, “has made it a practice of recycling Trump-era policies” which will continue to harm asylum seekers, particularly those from Haiti, according to Guerline Jozef, co-founder and executive director of Haitian Bridge Alliance, a nonprofit that advocates for humane treatment of migrants.

Biden Walks Back On Ukraine’s NATO Accession

June 22, 2023 M. K. Bhadrakumar, People's Dispatch. , , , ,
If only US President Joe Biden had a time machine as in the post-apocalyptic science fiction novella by H.G. Wells, he should have used that vehicle or device to travel purposely and selectively backward through time all the way to 1999 when it was that the US lost the plot on European security and Russia’s perennial quest for mutual security with Europe. At that defining moment of the post-Cold War era 24 years ago, George Kennan was prophetic to warn the Bill Clinton administration that US-Russia relations would be irreparably damaged if the Western alliance expanded to include the former Warsaw Pact countries. His advice was ignored.

Did The Debt Ceiling Deal Really Save The US From Bankruptcy?

June 20, 2023 Radhika Desai and Michael Roberts, Geopolitical Economy. , , , ,
So as far as the debt ceiling is concerned, there has been a pattern which has become a classic of sorts, with just days to go before the day that the Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said the US would run out of cash to meet its obligations, President Biden and House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy reached a bipartisan deal which is going to permit the government to keep borrowing in return for certain cuts in spending, social spending in particular, that the Republicans insisted on. The catastrophic disaster predicted by Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen in the weeks leading up to the negotiations and the deadline was again narrowly averted.

Activists From Coast To Coast Demand Biden End Fossil Fuel Era

June 15, 2023 People Vs. Fossil Fuels, Popular Resistance. , , , ,
Washington D.C. – Over 2,000 climate activists, frontline leaders, and environmental justice organizations in over 65 locations in more than 25 US states joined together from June 8–11th for a national week of action to send a strong message to President Biden: no more fossil fuels. With the approval of Willow Project, fast-tracking of the Mountain Valley Pipeline, and rollbacks for environmental protections, the US is doubling down on it’s role as the world’s top oil and gas producer at a time when scientists could not be clearer that stopping fossil fuels is the only way to avert global climate catastrophe.

Cuba: Defeat The Blockade Without Waiting For It To Be Lifted

June 7, 2023 Duane Stilwell, Black Agenda Report. , , , ,
Havana, Cuba — Over 1,300 delegates from 58 countries, representing 271 organizations, congregated here on May 2 to celebrate the “International Meeting of Solidarity with Cuba and Anti-Imperialism – 200 Years After the Monroe Doctrine. ”The conference at the Palacio de Convenciones was the closing event in a series of gatherings that, beginning on April 25, brought union activists and other friends of Cuba from outside the island together with workers and other Cuban citizens. The goal was to acquaint international visitors with the growing systemic difficulties faced by the Cuban people due to the economic, commercial, and financial blockade the U.S. government has imposed for 61 years and to give them an opportunity to see first-hand the creative resilience with which many ordinary Cubans face the resulting scarcities and continue to resist.

US Considers Reoccupying Haiti

June 6, 2023 Danny Shaw, Truthout. , , , ,
The United States government is spearheading an effort to reinvade and reoccupy Haiti. On May 4, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, led the latest diplomatic anti-Haitian assault traveling to Brasilia to try to convince the government of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva to again lead the “multilateral effort.” Bogged down in a proxy war in Ukraine to the tune of $113 billion, the Biden administration has been searching for a Caribbean Community and Common Market nation or another ally to deputize to carry out the unpopular mission. Under the guise of humanitarianism, and as a potential prelude to a full-scale invasion, Canada has been sending spy aircraft, ships and military aid to the Haitian National Police.

Close Guantanamo Monthly Vigils

June 6, 2023 Center for Constitutional Rights. , , ,
Monthly vigils — or even weekly vigils — for the closure of Guantánamo were a noticeable feature of the London protest scene for many years, while British prisoners were still held there, although, with the release of Shaker Aamer, the prison’s last British resident, in October 2015, it became impossible to sustain the impetus, and the Trump years, of course, were bleak for protestors, because Trump had tweeted, even before he took office, that “there must be no more releases from Gitmo,” and he was largely true to his word, releasing only one man in his nearly 1,500 days in office.

Growing Solidarity Movement Demands End To US War On Cuba

June 5, 2023 Margaret Flowers, Clearing the FOG. , , ,
This May Day, youth activists from the United States traveled to Cuba to learn about the revolution and to show their solidarity with the struggle against US imperialism. Clearing the FOG spoke with Calla Walsh of the US-based National Network on Cuba about the trip and about the campaign to remove Cuba from the 'state sponsor of terrorism' list, which President Biden recently renewed. Additionally, members of Congress are pushing the FORCE Act, which would make it harder for Cuba to be removed from the list. Days of action are planned in Washington, DC at the end of June to demand that the United States stop its illegal economic blockade of Cuba.

