The true seasonal message is that the monarchy has got to go

By Nathaniel Laxer

Christmas came and went, an 8 year old migrant child died in American custody on Christmas Eve and humanity still only has 12 years to limit severe irreversible climate change. But look on the bright side -- the Queen granted us her annual Christmas message! A statement that was broadcast live over CBC radio into my home, and the homes, cars and public places of millions of other people across Canada and across the Commonwealth.

During her statement -- made in a luxurious room that included an actual golden piano behind her -- the Queen stated that she believed “the power of faith, frequently inspires great generosity and self-sacrifice”, and that "With two weddings and two babies, and another child expected soon, it helps to keep a grandmother well occupied" Our poor queen! She is very busy.

Statements such as these are made particularly ironic and cuttingly cynical by the fact that the United Kingdom is instituting a campaign of -- as a UN report described it -- “mean-spirited and callous” austerity effecting it’s most vulnerable and destitute citizens. With “a 7 per cent rise in child poverty, a 60 per cent increase in homelessness since 2010 and exponential growth in the number of food banks.” The UN special rapporteur on the issue saying “'I have spoken with people who depend on food banks and charities for their next meal, who have sold sex for money or shelter, children who are growing up in poverty unsure of their future”. He only visited the country for 12 days.

While this campaign of vicious austerity was implemented, the royal family spent 2 million pounds, of their rather generous welfare state allowance on clothing for the royal wedding. The local council ordered the streets cleared of the homeless so that these new clothes would not be ruined by any unfortunate background. What a show of “great generosity and self sacrifice”.

Just like the great show of self sacrifice that the Queen will display when she will have to move out of her room in Buckingham Palace temporarily -- along with the 10,000 pieces of art in the royal collection -- while the palace undergoes a state funded 369 million pound renovation. Apparently this money couldn’t go towards her staff at places like Windsor Castle though. They almost went on strike in 2015 over their “appallingly low” wage of  as little as 14,400 pounds a year, or about 21,000 USD.

It would have only cost 293,000 pounds to give Grenfell tower proper fire protection, thereby saving 72 lives.

But none of this is a shock, the British monarchy has always been a parasitic leech. A leftover from the middle ages. A reactionary symbol of hierarchy, empire and a racist sense of superiority. A monarchy whose largest, most central crown jewel was stolen from India during its time as a blood-soaked colony.  A monarchy that has no reason to still exist in the United Kingdom, never mind here in Canada. This has long been true, but never more obviously so in this time of looming global ecological catastrophe and sickening growth of extreme economic inequality.

The real message as the world heads into the New Year is that we desperately need a fundamental restructuring of our society. The removal of the retrograde uselessness that is the monarchy will necessarily be a part of this restructuring.

See also: Of course we should get rid of the monarchy. And not because it is expensive, but because it is wrong.

The CBC notes the victory of fascism in Brazil by how it could benefit Canadian business. Seriously.

The extraordinarily dangerous proven racist, misogynist and outright fascist Jair Bolsonaro has won the Presidency in Brazil.

This is an extremely disturbing turn of events that could signal the end of democracy in the sixth most populous country in the world.

This is a man who has said:

“I am in favor of a dictatorship, a regime of exception.”

“The pau-de-arara [a torture technique] works. I’m in favor of torture, you know that. And the people are in favor as well.”

“I’m a rapist now. I would never rape you, because you do not deserve it… slut!”

“If your son starts acting a little gay, hit him with some leather, and he’ll change his behavior.”

You can read more at: JAIR BOLSONARO IS ELECTED PRESIDENT OF BRAZIL. READ HIS EXTREMIST, FAR-RIGHT POSITIONS IN HIS OWN WORDS.

On the night of his election the public broadcaster in Canada, the CBC, had this to say:

"This could mean fresh opportunities for Canadian companies looking to invest".

Seriously.

Based on a repugnant article from  Chris Arsenault of CBC News entitled "What a far-right Bolsonaro presidency in Brazil means for Canadian business". 

The debased, hypocritical and fake nature of the support of Canadian liberals and the liberal and conservative media -- including the state organ the CBC -- for democracy and the rights and freedoms of peoples is yet again fully exposed. 

Toronto police say the sky is falling -- Is the CBC their Chicken Little?

As 2018 dawns -- an election year in Toronto and Ontario -- Toronto police officers and their "union" appear to be launching a media offensive to counter attempts to modernize the police force and to reign in outrageously out-of-control spending on the force (which now tops a billion dollars a year in the city). While unstated a secondary goal is clearly to try to get Toronto's residents and media to rally around a force hurt by allegations of abuse and systemic racism with incidents like the Sammy Yatim killing, the seeming attempts to cover-up the involvement of a Toronto police officer in the beating of Dafonte Miller and the grossly abusive and racist practice of "carding".

The ramping up of this offensive was seen very clearly at the end of this week with CBC radio and news airing two reports based on anonymous sources claiming that Toronto police are now understaffed to the extent that they are in grave personal danger as individual officers and that they are not able to properly respond to emergency calls. One was from the wife of an officer apparently worried about her husband and the other was a long interview by radio host Matt Galloway with a veteran officer (a staff sergeant) who made a variety of claims also along these lines.

While the use of anonymous sources is a time-honoured journalistic tradition that allows people to speak out with less fear of reprisal, the assertions in these two reports, most especially the interview with the veteran officer, were not challenged in ways that left this listener scratching his head.

The staff sergeant, for example, provided (details absent) only very anecdotal evidence such as claiming they were unable to respond to a break-in and then hyperbolically claimed that the Toronto police would be unable to respond to a mass shooting like the Danzig shooting a few years ago and further implied that the city might have to eventually turn to the military to keep the streets safe!

That is a pretty gigantic rhetorical leap that was based on no actual numbers or serious evidence and that Galloway allowed to go basically unchallenged. I can provide personal examples from years ago, well before any modernization was underway, of police taking a very long time to respond to break-ins (which are not always the top priority) including one involving a close friend where the suspect was on sight for a very significant amount of time at his neighbour's house and he had to personally intervene to prevent the suspect's escape when police failed to arrive. Should I have conflated this at the time to mean that Toronto did not have enough police officers and that the police would not have been able to respond to more serious calls (which is presumably exactly what they were doing)?

Is there any evidence whatsoever that there are no longer enough police to respond to a serious emergency that is not of the completely anecdotal variety the staff sergeant provided? I have not seen any to date. In fact, all the "evidence" of these alleged issues has either been of the type in the interview or based on internal emails or "exit surveys" of officers themselves. This is happening against the backdrop of the police association and its deeply reactionary leader Mike McCormack threatening job action over the changes this year.

