2020-02-16: News Headlines

The Canary (2020-02-16). Labour leadership candidates call for action to 'diversify' the press. thecanary.co Labour leadership candidates have spoken out to condemn mainstream media behaviour.Labour leadership contender Sir Keir Starmer has signalled he would take action to "diversify" the press if he won the race to succeed Jeremy Corbyn.Following the death of TV presenter Caroline Flack, who took her own life, Sir Keir said the wider media had been responsible for "amplifying" the messages coming from social media.Speaking at the latest leadership hustings in London, he condemned the constant "vilification" of Labour politicians in the press.He said that both the traditional media and social media companies needed to…

RT (2020-02-16). Houthis say Saudi-led coalition airstrikes in Yemen killed at least 30 people, including women & children. rt.com Strikes carried out by the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen on Saturday left at least 30 dead, according to the health ministry in the Houthi-controlled Al-Jawf province. Women and children were among the casualties, the ministry told a local TV channel according to Reuters. The alleged attack came shortly after the Houthis claimed to have downed a coalition warplane on Friday. Meanwhile, according to Saudi state news agency SPA, a spokesman for the coalition said that a Tornado jet had "crashed." He added that a rescue operation had been launched but declined to go into detail about what may have caused the crash…

RT (2020-02-16). Daredevil routine at 1,300ft almost goes DISASTROUSLY WRONG for Russian paraglider & aerial gymnast (VIDEO). rt.com Russian paraglider Alexander Orlov and world champion aerial gymnast Anzhela Kulagila performed a daredevil routine in Vietnam, making jaw-dropping acrobatics moves at 400m (1,300ft) — but which almost went badly wrong. | Driven by Orlov, who controlled the flow of the parachute, the duo presented a heart-stopping routine with Kulagila executing acrobatics tricks on slings with no safety wire. | The…

William Hawes (2020-02-15). What "That's Not Realistic" Really Means: Bernie Sanders, Social Democracy, and Capitalist Apologetics. dissidentvoice.org When discussing politics, or listening to pundits in the mainstream media in the run up to the 2020 presidential election, you've probably heard a common refrain: certain policies are "not realistic." It's similar to the close-minded remark that certain politicians, such as Bernie Sanders, have issues regarding their "electability". What are these elites and people …

Staff (2020-02-15). Bloomberg Is Emerging as Corporate Media's Preferred Opposition to Sanders. truthout.org Coming out of the first two Democratic primary states, with Bernie Sanders leading in votes and Pete Buttigieg leading in delegates, who is "starting to dominate the national political debate like no one in the past five years other than President Donald Trump"? | According to NBC's Jonathan Allen (

WSWS (2020-02-15). #MeToo collaborates with fascistic forces to block showing of Polanski's film J'Accuse. wsws.org Allied with the reactionary Macron government, #MeToo demands the censorship of Polanski's brilliant account of the anti-Semitic frame-up of Captain Alfred Dreyfus, which was a seminal event in modern French history.

Tim Libretti (2020-02-14). Don't believe in class struggle? Read J.P. Morgan's report to wealthy clients. peoplesworld.org Mainstream media, largely corporate-owned, loves to avoid addressing the realities of class, and particularly of class struggle, at every turn. While we don't hear the voices of the 99%, we hear plenty from the 1% decrying the slightest reference to class struggle in the United States. The wealthy often complain when sane and reasonable minds …

RT (2020-02-14). Information wars: GOP lawmaker on quest to officially declare CNN and the Washington Post 'fake news'. rt.com In these times of political division, Americans on the far ends of the political spectrum often accuse each other of misinformation — but one GOP lawmaker wants CNN and the Washington Post to be officially declared "fake news." | Micah Van Huss, a Republican state lawmaker from Tennessee, has introduced a

Mike Miller (2020-02-14). Race and Class: Overcoming the Divides. counterpunch.org Preface The forthcoming 2020 election is again highlighting the country's apparently deep divides on race and class. A common formulation is that a hopelessly racist White working class is locked into the new Trump Republican Party which consciously has adopted a divide-and-conquer strategy based on race. The mainstream Democratic Party hope is that an electoral

