Innehållsförteckning för Jul-20-15 - 7/27/2015 från The Nation

@thenation.com Wisdom of the Whistleblower When I first exposed the existence of the signals-intelligence (SIGINT) community and the National Security Agency some 40 years ago, I mentioned that among the many tentacles of what Tim Shorrock calls the “cyberintelligence ruling class” [“The New Cybersecurity Elite,” June 15] were private SIGINT outfits created by present and former officials of the NSA and the “Five Eyes” [Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, and the United States]. Even then, I thought the commercialization of intelligence would reach a point where you would not be able to tell what was being done in the national interest and what was being done for commercial profit. Indeed, throughout history, intelligence for profit has led to false intelligence. Please keep reporting on these issues, as we…

On back-to-back days at the end of its term, the Supreme Court sustained Obamacare against (another) Tea Party challenge and extended the constitutional freedom to marry to same-sex couples nationwide. Thanks to the Roberts Court, millions of working-poor and middle-income people won’t lose their health insurance, and millions of gay and lesbian Americans will have the right to marry. But this is the same Court that has sharply restricted affirmative action, invalidated a critical section of the Voting Rights Act, freed corporations to spend unlimited amounts of money on political campaigns, and allowed businesses to compel arbitration in contracts that effectively precludes all remedies for illegal discrimination. So what happened this time? The simple answer in both instances is Justice Anthony Kennedy, who is the decisive vote so often that…

Folks, the jig is up: Bill Kristol finally has us figured out. Even after the most troglodytic politicians agreed it was time to remove the Stars and Bars from state capitols, flag poles, and license plates, the Weekly Standard editor tweeted: “The Left’s 21st century agenda: expunging every trace of respect, recognition or acknowledgment of Americans who fought for the Confederacy.” The record shows that Kristol considered for three whole minutes whether this quite captured the full profundity of his thoughts. It did not. He added: “It’s our own mini-French Revolution, expunging history in a frenzy of self-righteousness. Luckily, so far: 1st time tragedy, 2nd time farce.” It’s not surprising that Kristol would have picked up a smattering of Marx from his Trotskyiteturned-neocon father, Irving. But if he were actually…

On June 27, Bree Newsome climbed the flagpole in front of the South Carolina statehouse and pulled down the Confederate flag, the presence of which has drawn massive criticism since the church shooting in Charleston. She was immediately arrested, along with a fellow activist. Here is an excerpt of Newsome’s comments, published in Blue Nation Review: “Earlier this week I gathered with a small group of concerned citizens, both black and white, who represented various walks of life, spiritual beliefs, gender identities and sexual orientations. Like millions of others in America and around the world, including South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley and President Barack Obama, we felt (and still feel) that the Confederate battle flag in South Carolina, hung in 1962 at the height of the Civil Rights Movement, must…

February 2008 Operation Hot Winter commences. After four days, 112 Palestinians and three Israelis are dead. December 2008 Operation Cast Lead is a monthlong assault on Gaza, leaving about 1,400 Palestinians and 13 Israelis dead. September 2010 Peace talks begin, but falter over settlements. Summer/Fall 2011 Major protests occur on the anniversary of the 1948 Palestinian displacement, and the local economy suffers. March 2012 Operation Returning Echo results in the death of 23 Palestinians and injury of 23 Israelis over five days. November 2012 Operation Pillar of Defense leaves at least 160 Palestinians and six Israelis dead after a weeklong assault. July 2013 The US oversees Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, but the formulation of a peace treaty proves impossible. July 2014 Operation Protective Edge, a 50-day assault, leaves 2,131 Palestinians and…

Follow the money” is a basic rule of American politics. Find out who funds a given candidate’s campaign— and, equally as important, who isn’t funding it—and you can make a pretty good guess as to which interests and policies the candidate will support or oppose once in office. As the 2016 presidential campaign heats up, voters deserve to know where candidates stand on the challenge of our time: confronting the growing danger of climate change. In recent months, scores of governments, universities, companies, and pension funds around the world have begun to divest from oil, gas, and coal companies whose products are driving climate change and whose lobbying and public relations have delayed action and blocked solutions. Now it’s time for the politicians who wish to lead the United States…

