Tag: Human Rights

August 10th, Already! Moses Fleetwood Walker, & Harry Hay, Show Up For Equality, + More in Peace & Justice History For This Date

August 10, 1883
Adrian “Cap” Anson refused to field his visiting Chicago White Stockings team in an exhibition baseball game if the Toledo Mud Hens included star catcher Moses Fleetwood Walker in their lineup. Chicago’s Captain Anson, who grew up in slaveholding Iowa, said he wouldn’t share the diamond with a non-white player. After more than an hour’s delay, Charlie Morton, the Toledo manager, insisted that if Chicago forfeited the game, it would also lose its share of the gate receipts; Anson relented.

Moses Fleetwood Walker
Morton had not planned to have Walker catch due to injury, but insisted on putting him in at centerfield, despite Cap Anson’s objections.
August 10, 1948

Gay rights activist Harry Hay organized what later became the Mattachine Society (originally ~ Foundation), a groundbreaking 1950s gay rights organization. The group was named after the Mattachines, a medieval troupe of men who went village-to-village advocating social justice.
Mattachine: Radical Roots of Gay Liberation 
August 10, 1984
Two Plowshares activists, Barb Katt and John LaForge, damaged a guidance system for a Trident submarine with hammers at a Sperry plant in Minnesota. In sentencing them to six months’ probation, U.S. District Judge Miles W. Lord commented, “Why do we condemn and hang individual killers, while extolling the virtues of warmongers?”

Barb Katt
More on the Sperry Software Pair  
More plowshares actions 
August 10, 1988
President George H.W. Bush signed legislation apologizing and compensating for the World War II internment of Japanese Americans.
President Franklin Roosevelt had authorized the round-up of hundreds of thousands of Americans of Japanese ancestry, some of whom were American citizens, as security risks. Most lost all their property and were moved to relocation camps for the duration of the war (though not in Hawaii, then not yet a state, where public opposition would not allow it).
August 10, 1993
Ruth Bader Ginsburg is sworn in as the second woman and 107th Justice to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court. 
August 10, 2005
Mehmet Tarhan was sentenced to four years’ imprisonment on two charges of “insubordination before command” and “insubordination before command for trying to escape from military service” because he refused to serve in the Turkish Army.
He would not sign any paper, put on a uniform, nor allow his hair and beard to be cut. He went on two extended hunger strikes to protest his arrest and abuse while in Sivas Military Prison. War Resisters International has supported his efforts throughout his ordeal. He was released unexpectedly from prison after one year.

Read more

https://www.peacebuttons.info/E-News/peacehistoryaugust.htm#august10

Austrian CO Executed, Fatman Dropped, Rocky Flats, & More in Peace & Justice History for 8/9

August 9, 1943

Franz Jägerstätter, an Austrian conscientious objector who reported for induction but refused to serve in the army of the Third Reich, was executed by guillotine at Brandenburg-Gorden prison. An American, Gordon Zahn, wrote about Jägerstätter while researching the subject of German Roman Catholics’ response to Hitler.
Zahn’s book, In Solitary Witness, influenced Daniel Ellsberg’s decision to stand against the Vietnam War by bringing the previously secret Pentagon Papers to public attention.
Against the Stream by Erna Putz, the story of the courage of Franz Jägerstätter
August 9, 1945
The second atomic bomb, “Fatman,” was dropped on the arms-manufacturing and key port city of Nagasaki. The plan to drop a second bomb was to test a different design rather than one of military necessity. The Hiroshima weapon was a gun type, the Nagasaki weapon an implosion type, and the War Department wanted to know which was the more effective design.
Responsibility for the timing of the second bombing had been delegated by President Harry Truman before the Hiroshima attack to Colonel Paul W. Tibbets, the commander of the 509th Composite Group on Tinian, one of the Northern Mariana Islands in the western Pacific.