This would appear to make the claims at least worth further investigation to see if they are justified and not part of propaganda campaign to manufacture a policing "crisis" in Toronto so as to derail reforms that are long overdue.

These largely unsubstantiated allegations in this very political context are undermined further when we hear the anonymous staff sergeant during the interview claiming that criminality was increasing and getting worse in Toronto which is demonstrably untrue. He uses this to say more crime means we need more officers as if this is an A to B proposition, which it is not given that not all crime requires the same level of police response. This is clearly meant to imply that cutting the number of officers on the force by 300 by 2019 will cause the sky to fall and unleash anarchy in our streets.

The problem for this narrative, which again went basically unchallenged by Galloway, is that while year-to-year crime stats vary in relatively meaningless ways, the trends in crime in Toronto and Canada are clear and they are all going in one direction: DOWN. And not just down, but way down.

The Crime Severity Index in Canada, for example, is down rather dramatically by 29% versus a decade ago (it is down by even more than that if you go back further). The overall crime rate is down by 28%.

Further Toronto has one of the lowest (not highest) violent crime rates among Canada’s largest cities (let alone North American cities generally) and has had for many years. Of  15 of the largest cities in Canada in a recent survey "Toronto has the lowest crime rate...and the city’s homicide rate of 1.55 is less than the homicide rate in St. John’s, Regina, Saskatoon, Halifax, Ottawa, Winnipeg, Calgary, Vancouver and Edmonton."

These facts need also to viewed in conjunction with the reality that many marginalized and racialized communities in Toronto have been historically over-policed.

The Toronto police, their association and many of their members have a rather obvious and clear vested interest in preventing reforms that would cut into their grotesquely bloated budget that, until recently, Toronto politicians have been too scared to touch.

It would seem that the CBC is more than happy to provide a platform for them to try to do just that.

See also: The Sammy Yatim killing -- Consequences for police violence are what is "necessary for public confidence in the administration of justice"

See also: It is not just the police spending in Toronto that is out of control -- it is the police themselves

See also: You cannot 'discriminate' against the police. They are agents of discrimination.

Dunkirk, Venezuela, Israel, Baltimore & more -- The Left Chapter Sunday Reading List July 30 - August 6

This week's list of articles, news items and opinion pieces that I see as must reads if you are looking for a roundup that should be of interest to The Left Chapter readers.




This list covers the week of  July 30 - August 6. It is generally in order of the date of the article's release.

1) Right-Wing Colombia Leader Calls for Military Coup in Venezuela

Telesur

Former Colombian President Alvaro Uribe urged the Venezuelan military to rebel against the democratically-elected government.

Read the full article.

2) The Rise and Fall of the “Freest Little City in Texas”

James McCandless, Texas Observer

How a libertarian experiment in city government fell apart over taxes, debt and some very angry people.

Read the full article.

3) 'Great unfairness': 2 more sex assault cases where victims were jailed to ensure their court testimony

Janice Johnston · CBC News

A victim 8 months pregnant was jailed the night before she was to testify.

Read the full article.

4) Petition: Canada, Hands Off Venezuela!

Venezuela Solidarity 

Dear Minister Freeland,

I am outraged by the position the Trudeau government has taken with regard to the escalating conflict in Venezuela. Once again the government has condemned Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, expressing serious concerns over the government’s plan for a Constituent Assembly, saying it’s “contrary to Venezuela’s Constitution”.  This is not only a flagrant interference in the internal affairs of a sovereign nation but is also factually incorrect.  Article 347 and 348 of the Bolivarian Constitution clearly outlines its legitimacy and establishes the president’s right to convoke a National Constituent Assembly.

Read and sign the petition

5) What Mainstream Media Got Wrong About Venezuela's Constituent Assembly Vote

Carla Gonzalez, Telesur

Venezuelans voted Sunday for representatives of the National Constituent Assembly, amid what the government has called a targeted media campaign to destabilize the country and destroy its sovereignty.

International media outlets rushed to discredit the vote, sharing grossly misrepresentative accounts of the historic electoral process.

Read the full article.

6) Why the lack of Indian and African faces in Dunkirk matters

Sunny Singh, The Guardian

What a surprise that Nigel Farage has endorsed the new fantasy-disguised-as-historical war film, Dunkirk. Christopher Nolan’s movie is an inadvertently timely, thinly veiled Brexiteer fantasy in which plucky Britons heroically retreat from the dangerous shores of Europe. Most importantly, it pushes the narrative that it was Britain as it exists today – and not the one with a global empire – that stood alone against the “European peril”.

Read the full article.

7) Dunkirk, the War and the Amnesia of the Empire

Yasmin Khan, The New York Times

Two and a half million soldiers drawn from Britain’s empire in South Asia fought in World War II. But they are missing from many British commemorations and accounts of the war — an absence reinforced by Christopher Nolan’s new film “Dunkirk,” which does not feature any of the Indian soldiers who were present at the battle.

Read the full article.

8) Independent Jewish Voices Ranks NDP Candidates on their positions around Israel/Palestine

Independent Jewish Voices - Canada (IJV) and Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East (CJPME) recently questioned the four NDP Leadership candidates prior to the start of online voting on September 18th, 2017.

Read the full article.

9) The Unbearable Whiteness of CBC’s Reporting of the Blue Jays Beer Can Tosser

Erin Kobayashi, The Torontoist

The CBC devotes 5,000 words to the redemption of one white man, but completely erases the racism hurled at POC players during the same baseball game.

Read the full article.

10) Baltimore drops dozens of cases after video appears to show police officers planting evidence

Jacey Fortin, The Toronto Star 

State attorneys are dismissing dozens of cases in Baltimore after reviewing a video that appears to show a police officer planting evidence at a crime scene while two other officers look on.

Read the full article.

11) Andrew Loku inquest provides eye-popping glimpse into police mindset

Alok Mukherjee, Now Magazine

Inquiry into the police shooting death of another Black man in crisis raises uncomfortable questions about racial bias and the weak systems of accountability that are in place when police get it wrong.

Read the full article.

12) Why are women with disabilities being given help to die, instead of help to live?

Carmela Hutchison, Rabble

People with disabilities and their caregivers are at risk for being made to say yes to medical assistance in dying when they don't want to.

Read the full article.

13) This anti-abortion hijacking of Black Lives Matter is cynical and offensive

Elizabeth Nelson, The Guardian

Both Lives Matter has got away with a misleading ad. But using the language of human rights can’t hide its true agenda: subjugating Northern Ireland’s women.

Read the full article.

14) First Nations women had 800% more overdoses: 'horrific' crisis' new B.C. data

David P. Ball, Metro Vancouver

The statistics are as shocking as the "horrific" crisis they measure, British Columbia's new mental health minister, Judy Darcy, warned Thursday.