Biden-McCarthy Deal: Neoliberal Fiscal Policy Continues

May 31, 2023 Jack Rasmus, LA Progressive. , , , , ,
Over the weekend, US House of Representatives speaker McCarthy and president Biden announced a tentative agreement on raising the debt ceiling. The deal—almost certain to pass Congress later this week—represents a typical Neoliberal fiscal policy deal. Ever since neoliberal capitalism policies were introduced under president Carter in the late 1970s, and subsequently expanded dramatically under Reagan, Neoliberal fiscal policy has been characterized by accelerating Pentagon and war spending; simultaneous cutting of business-investor taxes; acceptance of consequent escalating budget deficits—and in turn US national debt levels; and the use deficit/debt to cap and reduce social program spending.

Biden Calls Cuba ‘Terrorist’; People Demand US Terrorism Against Cuba End

May 30, 2023 Calla Mairead Walsh, Hampton Institute. , , , ,
On Tuesday, May 23rd, the State Department reported that Cuba — along with Iran, Syria, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, and Venezuela — are not “not cooperating fully” in the United States’ supposed fight against terrorism. The Biden administration officially designates Cuba as a “State Sponsor of Terrorism” (SSOT), as well as Iran, Syria, and the DPRK. Literally 0% of Americans view Cuba as a serious threat, and the Biden administration has provided no evidence of Cuba supporting terrorism in any way. Cuban and American officials even met earlier this month in Havana to discuss cooperating on anti-terrorism measures. So why is Biden keeping Cuba on the “State Sponsors of Terrorism” list?

Post-Bakhmut Scenario In Ukraine War

May 29, 2023 M. K. Bhadrakumar, People's Dispatch. , , , , ,
Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky and US President Joe Biden met on the sidelines of the G7 Summit at Hiroshima within hours of the statement  from the Kremlin at 1 am last Sunday, transmitting President Vladimir Putin’s greetings to the Russian forces for the “completion of the operation to liberate Artemovsk” (known as Bakhmut in Ukraine). The operation lasted 224 days and turned into an epic battle. Ukraine paid a heavy price in blood in trying to hold onto Bakhmut, which came to be called a “Meat Grinder.” US analysts have listed 25 Ukrainian brigades and at least nine battalions and five regiments—an estimated deployment of 120,000 troops at the very least—thrown into the battle by Kiev.

Biden Labor Board Restores Right To Use Heated Language

May 27, 2023 Robert M. Schwartz, Labor Notes. , , ,
In a landmark May Day ruling called Lion Elastomers, the National Labor Relations Board restored the rights of union representatives to use heated language, including occasional profanity, during arguments with management. The Board ordered employer Lion Elastomers to reinstate steward Joseph Colone with full back pay going back to a 2018 discharge. The ruling reversed the Trump era’s infamous General Motors decision, which had upended 70 years of precedent protecting workers’ rights to use strong language when pressing union points during grievance discussions and other meetings.

Biden’s Debt Ceiling Betrayal Is A Democratic Party Tradition

May 26, 2023 Margaret Kimberley, Black Agenda Report. , , ,
When Joe Biden was first elected president his propagandists and their friends in corporate media told us that he was “the most progressive president since FDR” and that he would “cut child poverty in half.” Yet the temporary covid relief programs have all gone, from the Child Tax Credit, to emergency SNAP nutrition benefits, to automatic medicaid enrollment, and all with little fightback from the democrats. Now Biden is continuing the democratic presidents’ tradition of using sleight of hand to sell out the millions of people who have already lost what little help they had. The republican bogeymen and women have returned just when Biden needed them to make the case for his plan to further eviscerate the social safety net and continue the race to the bottom which results in precarity for the people.

The $20 Billion Scam At The Heart Of Medicare Advantage

May 26, 2023 Matthew Cunningham-Cook, The Lever. , , ,
The health insurance behemoth Humana enjoyed a banner 2022. The Louisville, Ky.-based insurer made $2.8 billion in profits last year, while paying out $448 million in dividends to shareholders and more than $17 million in compensation to its CEO. The main driver of those earnings? The federal government spent $20.5 billion overpaying Humana and other private insurers for the Medicare Advantage plans they manage on behalf of seniors and people with disabilities. If not for those overpayments, Humana could have suffered a nearly $900 million loss in 2022, according to a Lever analysis.
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