Welcome! "The Evening Blues" is a casual community diary (published Monday - Friday, 8:00 PM Eastern) where we hang out, share and talk about news, music, photography and other things of interest to the community.
Just about anything goes, but attacks and pie fights are not welcome here. This is a community diary and a friendly, peaceful, supportive place for people to interact.
Everyone who wants to join in peaceful interaction is very welcome here.
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Hey! Good Evening!
This evening's music features jazz singer and bandleader Cab Calloway. Enjoy!
Cab Calloway - Jumpin Jive
“Truth never damages a cause that is just.”
-- Mahatma Gandhi
News and Opinion
Will the Obama administration finally bring the CIA's torturers to justice?
The woman who will probably be the nation’s top lawyer opened the door to prosecuting the men and women responsible for the CIA’s torture program on Wednesday. And whether the President who nominated her likes it or not, she should act on it as soon as she’s in office.
President Obama’s nominee for attorney general, Loretta Lynch, in her first Senate confirmation hearing on Wednesday, admitted that certain actions taken by the CIA constituted torture and were illegal. In an exchange with Senator Patrick Leahy in which he asked her if waterboarding was torture, she responded:
Lynch: “Waterboarding is torture, Senator.”
Leahy: “And thus illegal?”
Lynch: “And thus illegal.”
Given her comments, Lynch should immediately appoint a special prosecutor to seek charges against the CIA for waterboarding three detainees (and likely many more) as soon as she’s confirmed. ...
Of course, the chances of actual accountability for the CIA is incredibly slim, given the agency can even get away with spying directly on the Senate itself with no consequences. True to form, the Justice Department hasn’t bothered to read their copy of the full Senate report on CIA torture (which runs almost 7,000 pages) despite having it for months. As Huffington Post’s Ali Watkins reported the same day Lynch testified, the Justice Department has disgracefully left the package containing the report unopened, despite the clear lawlessness documented inside it.
The Confirmation Hearings of US Attorney General Nominee Loretta Lynch
Bruce Dixon of the Black Agenda Report says Ms. Lynch's expertise in white-collar crime was defending white-collar criminals, not prosecuting them
In Torture Report Face-Off, ACLU Fights GOP Repo Man
The ACLU filed an emergency motion with a federal judge to stop the new GOP chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee from repossessing the full-length version of a revealing inquiry into CIA torture.
Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) has requested the White House and various executive agencies "immediately" return copies of the 6,700-page report, which Burr says was inappropriately transmitted by his predecessor, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.). Feinstein disputes that characterization.
The ACLU and other human rights groups charge that Burr's request is an attempt to keep the findings of the reportunder wraps permanently. As Politico points out: "Who maintains legal control of the report could be critical to whether and when it is made public."
"If Defendants transfer the report to Senator Burr, the ACLU faces the real threat of never securing the release of a document to which it is entitled by law," ACLU lawyers wrote in the emergency motion (pdf) filed late Tuesday in connection with a pending Freedom of Information Act lawsuit.
Marcy Wheeler delivers the goods. This is a richly detailed article worth clicking on the link and reading in full.
This is how a police state protects “secrets”: Jeffrey Sterling, the CIA and up to 80 years on circumstantial evidence
Sterling's conviction should chill anyone who believes in investigative reporting in a free society
The jury convicted Sterling based entirely on circumstantial evidence: there was not one shred of evidence showing Sterling handing Risen classified information on the operation, the Russian asset, or the letter that Risen found but FBI could not.
The evidence consisted of 57 phone calls between Sterling and Risen (some on their own phones, some on a phone Sterling had access to) between March 2003 and November 2005, the content of which we know nothing. It included a handful of emails, some of which indicate (in 2004, before Risen submitted his book proposal) Risen wanted to continue to talk to Sterling and wanted to send him something. One March 10, 2003 email, which Sterling deleted sometime in 2006, possibly after FBI subpoenaed him in this investigation, showed that Sterling had sent Risen the link to a CNN article claiming Iran had a very advanced nuclear weapons program. “All the more reason to wonder…” Sterling said in the email. The evidence showed that in March 2003, as the Bush Administration started a disastrous war based on claims of a dangerous nuclear program, Sterling used proper legal channels to raise concerns about the operation (citing “current events” to explain the timing of his concern) at the Senate Intelligence Committee. ...
D.C. information brokers should be worried that Sterling faces 80 years in prison based off this circumstantial evidence. All the more so, given the evidence supporting the charge that Sterling leaked to Risen in time for and caused him to write the article Risen told CIA he had in completed draft on April 24, 2003. After all, the only pieces of evidence that the government submitted from before the time when Risen told CIA he had a completed article were the CNN email, phone calls reflecting Risen and Sterling spoke for four minutes and 11 seconds across seven phone calls, and Sterling’s entirely legal discussion with staffers from the Senate Intelligence Committee.