Scheduled for August 11 against Kokura, the raid was moved forward to avoid a five-day period of bad weather forecast to begin on August 10. English translation of leaflet air-dropped over Japan after the first bomb [excerpt]: “We are in possession of the most destructive explosive ever devised by man. A single one of our newly developed atomic bombs is actually the equivalent in explosive power to what 2000 of our giant B-29s can carry on a single mission. This awful fact is one for you to ponder and we solemnly assure you it is grimly accurate.”
Of the 195,00 population of the city (many of its children had been evacuated due to bombing in the days just prior), 39,000 died and 25,000 were injured, and 40% of all residences were damaged or destroyed.“
What on earth has happened?” said my mother, holding her baby tightly in her arms. “Is it the end of the world?”
Hear an eyewitness account of this terrrible event
 Photographic exhibit of the aftermath
August 9, 1956

20,000 women demonstrated against the pass laws in Pretoria, South Africa. Pass laws required that Africans carry identity documents with them at all times. These books had to contain stamps providing official proof the person in question had permission to be in a particular town at a given time. Initially, only men were forced to carry these books, but soon the law also compelled women to carry the documents.
August 9, 1966
Two hundred people sat in at the New York City offices of Dow Chemical Company to protest the widespread use in Vietnam of Dow’s flammable defoliant Napalm
.
Napalm in use in Vietnam
Read more about Dow Chemical and the use of napalm 
August 9, 1987
Hundreds were arrested in an all-day blockade of the Rocky Flats nuclear weapons plant in Golden, Colorado. Protests at Rocky Flats had been going on for some years.

https://www.peacebuttons.info/E-News/peacehistoryaugust.htm#august9

7 clips from The Majority Report. They cover everything from ICE staging photo ops to tRump’s lies being corrected on TV, to vote blue no …. not for Zohran Mamdani and then the genocide in Gaza

 

Good Ideas Within

“Who’s Gonna Stop Him?” by Donna Schwartz Mills

Don’t ever say that to Karoli. Read on Substack

Image credit: Whitehouse.gov

Snippets:

(BTW – the image we’ve all seen of the exterior of the new addition is an unofficial AI rendering. I believe last week we said it was real. The REAL one is at the top of this newsletter. We apologize for the error.)

We are now long past lamenting that this stuff is not normal. The yahoos who have been installed in government have no interest in making our lives better – but they’re super good at coming up with crap to make them worse.

“Nothing is normal,” Karoli agrees. “but some things are so out of the realm of – like, for example…today’s executive order by Trump ordering a new census to be based on 2024 data with no non-citizens in the census. All of which is entirely illegal, unconstitutional.”

“Why is it that newspapers cannot say it’s unconstitutional? I mean, the Washington Post came close to saying that but they couldn’t actually say it,” she says. (NOTE: NPR does a good job here. Which is a good reminder to give to your local NPR station, if you can.)

When Karoli pointed out on social media that this latest EO was unconstitutional, someone came back at her with “Who’s going to stop him?”

That is exactly the kind of thinking that makes the authoritarian takeover complete. We still have the possibility of returning this nation to a functioning democracy – as long as we resist the temptation to become fatalistic about MAGA’s burrowing infestation of our government.

Just look at what has happened since the regime ordered Texas to engage in a highly irregular mid-cycle redistrict session to give the Republicans five more seats. The only reason this is happening is because the regime expects to lose the House in 2026, so they are doing everything they can think of to rig the election in their favor.

And we are fighting back. Those Democratic Texas legislators who fled the state to deprive Governor Abbott of a quorum are heroes in the fight for democracy. The Democratic governors who are assisting them and arranging for retaliatory re-districting are champions of democracy. And the House Democrats on the Oversight Committee who figured out they could force Chairman James Comer into subpoenaing the Epstein Files are golden.

And do you know what happens when we don’t meekly accept MAGA’s crazy maneuvers as done deals? They back down. Just look at the highest profile cases of people who have been kidnapped by ICE. Community outrage and publicity have helped get some of these folks released. But – as Aliza points out – the key to winning that battle is engaging the community.

“It is way past time for white people to do this job and this heavy lifting. It has to come from us. It HAS to. We have been reliant and allowing the people who we’ve oppressed and allowed to be oppressed save us every single time. And it is our turn… we have to have the difficult conversations with our families, with our neighbors, with our friends, with our fellow white people. We need to call these people, you know – we have to call them on their biases, and their flawed thinking. It has to happen. They can’t sit in comfort while all this shit’s happening around us,” she says.

View the podcast

Down That Rabbit Hole

Here’s a few of the resources I looked at while trying to understand if there actually is anyone to stop Trump from building his monstrosity of a ballroom:

Architectural Digest has this handy dandy timeline of all the many renovations that have been undertaken at the White House over the years.

The White House Historical Association has numerous articles on all things White House History.