Read the full article.

15) Ontario women to get free access to abortion pill starting Aug. 10

Meagan Fitzpatrick, CBC News

The Ontario government says it is giving women in the province more choice over their reproductive health by covering the cost of Mifegymiso, commonly referred to as an abortion pill, starting on Aug.10.

Read the full article.

16) Joseph Boyden Won’t Find Indigenous Identity In A Test Tube Of Spit

Robert Jago, Canadaland

In anticipation of a fall book tour for his new novel, Seven Matches, Joseph Boyden is back in the pages of Maclean’s magazine with an article restating his claim of First Nations ancestry, and anchoring that in the results of a DNA test.

Read the full article.

17) The Lost Cause Rides Again

Ta-Nehisi Coates, The Atlantic

HBO’s prospective series Confederate will offer an alternative history of post-Civil War America. It will ask the question, according to co-creator David Benioff,  “What would the world have looked like … if the South had won?” A swirl of virtual protests and op-eds have greeted this proposed premise. In response, HBO has expressed “great respect” for its critics but also said it hopes that they will “reserve judgment until there is something to see.”

Read the full article.

18) Galen Weston Knows Paying a Living Wage is Bad for Capitalism

Tannara Yelland, The Torontoist 

Galen Weston Jr., the mild-mannered, bespectacled grocery-store magnate you may recognize from President’s Choice commercials, is a thoroughly Canadian one-percenter. He is thoroughly Canadian in the sense that he isn’t flashy or grandiose like Richard Branson, and he doesn’t tout the benefits of vampirism or plot to destroy the free press, à la real-life super villain Peter Thiel. He is thoroughly of the one percent in the sense that his family is worth somewhere in the ballpark of $9 billion, he himself earned at least $5 million last year, and, despite that generous—one might even say obscene—level of wealth, he remains staunchly opposed to paying his employees enough money to live on.

Read the full article.

19) A perfect storm: homelessness, mental health, criminal law and no shelter beds

Sarah Shartal, The Toronto Star

This summer growing numbers of my clients in Toronto have stayed in jail because there were not shelter beds. Even Seaton House has put in cots. In one of the richest cities in the world we are keeping people in jail before trial because we cannot provide them a bed in a warehouse as their address.

Read the full article.

20) Facebook Apologizes To Black Activist For Censorship

NewsOne Staff

Activist and writer Ijeoma Oluo says her account was suspended for calling out racism.

Read the full article.

21) This is what really happens when prostitution is decriminalised

Julie Bindel, The Independent

The application form for opening a brothel in New Zealand is just two pages long: three pages shorter than the form needed to adopt a dog or cat from Battersea Dogs & Cats Home.

Read the full article.

22) Netanyahu's Looming Fall Is No Cause for Celebration

Gideon Levy, Haaretz

King Bibi’s departure is a necessary step, but by no means enough. Only a revolution in thinking will generate change in Israel.

Read the full article.

See also: Toronto Police, Star Trek, Omar Khadr & more -- The Left Chapter Weekly Reading List July 23 - 30

See also: Police Brutality, Thunder Bay, Ryerson & more -- The Left Chapter Sunday Reading List July 16 - 23

The Proud Boys, Omar Khadr and more -- The Left Chapter Sunday Reading List July 2 - 9

This week's list of articles, news items and opinion pieces that I see as must reads if you are looking for a roundup that should be of interest to The Left Chapter readers.


This list covers the week of July 2 - July 9. It is generally in order of the date of the article's release.

1) Fear of losing custody stops pregnant women from disclosing homelessness, Toronto numbers show

Ainslie Cruickshank, Toronto Star

Samantha was 18 and living in a shelter when she gave birth to her eldest daughter — just one of an estimated 300 babies born each year to homeless or underhoused women in Toronto.

Read the full article.

2) It’s time to shed the last vestiges of colonialism

Mandy Pipher, Toronto Star

Our economic, political, and cultural connections to Great Britain are so tenuous as to have little meaning. And its concern for us is non-existent.

Read the full article.

3) Small ads sex trafficking: the battle against Backpage

Annie Kelly, The Guardian

Backpage started out with small ads for household goods. So how did it grow into a major online market for child sex trafficking? Annie Kelly meets some of the survivors – and reveals how their fight for justice became a battleground for free speech on the internet.

Read the full article.

4) How Paul Robeson found his political voice in the Welsh valleys

Jeff Sparrow, The Guardian

African American star Robeson built his singing career in the teeth of racism in the early 1900s. But his radicalism was spurred on in Britain – by a chance meeting with a group of Welsh miners.

Read the full article.

5) Military "Proud Boys" Disrupt Mi'kmaw Memorial in Halifax

Anti-Racist Canada

On Canada day, while members of the Mi'kmaw Nation held a memorial remembering MMIWG in Halifax, a local contingent of "Proud Boys" arrived to disrupt the event, because the "Proud Boys" are classy that way.

Read the full article.

6) There’s Nothing ‘Feminist’ About Defending Pornography

Caitlin Roper, The Huffington Post

As sex trade survivor and activist Rachel Moran said, “There is not now, nor has there ever been, a feminist case for the commodification of females.”

Read the full article.

7) Indigenous woman hit by trailer hitch in Thunder Bay dies

Tanya Talaga, Toronto Star

Barbara Kentner was struck in the stomach by a metal trailer hitch thrown from a passing car last January.

Read the full article.

8) Minimum wage hike won’t bring ‘doom and gloom,’ economists say

Sara Mojtehedzadeh, Toronto Star

“Doom-and-gloom predictions” about the impact of minimum wage increases on job losses and inflation are not supported by evidence, according to a group of Canadian economists.

Read the full article.

9) Omar Khadr, Canada and the fragile rule of law

Globe and Mail Editorial Board

Reasonable people can debate many things about the apology and $10.5-million settlement that the government of Canada is giving Omar Khadr.

Read the full article.

10) Khadr apology, payout is an insult to all the Canadian vets who fought for our right to torture imprisoned children

The Beaverton

Today, I was outraged to hear that the Trudeau government has agreed to pay $10.5 million and issue an apology to admitted terrorist Omar Khadr. This decision is a slap in the face to all of our men and women in uniform who defend our proud Canadian values of depriving any human rights to a fifteen-year-old child soldier.

Read the full article.

11) AGO exhibition reframes the idea of Canada

I. Rattan, Now Magazine

Five artists reflect on how their Art Gallery of Ontario exhibits reclaim a piece of Canada’s history for Indigenous, ­immigrant and racialized voices.

Read the full article.