No matter what you think all the later phone calls between Sterling and Risen indicate, short of evidence of a face-to-face meeting in this earlier period, the evidence seems to suggest Sterling was doing something that people in DC do all the time: point an investigative reporter to where she might find classified scoops, without providing those scoops themselves. ... The conviction of Jeffrey Sterling on all counts represents many things. But perhaps the most alarming is the principle that you can go to prison for having given an investigative reporter a tip that led him to chase down classified information about that tip and then publish it in an article or book.
Heh, so here's another option for Obama to help him shut down Gitmo...
Raúl Castro demands that US return Guantánamo base to Cuba
Cuba’s President Raúl Castro has demanded that the United States return the US base at Guantánamo Bay, lift the half-century trade embargo on Cuba and compensate his country for damages before the two nations re-establish normal relations.
Castro told a summit of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States that Cuba and the US are working toward full diplomatic relations but “if these problems aren’t resolved, this diplomatic rapprochement wouldn’t make any sense”. ...
On Wednesday, Castro emphasised an even broader list of Cuban demands, saying that while diplomatic ties may be re-established, normal relations with the US depend on a series of concessions that appear highly unlikely in the near future.
“The re-establishment of diplomatic relations is the start of a process of normalising bilateral relations, but this will not be possible while the blockade still exists, while they don’t give back the territory illegally occupied by the Guantánamo naval base,” Castro said.
He demanded that the US end the transmission of anti-Castro radio and television broadcasts and deliver “just compensation to our people for the human and economic damage that they’re suffered”.
US plan to track drivers went much wider, new documents reveal
Federal agencies tried to use vehicle license-plate readers to track the travel patterns of Americans on a much wider scale than previously thought, with new documents showing the technology was proposed for use to monitor public meetings.
The American Civil Liberties Union released more documents this week revealing for the first time the potential scale of a massive database containing the data of millions of drivers, logged from automatic license plate readers around the US.
Further documents released by the ACLU on Wednesday show that Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) officials in Phoenix planned on “working closely” with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) to monitor public gun shows with the automatic technology in 2009.
Although the DEA has said the proposal was not acted upon, the revelations raise questions about how much further the secret vehicle surveillance extends, which other federal bodies are involved and which other groups may have been targeted.
“The broad thrust of the DEA is to spread its program broadly and catch data and travel patterns on a massive scale,” Jay Stanley, a senior policy analyst with ACLU, told the Guardian. “This could be a really amazing level of surveillance that we’ve not seen before in this country.”
The ACLU warned that the build-up of a vehicle surveillance database, the existence of which first surfaced on Monday, stemmed from the DEA’s appetite for asset forfeiture, a controversial practice of seizing possessions at traffic stops and vehicle pullovers if agents suspect they are criminal proceeds.
Canada tracks millions of downloads daily
FCC vote to force high-speed internet upgrades angers cable industry
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) looks set to redefine what high-speed internet means on Thursday in a vote that has angered the cable industry.
One of the FCC’s duties it to make sure that broadband internet services are being deployed across the US. It has the power to enforce upgrades if it feels broadband is not being deployed in a timely manner.
Broadband internet is currently defined by the regulator as 4 megabits per second (Mbps) for downloads and 1Mbps for uploads, a standard set in 2010 that is well below the current national average of 32.4Mbps downloads and 9.9Mbps uploads as measured by broadband tester Ookla.
But many areas of the US still have poor internet access. Under the Telecommunications Act of 1996 the FCC is charged by Congress with ensuring that broadband access is rolled out in a “reasonable and timely” manner. Its last report on the subject found 19m Americans still did not have access to high speed internet.
FCC chairman Tom Wheeler wants to update the definition of what constitutes broadband to 25Mbps for downloads and 3Mbps for uploads, a move that could give the regulator greater authority to force upgrades from internet service providers.
US Announces Support of Neo-Nazis
Pentagon officials confirmed last week that US troops will deploy to Ukraine in the spring to help build the Ukrainian National Guard. In addition to sending US troops, Washington has already sent heavy military equipment and has earmarked $19 million for Ukrainian forces.
In its announcement, the Pentagon failed to mention that the Ukrainian National Guard includes the Azov Battalion, a pronounced neo-Nazi group that has reportedly been involved in the recent violence in Ukraine. ...
In the context of the US opposing a UN resolution designed to combat glorification of Nazism (the only other countries to vote against the resolution were Canada and Ukraine) an impression is created that the US will use any means necessary to achieve its goals in Eurasia.