One of the biggest changes to the White House occurred during the Truman Administration, which added the East Wing to the building in order to cover up an underground security bunker that was added during the war. Wikipedia’s got a deep dive into that one.

Finally: Karoli (who is a much better researcher than I) found a New York Times article (gift link) with the answer to the question we originally posed: It turns out that there IS a standing Committee for the Preservation of the White House – and it’s made up of the director of the National Park Service, representatives from the White House, the Smithsonian Institution, the Commission of Fine Arts, the National Gallery of Art and more appointees of the president.

As it turns out:

Mr. Trump has not nominated a park service director, a position that requires Senate confirmation, or announced the appointments of individuals to serve on the committee. The terms of 13 individuals that former President Joseph R. Biden Jr. appointed to the committee in 2023 expired when Mr. Trump began his second term, according to a government database. Jessica Bowron, the comptroller of the National Park Service, is currently serving as its acting director.

So the answer to that question is – No, there appears to be no one who will stop him from this one. (snip-MORE on the page, including the podcast)

A Couple Of Clay Jones’s Posts

Only one is a toon, today:

A Chat With Ed Wexler by Clay Jones

Meet Ed Read on Substack

Today’s Zoom talk is with Ed Wexler, who draws for Cagle Cartoons. Join us as we talk about cartoons, art supplies, caricatures, SoCal weather, and Duck Tales.

(The Zoom chat is on the page, linked at “Read On Substack” above. It’s an hour & 15 min.–A.)

You can find Ed on Facebook and X/Twitter.

If you’re a fellow cartoonist and would like to do one of these with me, let me know. I’d love to talk to you.

=============

Dr. Robert by Clay Jones

RFK Jr is going to stick it in our butts Read on Substack

On Tuesday, it was announced that the Trump Regime, which is a petri dish of conspiracy theories, is canceling almost $500 million in contracts to develop mRNA vaccines to protect the nation against future viral threats.

The federal Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA, which is also the noise Pete Hegseth makes when throwing up in a back alley dumpster), which oversees the nation’s defenses against biological attacks, is terminating 22 contracts with university researchers and private companies to develop new uses for the mRNA technology, because the Health and Human Services Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., is not a doctor or medical expert, but a conspiracy-theorist whack job.

Lunatics who believe vaccines cause autism and come with tracking chips so the Deep State Illuminati baby-eating reptillians can keep track of you are ecstatic. Actual scientists, doctors, and public health experts, not so much.

Showing evidence that the brain worm may have eaten more than we first believed, RFK Jr. said, “Let me be absolutely clear: HHS supports safe, effective vaccines for every American who wants them. That’s why we’re moving beyond the limitations of mRNA vaccines for respiratory viruses and investing in better solutions.”

This is like when Trump tried to get rid of Obamacare with “something better.”

The first COVID vaccine was developed during the first Trump regime, but that administration never had a plan to roll it out to the public. They were planning to hide it all behind a toilet at MAGA-Lardo. Thankfully, Joe Biden won the 2020 election and made the vaccines effective. Now, the same regime that took credit for the vaccine is trying to destroy it.

Michael Osterholm, who runs the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, said, “This may be the most dangerous public health judgment that I’ve seen in my 50 years in this business. It is baseless, and we will pay a tremendous price in terms of illnesses and deaths. I’m extremely worried about it.” He’s worried.

Every single MAGAt who yelled “Go get another booster, soy boy” during a losing argument responded with, “Yee-hay, yee-haw, yee-haw.”

Mary Holland, the president and CEO of The Children’s Health Defense, said, “While we believe the mRNA vaccines should be taken off the market, the announcement is a positive move towards protecting public health.” By the way, the Children’s Health Defense was founded by RFK Jr, but I’m sure the people running that organization are totally credible (insert rolling eyes here).

I had a feeling it was bad to make the nation’s top health official a guy who believes in chemtrials and likes to tool around town in a car with a whale’s head strapped to it. (snip-MORE, and it’s good/not good. Clay’s commentary is what’s good; the news is not.)