12) El Salvador teen rape victim sentenced to 30 years in prison after stillbirth

Nina Lakhani, The Guardian

A teenage rape victim in El Salvador has been sentenced to 30 years in prison for murder after having a stillbirth, the latest in a long line of failures of justice against pregnant women in the Central American country.

Read the full article.

13) What would it take for Thunder Bay to admit it’s in crisis?

Jon Thompson, TVO

In a tale of two hashtags, a city determined to portray itself in a positive light is at odds with Indigenous residents’ concerns about systemic racism.

Read the full article.

14) Canadian journalists slam CBC's 'shameful' coverage of violent 'alt-right fight club'

Press Progress

CBC News admits they "made mistakes" after the controversial leader of a group, described by the Southern Poverty Law Center as an "alt-right fight club" linked to riots and violent rallies, was given a platform on the public broadcaster to defend historical violence against Indigenous people and promote a website aimed at recruiting new members to his group.

Read the full article.

15) CBC Interview With 'Proud Boys' Founder Gavin McInnes Goes Off The Rails


Emma Paling, The Huffington Post

A CBC interview ended awkwardly on Wednesday after a controversial guest defended an 18th-century decree offering money for the dead bodies of Indigenous people.

Read the full article.

16) Five false things right-wing provocateur Gavin McInnes said in a CBC interview

Ashley Csanady, The National Post

The founder of an organization whose members interrupted an Indigenous ceremony used a CBC interview to spread misinformation about the history of the Mi'kmaq people.

Read the full article.

17) The alt-right’s jocular façade is an attempt to deny responsibility

Tabatha Southey, The Globe and Mail

On Canada Day, in downtown Halifax, a small ceremony attended by perhaps 50 people was interrupted by five men wearing matching black polo-style shirts with yellow trim who identified themselves as members the "Proud Boys, Maritime Chapter."

Read the full article.

18) People of Colour Know Police Won’t Protect Us from Racist Hate

Abdullah Shihipar, Vice

Last month, a woman named Nikki Samuels walked into a clinic in Mississauga, Ontario with her child and demanded to see a white doctor. She became belligerent and began shouting that she wanted to see someone who "speaks English" and "doesn't have brown teeth." As she continued to harass the staff in the waiting room, others began to confront the woman about her racist and erratic behaviour and of course, someone began to film the incident. The video went viral and was serious enough to garner reaction from the province's premier.

Read the full article.

19) Thomas Jefferson was a horrible man who owned 600 human beings, raped them, and literally worked them to death 

Shaun King, New York Daily News

Earlier this week, a room connected to the Monticello home of Thomas Jefferson was discovered to have been the living quarters for Sally Hemings. As the news broke of the discovery, many headlines referred to Hemings as Jefferson's mistress. But she was not a mistress.

Mistress implies consent. Thomas Jefferson owned Sally Hemings. She was his legal property. Thomas and Martha Jefferson owned Sally from the time she was an infant. She could not leave. She was not free. Both Martha and Thomas Jefferson refused to free Sally Hemings their entire lives. Hemings remained enslaved at Monticello into her 50s.

Read the full article.

See also: Canada 150, Basic Income, the Western Wall & more -- The Left Chapter Sunday Reading List June 25 - July 2

See also: Grenfell, the LCBO, Québec Solidaire and more -- The Left Chapter Sunday Reading List June 18 - 25

The right wing tin foil hats are out in the wake of the Quebec City terrorist attack

What to do when the narrative you want to be true turns out not to be? On the anti-Islamic fringes of the Canadian right it seems it is then always time to turn to those Kellyanne Conway "Alternative Facts"!

After the horrific -- and now very clearly anti-Islamic -- terrorist hate crime committed at a Quebec City mosque on Sunday night there was, for a short period of a few hours, some confusion as to who the police thought might be involved.

Quebec police took two men into custody. One of the two was Mohamed Belkhadir who was identified as being an immigrant from Morocco. As a result of this fact, as The Intercept noted:

Almost immediately, various news outlets and political figures depicted the shooter as Muslim. Right-wing nationalist tabloids in the UK instantly linked it to Islamic violence...
...White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer exploited the attack to justify President Trump’s ban on immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries. “It’s a terrible reminder of why we must remain vigilant and why the President is taking steps to be proactive rather than reactive when it comes to our nation’s safety and security,” Spicer said at this afternoon’s briefing when speaking of the Quebec City attack.

Likewise on the Canadian right there were those who made similar comments.

Later it turned out that the Quebec police had made a mistake and that Belkhadir was an innocent witness who had been at the mosque, had tried to render assistance to victims and had been apprehended when he tried to flee police as he did not realize he was being approached by police officers as opposed to possible attackers.

Quebec police determined that Belkhadir was not involved and released him. Police then announced that it was only the other person who had been arrested -- a white nationalist right wing extremist named Alexandre Bissonnette -- who is now alleged to have been the shooter. Belkhadir has been totally cleared.

These sorts of initially mistaken media and police reports, arrests, statements, and eyewitness comments are, of course, incredibly common in the chaotic aftermath of such terrible crimes and while they sadly are then used by conspiracy theorists as "proof" of a cover-up it makes perfect sense they would occur. The CBC explained why it initially reported the names of both Belkhadir and Bissonnette, then took both names down when the police announced they were not both culpable until finally posting Bissonnette's name as the alleged perpetrator when the police clarified matter. There is nothing nefarious about this -- there was an investigation that established that a person that the police had thought might be involved was not.

But this, of course, upended the notion that rather than being a racist attack on Muslims it was actually a terrorist attack by Muslims.

So it was time for the tin foil hats to come out.

The increasingly Alex Jonesesque commentator and Toronto Sun columnist Tarek Fatah took to Twitter to raise the specter of a cover-up!

Seriously. This would also presumably mean that the Quebec police are part of this plot trying to cover-up a "MuslimOnMulsim" terror attack because of their long established, deep solidarity with people of the Islamic faith. That "seems" very believable.

And, needless to say, Rebel Media had to get in on the act. Ezra Levant and crew sent "journalist" Faith Goldy to Quebec City to file a report "Quebec Terror: Blame Trump, Ignore Witnesses" that talks about reports of "second shooters", claims to ask all the challenging questions, etc and to assure readers that "unlike the mainstream media, we’ll follow the FACTS — wherever they lead."

This is pretty disgraceful.

And who has got one of the banner advertisements right above these Rebel Media dispatches from the deluded?

Given what some of her supporters were saying on her Facebook page after the attack, she might want to reconsider.  

Update: It turns out that Rebel Media is actually using the Quebec Mosque attack to fund raise so that their "reporter" can continue to sow doubts and to allegedly find out "What’s really going on at the mosque in Quebec City?" 

How grotesque is that? Even by Rebel Media's staggeringly low standards, it is pretty revolting.