RT (2020-02-14). Anti-BDS laws are meant to censor & control speech, journalist Abby Martin tells RT after suing Georgia govt over cancelled talk. rt.com Barred from speaking at a public university over her refusal to sign a pledge of allegiance to Israel, journalist Abby Martin is now suing the state of Georgia, arguing its anti-BDS legislation sets fire to the First Amendment. | Slated to give a keynote talk at a media literacy conference at Georgia Southern University later this month, Martin was asked to sign what amounts to a loyalty oath to the State of Israel, mandated under a 2016 Georgia law barring the government from hiring contractors who boycott Israeli products or associate with the global Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement. Martin t…

Mark Angelides (2020-02-14). UK Government Approves Net Censorship — British Free Speech Dies. globalresearch.ca The United Kingdom has become the first Western nation to move ahead with large-scale

Thomas Klikauer (2020-02-14). Cambridge Analytica: a Salesgirl's Report. counterpunch.org Much has been written about the murky world of the UK PR firm Cambridge Analytica — a company acting by stealth which furnished the propaganda behind successes like the election of Donald Trump along with the British vote for Brexit. One of the faces that Alexander Nix, Cambridge Analytica's shadowy boss, liked to push was

Staff (2020-02-14). The Corporate Media Is Directly Profiting from Mike Bloomberg's Rise as He Spends Fortune on TV Ads. democracynow.org Billionaire Democratic presidential candidate Mike Bloomberg is rising in the polls in the wake of the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary. Democracy Now! co-host Juan González speaks with us about Bloomberg's approach to campaign spending, the administration's policies during his three terms as mayor of New York City and the scores of lawsuits filed against Bloomberg and his company. "It's amazing to me that Michael Bloomberg is getting as much attention as he is," González says.

Medea Benjamin (2020-02-13). Can the World's Second Superpower Rise From the Ashes of Twenty Years of War. mintpressnews.com While our government's war propaganda has convinced many Americans that we are powerless to stop its catastrophic wars, it has failed to convince most Americans that we are wrong to want to.

RT (2020-02-13). 'Actually dangerous': Samantha Bee's denunciation of PragerU shows liberals still don't get the allure of the forbidden. rt.com Liberal comedian Samantha Bee has said she fears YouTube powerhouse PragerU is brainwashing kids by disguising right-wing propaganda as educational content — but her fear is the best endorsement the outlet could hope for. | Calling the popular conservative channel "actually dangerous," Bee warned it was "trick[ing] kids into thinking their videos are educational" in a tweet posted on Wednesday night.

RT (2020-02-12). What about stopping endless wars? Trump urges GOP to vote down Iran war resolution because it's a partisan ploy by Democrats. rt.com US President Donald Trump says the resolution that would block him from using force against Iran is a partisan trick by Democrats, even though he campaigned on a peace platform and some of his closest allies support the proposal. | "We are doing very well with Iran and this is not the time to show weakness," Trump tweeted on Wednesday, adding that Tehran would "have a field day" if his hands were tied. | "The Democrats are only doing this as an attempt to embarrass the Republican Party. Don't let it happen!" he urged the GOP majority. ….If my hands were tied, Iran would have a field day. Sends a very bad s…

Hatewatch Staff (2020-02-12). Neo-Confederate Attorney Accused of Mishandling Clients' Money Promoted Online Trolling, Harassment. splcenter.org Harold Ray Crews, attorney and chairman of the North Carolina chapter of the neo-Confederate hate group League of the South, must attend a hearing Feb. 21 to determine whether the state bar association will suspend his law license.

Staff (2020-02-11). Despite Corporate Media's "War on Bernie," Sanders Rides Wave of Support into New Hampshire Primary. democracynow.org Polls have opened in New Hampshire for the first primary of the election season. The vote comes eight days after the still-disputed Iowa caucuses, where both Senator Bernie Sanders and former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg claimed victory. Both candidates have asked for a partial recanvass of the results. We speak with Arnie Arnesen, a longtime radio and TV host in New Hampshire and a former New Hampshire legislator, and Norman Solomon, co-founder and national coordinator of RootsAction.org, which is supporting Bernie Sanders.

splcenter (2020-01-30). White Nationalist State Department Official Still Active in Hate Movement. splcenter.org U.S. State Department official Matthew Q. Gebert has been steadily producing white nationalist propaganda in the nearly six months since he was suspended from his job, Hatewatch has learned.

splcenter (2020-01-30). White Nationalist Podcaster Identified as U.S. Army Veteran. splcenter.org White nationalist State Department official Matthew Q. Gebert is regularly producing white supremacist propaganda with a man named Michael McKevitt, formerly of the U.S. Army, Hatewatch has determined.