2 Anniversaries in Peace & Justice History for 8/7

August 8, 1974

President Richard M. Nixon resigned from office, the first U.S. president ever to do so. The House Judiciary Committee had, with bipartisan support (the Democrats and one-third of the Republican members), voted for three articles of impeachment: obstruction of justice, abuse of power, and contempt of Congress.A week later, one of the White House tapes was finally made public, showing the President’s direct involvement in the Watergate scandal cover-up:
“…call the FBI and say that we wish, for the country, don’t go any further into this case, period…” – Nixon to Chief of Staff Haldeman, June 23, 1972 (six days after the Watergate break-in)

He officially left office August 9, and was fully pardoned one month later by his successor, President Gerald Ford. Asked years later about some of his administration’s questionable activities, Nixon said, “Well, when the president does that, it isn’t illegal.”
The headlines in Washington that day 
August 8, 1999
A 53-mile peace walk commemorating the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki ended near Clam Lake, Wisconsin, at the site of the U.S. Navy’s Project Elf (extremely low frequency) submarine communications transmitter. Twelve of the demonstrators were arrested for trespassing, adding to the nearly 500 previously arrested for sit-ins, Citizen Inspections, blockades and disarmament actions at the transmitter site in Ashland County.

https://www.peacebuttons.info/E-News/peacehistoryaugust.htm#august8

Peace & Justice History for 8/7

August 7, 1904
Ralph Bunche, born this day in Detroit, spent a remarkable life in vigorous service to academia, his community, the nation and the world.

Ralph Bunche
Head of the Howard University Political Science Department for over twenty years, he was one of the first African Americans to hold a key position at the U.S. State Department. He went on to the United Nations and served as its mediator on Palestine. He was the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize for negotiating the 1948 armistice agreements between Israel and the Arab states. He worked with Martin Luther King in the civil rights struggles of the ‘50s and ’60s.
Succinct biography of Ralph Bunche
August 7, 1958
The D.C. Court of Appeals reversed playwright Arthur Miller’s conviction for contempt of Congress following a two-year legal battle. He had been charged for refusing to tell the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) the names of alleged Communist writers with whom he attended five or six meetings in New York in 1947.

Arthur Miller in front of HUAC
Read more 
August 7, 1964
After a reported U.S. confrontation with North Vietnamese forces that, it was later discovered, never occurred, the U.S. Congress nearly unanimously passed the Gulf of Tonkin resolution.The resolution gave President Lyndon Johnson broad powers in dealing with North Vietnam, including sending U.S. troops.
News coverage relied almost entirely on official U.S. government sources so Americans assumed the North had in fact launched an unprovoked attack. Two courageous senators, Wayne Morse (D-Oregon) and Ernest Gruening (D-Alaska), provided the only “no” votes.

“I rise to speak in opposition to the joint resolution. I do so with a very sad heart. But I consider the resolution . . . to be naught but a resolution which embodies a predated declaration of war . . . .” –Senator Wayne Morse
The media and the Gulf of Tonkin 
The facts of the incident uncovered by the National Security Archive
August 7, 1995
Four experienced Plowshares activists, Michele Naar-Obed, Erin Sieber and Rick Sieber, hammered and poured their blood on the U.S.S. Greenville, a fast-attack submarine in production at the Newport News, Virginia, shipyard.

https://www.peacebuttons.info/E-News/peacehistoryaugust.htm#august7

PATCO Crushed, & More, In Peace & Justice History for 8/5

August 5, 1963
The U.S., U.S.S.R. and U.K. signed the Limited Test Ban Treaty in Moscow, banning nuclear testing in the atmosphere, in space or underwater. Underground testing, however, was not prohibited. It has since been signed by more than 100 countries.
 
Text of the treaty, background and signatories
August 5, 1964
President Lyndon Johnson asked Congress ”for a resolution expressing the unity and determination of the United States in supporting freedom and in protecting peace in southeast Asia.” 
The president had already used the alleged incidents in the Gulf of Tonkin [see August 4, 1964 above] to mount major air strikes on the North Vietnamese navy. The resulting Congressional Resolution authorizing military force in Vietnam was the legal basis for the war there that lasted until 1975.
Only two members of the senate voted against the resolution: Ernest Greuning of Alaska and Wayne Morse of Oregon. …

“Let’s go back to the war in Vietnam. I was here. I was one of the Senators who voted for the Gulf of Tonkin resolution. Yes, I voted for the Gulf of Tonkin resolution. I am sorry for that. I am guilty of doing that. I should have been one of the two, or at least I should have made it three, Senators who voted against that Gulf of Tonkin resolution. But I am not wanting to commit that sin twice, and that is exactly what we are doing here.
This is another Gulf of Tonkin resolution.”
Senator Robert Byrd (D-WV) in debate on the resolution to authorize use of military force on Iraq, October 4, 2002