Car Culture, the CIA, Pope Francis & more -- The Left Chapter Holiday Reading List December 18 - 25

This week's list of articles, news items and opinion pieces that I see as must reads if you are looking for a roundup that should be of interest to The Left Chapter readers.

This list covers the week of December 18 - 25. It is in order of date of the article's  release. As Christmas fell on a Sunday it comes one day later than usual.

1) Still fighting for our seat at the table: Keep the national inquiry focus on Indigenous women and girls

Cherry Smiley, Feminist Current

Our lives as Indigenous women and girls are severely impacted by male violence, poverty, and other expressions of patriarchy, capitalism, and racism. We should, therefore, be allowed to prioritize issues that directly impact us. But some Indigenous and non-Indigenous individuals believe that we should now, at the eleventh hour, rethink and redo decades of focused political strategy and no longer support a national inquiry into disappeared and murdered Indigenous women and girls. Rather, they say we should expand the national inquiry to include disappeared and murdered Indigenous men and boys.

Read the full article.

2) Obama and the Clintons still have no earthly idea why the Democratic Party lost the presidential election 

Shaun King, New York Daily News

Over the past few days, the Obamas and the Clintons have made a series of statements on why the Democratic Party lost the presidential election to Donald Trump. The statements, if anything, reveal what happens when politicians are isolated from the American public for so long. While some nuggets of truth could be found there — by and large they all severely miss the mark on how and why Hillary Clinton lost. Instead of looking internally at mistakes they made, they continue to look outward — casting blame on anybody and everybody but themselves.

Read the full article.

3) ‘Fake News’ in America: Homegrown, and Far From New

Chris Hedges, Truthdig

The media landscape in America is dominated by “fake news.” It has been for decades. This fake news does not emanate from the Kremlin. It is a multibillion-dollar-a-year industry that is skillfully designed and managed by public relations agencies, publicists and communications departments on behalf of individuals, government and corporations to manipulate public opinion. This propaganda industry stages pseudo-events to shape our perception of reality. The public is so awash in these lies, delivered 24 hours a day through electronic devices and print, that viewers and readers can no longer distinguish between truth and fiction.

Read the full article.

4) Canadians are wrong about Muslims, happiness, and homosexuality

CBC Radio

Canadians think there are way more Muslims in Canada than there really are.
We think a third of Canadians believe homosexuality is immoral, but in reality, only a sliver of the population thinks so.

On average, Canadians believe a quarter of the population think it's wrong to have sex before marriage. In reality, only 15% of us think you should get hitched before hooking up.

Read/hear the full article.

5) Letter to a “comrade” who insists on justifying the unjustifiable

 Julien Salingue, Medium

“Comrade”,

For several weeks now I’ve been saying to myself that I’m going to write to you, and the tragic events of Aleppo and your reaction to them, and sometimes your non-reaction, is what eventually persuaded me that the time had come to address you.

Read the full article.

6) The top 10 most irritating Canadians of 2016 (TV-related)

John Doyle, The Globe and Mail

What a year, my dears. Are we jaded yet?

Trump and Brexit, terrorist attacks and death. The endless deaths. All those celebrities passing away and, well, in case somebody feels like fixating on that, the countless dead in wars, bombings and shootings as the viciousness of human hatred was on full display. A year of hackers, hotheads and liars.

Read the full article.

7) Private car, socialized costs

Yves Engler, Rabble

The second in a four-part series on the "great Toronto toll debate."

When are capitalists in favour of public ownership? When it earns them a profit. Nowhere can this be seen more clearly than when looking at car companies.

Read the full article.

8) Michigan Dem Meeting Breaks Into Violence as Clinton Fans Repel Sanders Partisans

Michael Sainato, Observer

On December 3, the Michigan Democratic Party held a committee meeting, open to the public and party members, to vote on delegates to represent Michigan at the Democratic National Committee. Unfortunately, rather than learning from Hillary Clinton’s presidential election loss, and sincerely welcoming Bernie Sanders supporters into the party after scolding them for more than a year, the Democratic establishment has continued treating progressives as second class citizens.

Read the full article. 

9) Car-centric landscape, not tolls, harm the poor

Yves Engler, Rabble

The third in a four-part series on the "great Toronto toll debate."

There's no doubt tolls hurt poor people, but a car-dominated transportation system does far more damage and everyone who wants a more just society should support measures that help rid our over-heating planet of private automobiles.

Read the full article.

9) A black mother told police a white man assaulted her child. They arrested her instead.

Peter Holley, The Washington Post

A Fort Worth police officer has been placed on “restricted duty status” after a viral video emerged Wednesday showing the officer arresting a mother who called authorities to report that her 7-year-old son has been assaulted.

Read the full article.

10) The CIA Is Not Your Friend

Jordy Cummings, Jacobin

The Central Intelligence Agency used to be the “bad guy.” After the coup in Chile and Operation Phoenix in Vietnam; after spying on and repressing the antiwar movement; after secret mind-control experiments and bizarre assassination plots, the agency became liberals’ ultimate bogeyman.

Read the full article.

11) Trump’s unpopularity threatens to hobble his presidency

Steven Shepard, Politico

President-elect Donald Trump will descend on Washington next month, buoyed by his upset victory and Republican control of Congress to implement his agenda.

But he’s facing a major obstacle: Trump will enter the White House as the least-popular incoming president in the modern era of public-opinion polling.

Read the full article.

12) Unhappy Holidays: Houston Police Force Homeless People to Throw Away Food

Jeremiah Jones, Counter Current News

Local activists attempting to hand out food and gifts were shocked on Thursday afternoon when Houston police forced the homeless to throw away the donations.  Around 1 pm on Thursday,  several individuals met in downtown Houston to distribute plates of hot food, blankets, and other supplies to the city’s growing homeless population. Soon after, Houston police arrived on the scene of two different intersections where the homeless advocates were giving out gifts and food.

Read the full article. 

13) Pope Francis: Christmas has been ‘taken hostage’ by materialism

Reuters

Pope Francis said Christmas has been “taken hostage” by dazzling materialism that puts God in the shadows and blinds many to the needs of the hungry, the migrants and the war-weary.

Read the full article.

14) Germany moves to atone for 'forgotten genocide' in Namibia

Jason Burke, The Guardian

It has become known as the first genocide of the 20th century: tens of thousands of men, women and children shot, starved, and tortured to death by German troops as they put down rebellious tribes in what is now Namibia. For more than a century the atrocities have been largely forgotten in Europe, and often in much of Africa too.

Read the full article.