This issue marks the 150th anniversary of The Nation, a magazine founded, in part, to secure equality for emancipated slaves and their descendants. Sadly, recent events demonstrate that the United States remains a long way from that goal. Dylann Roof, the accused murderer of nine men and women in the Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina, is clearly a disturbed individual. Yet the language he drew on to justify his crime demonstrates the enduring power of historical myths and memories. Before opening fire on his victims, Roof reportedly explained his actions by saying, “You are raping our women and taking over the country.” This supposed need to save white women from black rapists has deep historical roots. It was invoked to legitimate the violent overthrow of Reconstruction, the nation’s…

I started as a Nation intern 18 years ago, and so I remember the days when the magazine lived and breathed in a printbased world. In 1997, our website, still in beta release, consisted of a few “About Us” pages and a couple of pieces from the magazine that we’d post once a week. To indicate that this was all very cutting edge, we stuck a lightning bolt next to the nameplate. Back then, writing for the magazine was a comparatively monastic experience. You’d work for weeks on an article, defend its arguments against vigorous but loving critiques from the editors, and gratefully accept changes from fact-checkers and copy editors. Finally, the issue would ship to the printer. And then: the vast silence. If you were lucky, a few weeks…

Would abortion rights be more secure today had Roe v. Wade been decided on the basis of women’s right to equality rather than privacy? Many smart people have thought so. You can see why this is a tempting argument. Roe has been relentlessly attacked as confused, illogical, and poorly written, relying on a concept of privacy that is found nowhere in the Constitution (in Griswold v. Connecticut, the 1965 decision that struck down a state ban on birth-control use by married couples, Justice William O. Douglas famously located the right to privacy in the “penumbras” and “emanations” of various provisions, such as the Fifth Amendment’s guarantee against selfincrimination). To conservatives, Roe is the very definition of judicial overreach. Wouldn’t it be a good thing if abortion rights could be reconstructed…

STANFORD UNIVERSITY RECEIVED A lot of good publicity when it announced in March that it would waive undergraduate tuition for families making less than $125,000 a year. The initiative was one of several of late responding to the growing problem of access to higher education: economic stratification at elite colleges, rising tuition and student debt at all colleges. The following month, the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation debuted a $1 million annual prize to promote economic diversity at selective schools. Starbucks is nearing the end of the first year of a program, conducted in partnership with Arizona State, to offer a partial tuition benefit to the company’s employees. These efforts may be admirable, but collectively they only reinforce the system that created those inequalities in the first place. They are symptomatic…

At the beginning of his essay in the catalog for this year’s Venice Biennale, Okwui Enwezor asks: “What do we see? A void of nothingness? A horizon of possibilities? What to do?” Enwezor is describing, perhaps more accurately than he realizes, the perspective of the visitor to the Venice Biennale—not just this year’s (of which Enwezor is the artistic director and curator), but any biennale curated by anyone in recent memory. “Leap into the void or into the fray?” These are the possibilities that Enwezor envisions, but there are others, one being to turn back and walk away. Which is what I did, inadvertently, two years ago: Having decided not to attend the preview of the 55th Biennale— thinking that I’d be able to see much more if I visited…

In 1976, the New York Public Library, whose holdings include cuneiform tablets, the illuminated Landevennec Gospels from the ninth century, Virginia Woolf’s diaries, and George Washington’s recipe for beer, printed its annual report on butcher paper. The report wasn’t a tongue-in-cheek attempt at the sort of conceptual art then making waves in SoHo. With New York City in financial collapse, the NYPL was facing drastic budget shortfalls and desperately needed to cut costs, even if it meant printing an important public document on the cheapest paper available or reducing hours at half of the system’s 83 branch libraries. The 1970s and early ’80s were gaunt years for the NYPL, but after a decade of hard work, the system was rejuvenated. Its president, Vartan Gregorian, joining forces with the legendary philanthropist…

57% Percentage of the public in 2015 that supports same-sex marriage 22 Countries that have legalized same-sex marriage 28 States that still have no employment discrimination laws covering sexual orientation or gender identity 51% Students in 2013 who reported hearing homophobic remarks from school staff “One would think Freedom of Intimacy is abridged rather than expanded by marriage. Ask the nearest hippie.” Justice Antonin Scalia, in his dissenting opinion to the Supreme Court’s ruling legalizing samesex marriage…