August 5, 1981
President Ronald Reagan, having ordered striking air traffic controllers back to work within 48 hours, fired 11,359 (more than 70%) who ignored the order, and permanently banned them from federal service (a ban later lifted by President Bill Clinton). The controllers, seeking a shorter workweek among other things, were concerned the long hours they were required to work performing their high-stress jobs were a danger to both their health and the public safety.
Lessons from When Reagan Crushed PATCO Union 

https://www.peacebuttons.info/E-News/peacehistoryaugust.htm#august5

Open Windows, Clay Jones

Supersized Winning by Clay Jones

Tariffs are taxes Read on Substack

The Treasury Department reported that Trump’s tariffs brought in over $28 billion in revenue last May. Naturally, this got MAGAts hyped up and excited as they think this is “winning.”

Hey, it doesn’t matter that Trump’s tax cuts for asshole billionaires will lead to even larger deficits, we’re getting all this revenue from foreign nations. They got more “winning” last week when the European Union agreed on a tariff on their goods of 15 percent. Holy Wowzers. That’s a lot of winning.

What MAGAts don’t realize is that the $28 billion wasn’t paid for by China, Mexico, Canada, or even Penguin Island. They don’t understand that the 15 percent on EU stuff won’t be paid for by the EU. American consumers pay for the tariffs. Even if you suck at economics, and it’s a hard subject, learning how tariffs work can be easy.

In easy terms, a tariff is a tax. While Donald Trump is cutting taxes, he’s also raising them.

Let’s say I live in Denmark and I sell wooden shoes. That’s Denmark, right? Or was it Holland? I just looked it up, and it’s Holland. The shoes are called “Klompens,” probably because you klomp around in them. Anywaysies, I’m in Europe and I sell stupid shoes. When I sell them to stores in the United States, Trump forces me to pay a 15 percent tariff. How do I make up that 15 percent, because I don’t want to eat it. I raise the price of my Klompens by 15 percent. The store doesn’t want to eat that 15 percent either, so guess what they do. They raise the price of the shoes they bought from me by at least 15 percent. That means American customers of those stupid, ugly wooden shoes pay the tariffs.

The way this can hurt me is that people may not want to purchase my stupid, ugly wooden shoes, and will tell me to get the klomp out of here. Fortunately, American consumers may not even notice the price increase. We still purchase iPhones even though every new version costs more than the last one, and the only changes are that they come in more colors and with “enhanced” AI, like we need more of that shit. Siri doesn’t let me talk to myself anymore. I’m sticking with my 12 until it dies of natural causes or I accidentally murder it deliberately. So far, it’s fine, knock on Klompens. (snip-MORE)

Trump is rewriting history by Ann Telnaes

He wants you to forget the truth Read on Substack

Grey Poupon When You Get Your Limo On by Clay Jones

Why don’t I have a job where my travel’s paid for and it’s all first class? Read on Substack

This cartoon was drawn for the FXBG Advance.

The Advance wrote with today’s cartoon: Reporting this past week by Adele Uphaus that a member of the Fredericksburg School Board took a first-class flight to a conference in Atlanta, had school division transportation personnel shuttle her to the airport in Richmond, and was traveling with School Board clerk Angie Roenke’s credit card which was shut down due to “possible purchase card usage issues” drew a great deal of attention. As did Uphaus’ reporting on July 8 about travel to Hawaii by another Board member. Yes — Clay Jones noticed.

I have covered this subject not just once but twice before. This is the third version, and it’s based on some new reporting by Adele Uphaus.

I know that if I ever flew first class on my last employer’s dime, I would have some ‘splaining to do. After every convention, the editor who managed expenses would call me into her office and review everything on my expense report, which typically had very low expenses. The editor’s presumption with each review was that you were trying to steal from the company. It was about as enjoyable as a body cavity search, unless you’re into those kinds of things.

Anyway, I don’t get how a school board member is flying first class and getting away with it while teachers are buying their own school supplies. (snip-MORE)

Whistleblower: 10-year-old Palestinian boy ‘gunned down’ after receiving food aid

Former US Green Beret says Israel committed war crimes at Gaza food distribution site | BBC News