See also: Climate Change, Porn Culture, Tolls & more -- The Left Chapter Sunday Reading List December 11 - 18

See also: Last Tango in Paris, the TDSB, Duterte & more -- The Left Chapter Sunday Reading List December 4 - 11

Climate Change, Porn Culture, Tolls & more -- The Left Chapter Sunday Reading List December 11 - 18

This week's list of articles, news items and opinion pieces that I see as must reads if you are looking for a roundup that should be of interest to The Left Chapter readers.


This list covers the week of December 11 - 18. It is in order of date of the article's  release.


1) Canada doesn't deserve a black woman on its money

CBC Radio 

Canada has a long way to go in its relationship with black communities before it should put Viola Desmond on its currency.

Desmond — a successful black businesswoman known for courageously refusing to leave a whites-only area of a Nova Scotia movie theatre in 1946 — will replace Sir John A. Macdonald on the $10 bill in 2018.

But according to Toronto writer Septembre Anderson, putting Desmond on Canadian money perpetuates the myth that the country is closer to racial equity than it actually is.

Read the full article.

2) Half the world's species failing to cope with global warming as Earth races towards its sixth mass extinction

Ian Johnston, The Independent

Nearly half the species on the planet are failing to cope with the global warming the world has already experienced, according to an alarming new study that suggests the sixth mass extinction of animal life in the Earth’s history could take place in as little as 50 years.

Read the full article.

3) Pipeline Spills 176,000 Gallons of Oil Into Creek 150 Miles From Dakota Access Protests

Tom Dichristopher, CNBC

A pipeline leak has spilled tens of thousands of gallons of crude oil into a North Dakota creek roughly two and a half hours from Cannon Ball, where protesters are camped out in opposition to the Dakota Access pipeline.

Read the full article.

4) David Suzuki says economy cannot trump environment

David Suzuki is not hiding his displeasure with the federal approval of the Trans Mountain and Line 3 pipeline expansion projects.

The renowned environmentalist told CBC's The Early Edition the economic arguments for the projects don't make sense.

Read the full article.

5) Anti-poverty activist says action needed on welfare, not more study

CBC Radio

Meetings are underway in Sudbury as the province begins looking at establishing a guaranteed basic income for the region's poorest. But Gary Kinsman, with the Raise The Rates advocacy group in Sudbury, says action is needed now to raise welfare rates.

Hear the full interview.

6) Men’s-Rights Activists Are Finding a New Home With the Alt-Right

Claire Landsbaum, NYMag.com

Back in May, while addressing a crowd of supporters in Spokane, Washington, Donald Trump took time to lament the current state of gender relations. “All of the men, we’re petrified to speak to women anymore,” he said. “We may raise our voice — you know what, the women get it better than we do, folks, they get it better than we do.”

Read the full article.

7) Arctic shatters heat records, triggers massive ice melt

Olivier Moon, AFP

The Arctic shattered heat records in the past year as unusually warm air triggered massive melting of ice and snow and a late fall freeze, U.S. government scientists said Tuesday.

The grim assessment came in the Arctic Report Card 2016, a peer-reviewed document by 61 scientists around the globe issued by the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Read the full article.

8) The impact of porn culture on girls is too big to ignore

Laurie Oliva, Feminist Current

If we were to plot events that have significantly altered the female experience, one of them would have to be the arrival of porn culture and the role of technology in this advancing phenomenon.

Last month a 12-year-old boy was sentenced for repeatedly raping his sister after “becoming fascinated with hardcore porn.” The boy had typed in search terms online in order to find incest porn. The prosecutor in the case said, “Cases of this nature will increasingly come before the court because of the access young people now have to hard core pornography.”

Read the full article.

9) The year as we saw it: 10 charts that defined Ontario in 2016

Trish Hennessy and Manisha Aggarwal-Schifellite, Behind the Numbers

The experts at the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives’ Ontario office have been tracking economic developments in Ontario throughout the year. Some problems persist: the gender pay gap, social assistance poverty, the use of expensive payday loans as a last resort because traditional banks fail to serve low-income customers as well as they should.

Read the full article. 

10) How Patrick Brown retracts, recants, renounces

Martin Regg Cohn, Toronto Star

We all harbour secret fantasies. Especially politicians.

Some dream of power and glory. Others fantasize about running a marathon in under three hours.

And some dream of doing God’s will in Ontario as it is in heaven. Without anyone knowing their glorious secret in advance.

Read the article.

11) Trump’s 17 cabinet-level picks have more money than a third of American households combined

Dan Kopf, Quartz

The 17 people who US president-elect Donald Trump has selected for his cabinet or for posts with cabinet rank have well over $9.5 billion in combined wealth, with several positions still unfilled. This collection of wealth is greater than that of the 43 million least wealthy American households combined—over one third of the 126 million households total in the US.

Read the full article.

12) Federal cabinet secretly approved Cold War wiretaps on anyone deemed 'subversive,' historian finds

 Dave Seglins & Rachel Houlihan, CBC 

A Canadian historian has found top secret documents from the dawn of the Cold War that show the federal government secretly approved an RCMP surveillance program to wiretap suspected spies, communist sympathizers and others deemed "disloyal" or "subversive."

Read the full article.

13) Russia Today and the post-truth virus

Idrees, Pulse

A video is circulating of a woman revealing “the truth” on Syria that is being withheld from us by “the mainstream media”. The woman is introduced as an “independent Canadian journalist”. She is said to be speaking  “at the UN”. The date is December 9, 2016. The video has become viral.

Read the full article.

14) Petition: Open the armouries for shelter

Cathy Crowe, change.org

Toronto's shelter system is full and people are routinely turned away. The overflow, volunteer-run Out of the Cold program is similarly full. Last winter, the two 24-hour warming centres were overcrowded, sleeping people inches away from each other on mats on the floor. A serious Strep A outbreak has resulted in a loss of over 100 shelter beds. Hundreds of people are abandoned, forced to sleep outside in parks, ravines, under bridges and on sidewalks.

Read and sign the petition.

15) New map reveals shattering effect of roads on nature

Damian Carrington, The Guardian

Rampant road building has shattered the Earth’s land into 600,000 fragments, most of which are too tiny to support significant wildlife, a new study has revealed.

Read the full article.

16) ‘Tyrants across the world know now they can maintain power through mass slaughter.’ Interview with Leila al-Shami for Open Left

LeftEast

Leila al-Shami, co-author of Burning Country, a writer who has worked with human rights movements in Syria and elsewhere in the Middle East, gave this interview to Ilya Matveev and Gabriel Levy on 29 November for OpenLeft (before the fall of Aleppo to the government forces). It sheds some light on the social and geopolitical situation which has rendered the Allepo crisis so severe in these past weeks. It is also, however, part of an emerging transnational conversation between anti-war activists in Russia and Syrian activists, spearheaded by portals such as OpenLeft, where the interview will soon appear in Russian.