On June 18, Pope Francis released his encyclical on the environment and climate change, calling for urgent action. In it, Francis makes the moral argument for addressing the climate crisis, emphasizing that “highly polluting fossil fuels” must be “progressively replaced without delay.” The encyclical aligns the Catholic Church with the grassroots climate movement. “Particular appreciation is owed to those who tirelessly seek to resolve the tragic effects of environmental degradation on the lives of the world’s poorest,” the pope writes. “Young people demand change.” This is the wisdom of a leader who understands that the choice to confront the climate crisis now lies with the people. Institutions will follow. Pope Francis also demonstrates how influence should be used in a time of crisis—to advocate for the people whom power has…

Mayor Bill de Blasio bestowed an uncommon honor on The Nation. We are proud to reprint his proclamation here. Office of the Mayor City of New York PROCLAMATION Whereas: Healthy debate. Consistent reflection. Diverse voices. Nuanced perspectives. Institutions that hold us accountable. My administration operates on the core belief that all of these ingredients are crucial in protecting our civil society and sustaining a robust democracy. Thankfully, we are not alone. On July 6, 1865, a group of committed abolitionists launched a rousing periodical, which would elevate our country’s political discourse long into the future, with these famous words: “The Nation will not be the organ of any party, sect or body. It will, on the contrary, make an earnest effort to bring to the discussion of political and social…

In the 1924 presidential election, American voters faced the usual choice between a conservative Republican (Calvin Coolidge) and a conservative Democrat (John W. Davis). But that year there was also a third option: Senator Robert M. La Follette of Wisconsin, a Progressive. The nation chose Coolidge. The Nation chose La Follette. When Fightin’ Bob announced his candidacy that June, The Nation said he would “raise a standard of revolt to which honest men may repair. We count it glorious news…. We are not asking ourselves at this hour whether Mr. La Follette will win or not. We are merely giving profoundest thanks that in one of the darkest hours the Republic has known there is still one man in political life who will not bow the knee to Baal.” La…

“I HAVE SETTLED THE MATTERS WITH MY PARENTS AND INTEND to go with them. I [can] be sent with my father, Sheikh Abdul Qayyum, petitioner. I am making this statement with my free consent and will.” This statement was uttered by 26-yearold Uzma Qayyum to the judge in an Islamabad Sessions Court earlier this year. The court proceeding, whose end was marked by these words, had centered on the right of Uzma Qayyum to remain at Jamia Hafsa, a women’s religious seminary affiliated with Islamabad’s Red Mosque. In his petition before the Human Rights Cell of the Supreme Court, Sheikh Abdul Qayyum had alleged that his daughter had been “indoctrinated with extremist ideologies by Maulana Abdul Aziz and his wife Umme-Hassaan,” the leaders of the Red Mosque and Jamia Hafsa,…

In Sapiens, Yuval Noah Harari recounts how humans have developed from brutes to demigods in the course of their evolutionary history: a grand narrative, one would think, but he perceives it as a comic-tragedy, and details it with mordant humor. Even the book’s subtitle, A Brief History of Humankind, is punning, making “Brief” the soul of wit. At slightly over 400 pages, the narrative is indeed concise, but Sapiens is also an extended brief about the suffering our species has caused itself and others. (The “historical record,” he summarizes for his jury of readers, “makes Homo sapiens look like an ecological serial killer.”) “Brief” is also used ironically, since Sapiens is manifestly “big” in key respects. Harari, an Israeli historian, may not have anticipated that his tome would become such…

ACROSS 1 Masseuse to avoid a bath toy (6,4) 6 Prepare soup for work (4) 10 Philosopher retreats in total panic (5) 11 and 12 President informed mechanic in crisis (9,2,5) 12 See 11 13 Places to work off frozen sweets (7) 14 Complains loudly about broken bracelet—it can give you a jump (7,5) 19 Detective and troublemaker on opposite sides of Venice’s borders (12) 22 Outpouring of what might cause a drunken brawl? (7) 24 Bite fish after turning over to ignore the alarm (5,2) 25 Please German with tear for a painful conclusion (6,3) 26 To their buddies, conceivably, Einstein and Newton are similar (5) 27 At heart, nasty person is kind (4) 28 Added an S to a dull prize, shockingly (10) DOWN 1 Fix member of…