Read the full article. 

17) "To Call it the Liberation of Aleppo is an Insult to our Dignity”

Arash Azizi, IranWire

On December 15, as buses were getting ready to evacuate people from East Aleppo, which had just fallen to the forces of Bashar al-Assad, IranWire spoke to a local resident of the city, a  young woman who was born in Aleppo and has lived there most of her life. She gave us her take on the tumultuous events of the last few days.

Read the full article

18) How Clinton lost Michigan — and blew the election

Edward-Issac Dovere

Everybody could see Hillary Clinton was cooked in Iowa. So when, a week-and-a-half out, the Service Employees International Union started hearing anxiety out of Michigan, union officials decided to reroute their volunteers, giving a desperate team on the ground around Detroit some hope.

Read the full article.

19) On Toronto Tolls, Marxists Align with Auto Industrial Complex

Yves Engler, Dissident Voice

What’s left and what’s right? Usually it is obvious, but sometimes you have to take a step back and consider the bigger picture.

For example, the Toronto toll debate has exposed a lack of scrutiny of the leading source of corporate profit over the past century by many supposed leftists. Absent a political economy of the auto industrial complex, many Marxists have objectively allied themselves with the private car’s awesome political, cultural and ideological power.

Read the full article.

20) The shameful fascism of The Walking Dead

Sean T. Collins

As 2016 stumbles to a close, the acceptable pathways for talking about the politics of pop culture are as well-beaten as the skull of one of Negan's enemies. "Talk Show Host EVISCERATES Politician." "Show X Has a Y Problem." Discussions of cast, character, and creator diversity. But one of television's most prominent franchises has a fundamental and frightening ethical flaw that has been left to fester.

The show is The Walking Dead. The flaw is fascism.

Read the full article.

See also: Last Tango in Paris, the TDSB, Duterte & more -- The Left Chapter Sunday Reading List December 4 - 11

See also: Fidel Castro, Justin Trudeau, Cornel West & more -- The Left Chapter Sunday Reading List November 27 - December 4

Castro, Climate Change, Trump & more -- The Left Chapter Sunday Reading List November 20 - 27

This week's list of articles, news items and opinion pieces that I see as must reads if you are looking for a roundup that should be of interest to The Left Chapter readers.

This list covers the week of November 20 - November 27. It is in order of date of the article's  release.

1) Suddenly It’s Okay to Be pro-Israel and anti-Semitic

Gideon Levy, Haaretz

All of a sudden it’s not so terrible to be anti-Semitic. Suddenly it’s excusable as long as you hate Muslims and Arabs and “love Israel.” The Jewish and Israeli right has issued a sweeping amnesty to anti-Semitic lovers of Israel – yes, there is such a thing, and they’re en route to taking power in the United States.


Read the full article.

2) Many in Milwaukee Neighborhood Didn’t Vote — and Don’t Regret It

 Sabrina Tavernise, New York Times

Four barbers and a firefighter were pondering their future under a Trump presidency at the Upper Cutz barbershop last week.

“We got to figure this out,” said Cedric Fleming, one of the barbers. “We got a gangster in the chair now,” he said, referring to President-elect Donald J. Trump.

They admitted that they could not complain too much: Only two of them had voted. But there were no regrets.

Read the full article.

3) Lessons from Italy: the Dangers of Anti-Trumpism

Cinzia Arruzza, Verso

Comparisons between Donald Trump and former Italian PM Silvio Berlusconi abounded throughout the presidential election campaign and have only proliferated since Trump declared victory. They are not entirely ungrounded.

Trump and Berlusconi are both men who came to power from business rather than politics and both have presented their inexperience with the political establishment as a mark of purity. They have both insisted on their entrepreneurial success as the most evident proof of their qualification to rule the country. Like Plato’s tyrant, they both exhibit an ethos based on a dream of continuous and unlimited jouissance and an aggressive and hubristic eros (though Berlusconi prefers to think of himself as an irresistible seducer rather than a rapist). They both indulge in gross misogynistic and racist jokes and have reshaped public language by legitimizing insult and political incorrectness as acceptable forms of political communication and by embodying an exhilarating return of the repressed. They both revel in kitschy aesthetics and don the orange hue of artificial tanning. And they both allied with the far right in order to advance a political project of authoritarian neoliberalism and unbridled capitalism.

Read the full article.

4) I have never been sexually assaulted

Deidre Pearson, Feminist Current

 I have never been sexually assaulted.

When I was five-years-old I went to an in-home daycare, run by a woman who had a son and some daughters (a combination of my age at the time and the years that have passed make me unable to remember precisely how many). The woman’s daughters were older than me, but younger than the boy. He may have been in grade six or even in high school — to me he was just a “big kid.”

Read the full article.

5) French politicians are now marching to Marine Le Pen’s immigration tune

Philippe Marlière, The Guardian 

The first round of the French presidential election is five months away, yet France is already in political turmoil. There are several reasons. First, François Hollande, the incumbent president, is so weak and discredited that some expect him to pull out of the race altogether. This would be an unprecedented move for a president in office.

Second, Marine Le Pen, leader of the Front National, is going from strength to strength. She is consistently polling at more than 20% of the share of the vote (against 17.9% in 2012) and seems guaranteed to make it to the second and decisive round of next year’s presidential elections. What’s more, Le Pen’s rise has been directly affecting her opponents across the political spectrum.

Read the full article.

6) Lashing Out at ‘Identity Politics,’ Pundits Blame Trump on Those Most Vulnerable to Trump

Adam Johnson, Fair

Over the past two weeks, pundits from all ends of the spectrum have been scrambling to explain Clinton’s unexpected loss, with reasons spanning from the plausible to the highly dubious; WikiLeaks, Bernie Sanders, fake news, Jill Stein, Russia, bad algorithms and the FBI have all been accused of having sole or part responsibility. Lately, however, a new, entirely bogus culprit has emerged from center and center-left circles: “identity politics” and its close cousin, “political correctness.”

Read the full article.

7) Writers, Do Better

Kathryn Borel Jr., The Walrus

The first person who helped me after I was sexually assaulted by a stranger in 2012 was a tiny female jogger. Before she came to my aid, and after the assault was over—for reasons I’ll never understand—my rapist followed me. I walked fast for an hour trying to get to my house while he tailed me. As the sun was coming up, there was a woman across the street, out on her morning run. I didn’t even see her cross over to my side—but suddenly she standing between me and my rapist, yelling at him. He fled. She walked me home, made sure I was inside, then jogged off. I never saw her again.

Read the full article. 

8) Trudeau attended cash-for-access fundraiser with Chinese billionaires

Robert Fife & Steven Chase, The Globe and Mail

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was the top draw at a $1,500 Liberal Party cash-for-access fundraiser at the mansion of a wealthy Chinese-Canadian business executive in May. One of the guests at the event was a well-heeled donor who was seeking Ottawa’s final approval to begin operating a new bank aimed at Canada’s Chinese community.

Read the full article.

9) Dear Democrats, you must stop blaming Hillary’s loss on black folk and Bernie supporters 

Shaun King, New York Daily News

I thought this would happen.

As Democrats begin to deal with the severe emotional reality of a Donald Trump presidency and a conservative Congress, they need someone to blame. They are good at that.

No doubt, many people blew this election, Hillary Clinton and the Democratic establishment chief among them, but black folk and Bernie Sanders supporters simply don’t deserve one iota of blame.

Read the full article. 

10) Mystery solved in the case of the missing transit revenue

Edward Keenan, The Toronto Star 

To hear some members of city council tell it, Toronto is like the setting of some heist film — Ocean’s Fourteen: The Great Transit Caper. Hardened thieves are scheming and sneaking and disguising themselves as children all to the ends of ripping off the transit system. Sounds like a case of [Duh-duh-duuuuuuuuuuhhhhn] fare evasion.

Read the full article. 

11) Petition - PayPal: Stop discriminating against Palestinians.

Sum of Us

PayPal does business in 203 countries around the world and is the default method of online payment for millions. But it won’t serve Palestinians in Gaza and the occupied West Bank -- even though it has no problem providing Israelis living in illegal settlements with the same service.

Read the full article and sign the petition. 

12) Guest Editorial: Sawant’s Response to Mudede’s “Brazenly Dishonest” Argument About Anti-Trump Protests

Kshama Sawant, The Stranger

I share the horror of millions of people over Donald Trump’s ascendance to the White House. While Trump lost the popular vote and the majority of the American people do not agree with his right-wing positions, bigots are nonetheless feeling emboldened. A surge in bullying and hate crimes has taken place, and the KKK felt confident enough to hold a victory rally in North Carolina.

Read the full article. 

13) Impassioned Sandra Jansen calls on legislature to stand against misogyny

Rick McConnell, CBC News

Calgary MLA Sandra Jansen drew a standing ovation Tuesday after she rose in the legislature and gave an impassioned speech denouncing the hateful and misogynistic comments she has faced since crossing the floor to join the NDP last week.

The first words out of the former Tory MLA's mouth likely raised eyebrows when she said: "What a traitorous bitch!"

Read the full article.

16) Trump’s climate denial is just one of the forces that point towards war

George Monbiot, The Guardian 

Wave the magic wand and the problem goes away. Those pesky pollution laws, carbon caps and clean-power plans: swish them away and the golden age of blue-collar employment will return. This is Donald Trump’s promise, in his video message on Monday, in which the US president-elect claimed that unleashing coal and fracking would create “many millions of high-paid jobs”. He will tear down everything to make it come true.

Read the full article.

17) Buckingham Palace advertises for new gardener... who will earn less than the London Living Wage

Lizzie Edmonds, The Evening Standard

Buckingham Palace is advertising for a gardener where the successful candidate will earn less than the recommended London Living Wage.

An advert has been placed on the Royal Household website for a live in gardener with a salary of £17,000, which works out at £8.72 an hour for a 37-and-a-half-hour working week.

Read the full article.

18) Conservative MP Kellie Leitch calls for CBC to be dismantled

Conservative leadership candidate Kellie Leitch is proposing to sell the CBC, saying she doesn’t believe the broadcaster should be “propped up by taxpayers.”

Read the full article.

19)  Arctic ice melt could trigger uncontrollable climate change at global level

Fiona Harvey, The Guardian

Arctic scientists have warned that the increasingly rapid melting of the ice cap risks triggering 19 “tipping points” in the region that could have catastrophic consequences around the globe.

Read the full article.

20) Colin Kaepernick has tense exchange with reporter over Fidel Castro T-shirt

Brandon Schlager, Sporting News 

San Francisco quarterback Colin Kaepernick is being asked once again to explain a controversial message — this time for wearing a T-shirt featuring Malcolm X and Fidel Castro during a news conference.

Read the full article.

21) The 13 impossible crises that humanity now faces

George Monbiot, The Guardian

Please don’t read this unless you are feeling strong. This is a list of 13 major crises that, I believe, confront us. There may be more. Please feel free to add to it or to knock it down. I’m sorry to say that it’s not happy reading.

Read the full article.

22) Galloway sex-assault complainant breaks silence

Laura Kane, Canadian Press

The former University of British Columbia student who accused Steven Galloway of sexual assault says her complaint against the acclaimed author was not about a "consensual affair."

Read the full article.

23) Jo Cox's murder was followed by 50,000 tweets celebrating her death

Mark Townsend, The Guardian

More than 50,000 abusive and offensive tweets were sent celebrating Labour MP Jo Cox’s murder and lauding her killer, Thomas Mair, as a “hero” or “patriot” in the month following her death, prompting calls for the government to do more to tackle hate speech online.

Read the full article.

24) Fidel Castro 1926-2016

Greg Grandin, The Nation

Fidel Castro is dead at 90. He took power in 1959, at the head of the joyful, raucous, and brash Cuban Revolution, which was immediately placed under siege by Washington. Castro almost outlasted 11 US presidents—Eisenhower, Kennedy, LBJ, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush I, Clinton, Bush II, and passing in the waning days of Obama’s last term. Perhaps he just couldn’t bear the thought of President Donald Trump. Having been sanctimoniously lectured by all 11 US presidents on what constitutes proper democratic procedure, he might have thought Trump, about to take office with a minority  of the vote and with significant voter suppression, a vindication.

Read the full article.

Finally, while not from the last week, this article is worth sharing again in the wake of the death of Fidel Castro:

25) Nelson Mandela on How Cuba "Destroyed the Myth of the Invincibility of the White Oppressor"

Nelson Mandela, Democracy Now

We have come here today recognizing our great debt to the Cuban people. What other country has such a history of selfless behavior as Cuba has shown for the people of Africa? How many countries benefit from Cuban health care professionals and educators? How many of these volunteers are now in Africa? What country has ever needed help from Cuba and has not received it? How many countries threatened by imperialism or fighting for their freedom have been able to count on the support of Cuba?

Read the full article.

And...In Memoriam: Fidel Castro 1926-2016 

"Nothing in the world is irreversible, not even capitalism."

See also: Trump, UBC, Basic Income & more -- The Left Chapter Sunday Reading List November 13 - 20

See also: Trump -- The Left Chapter Sunday Reading List November 6 - 13