"Ukraine, a new and important space on the Eurasian chessboard, is a geopolitical
pivot because its very existence as an independent country helps to transform
Russia. Without Ukraine, Russia ceases to be a Eurasian empire," wrote
former US National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski in his 1997 book, The
Grand Chessboard.
"However, if Moscow regains control over Ukraine, with its 52 million people and major resources as well as access to the Black Sea, Russia automatically again regains the wherewithal to become a powerful imperial state, spanning Europe and Asia," said Brzezinski, who has been labeled, "The man behind Obama’s foreign policy."
Obama Cements Ties With New Saudi King, Who's Already Overseen Four Beheadings
In the five days since Saudi Arabia's King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud took the throne, he has already overseen at least four beheadings, which critics say underscores the brutality of the regime, as well as the hypocrisy of the United States for holding the oil-rich country as one of its closest allies in the Middle East.
The Saudi regime has been criticized for state executions by public beheadingand stoning for "crimes" that include sorcery, drug smuggling, adultery, apostasy, and same-sex intercourse. According to the Death Penalty database, maintained by Cornell University Law School, the country has a high rate of executions, with at least 16 carried out since January, and at least 87 in 2014.
News of the executions broke amid a highly-publicized trip by Obama to attend the funeral of late King Abdullah and cement relations with his successor, King Salman. Following Abdullah's death, top U.S. officials from both sides of the political aisle have raced to heap praise upon the House of Saud.
Ahead of his visit to Riyadh, Obama said that the he would not challenge the state's track record. "Sometimes we have to balance our need to speak to them about human rights issues with immediate concerns that we have in terms of countering terrorism or dealing with regional stability," Obama told CNN on Tuesday.
Legacy of Endless Afghan War Includes Nation Plagued by Unexploded Bombs
As seen in other abandoned battlefields in the anals of U.S. wars overseas, new reporting out of Afghanistan shows that among the other deadly legacies left behind by foreign troops are tens of thousands unexploded munitions dropped from the sky or left in the ground that will continue to kill and maim civilians long after the "official" fighting has stopped.
Reporting from the Afghan city of Khost, Guardian foreign correspondent Sune Engel Rasmussen reviewed data and spoke with members of the UN's Mine Action Coordination Centre of Afghanistan (Macca) to learn that unexploded bombs and shells in Afghanistan "are killing and maiming people at a rate of more than one a day"—the vast majority of whom are children.
Citing MACCA statistics from 2014, Rasmussen reports "there were 369 casualties in the past year, including 89 deaths. The rate rose significantly in October and November when 93 people were injured, 84 of them children. Twenty died."
Border Fire: UN peacekeeper dead after IDF shells Lebanon border
Playing With Fire on the Lebanese Border
Since the end of the last war between Israel and Lebanon in 2006, the prospect of renewed hostilities between the two countries has been viewed as almost inevitable by most observers. As heinous and destructive as that conflict was, it ultimately resolved none of the underlying issues between the respective parties and seemed only to set the table for yet another escalation of fighting.
Today’s events have primed both sides for just such an escalation.
After an Israeli drone strike on January 18th killed several high-ranking Hezbollah operatives (including the son of prolific former commander Imad Mughniyeh), the group delivered its expected retaliation today by ambushing an Israeli military convoy traveling through a disputed zone near the Lebanese border.
Also in response to the ambush, Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman called for a “harsh… disproportionate” response. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned in a speech that “all those who are challenging us on our northern border [near Lebanon], look at what happened in Gaza.”
With elections coming March 17, Netanyahu would be risking his already-fragile political standing by betting on the highly uncertain prospect of swift military victory against the group.
A new conflict would also risk further imperiling Netanyahu’s increasingly contentious relationship with the United States. The Obama administration is in the midst of sensitive nuclear negotiations with Hezbollah’s patron Iran, and those talks could be derailed by a resumption of major hostilities in South Lebanon. While a calculated derailment may serve Netanyahu’s short-term interests, the long-term price could be high; Netanyahu is already perceived to be manipulating the American political system to undermine administration policies.
Senators to introduce legislation to end US travel restrictions to Cuba
Eight Republican and Democratic US senators will introduce legislation on Thursday to end restrictions on US citizens’ travel to Cuba, the first effort in Congress toward ending the US embargo since President Barack Obama moved to normalize relations last month.
The bill would end legal restrictions on travel to the island by US citizens and legal residents, according to a statement about the senators’ plans.
It would also end restrictions on banking transactions related to that travel. ...
The senators backing the bill include Republicans Jeff Flake, Jerry Moran, Michael Enzi and John Boozman, as well as Democrats Patrick Leahy, Richard Durbin, Tom Udall and Sheldon Whitehouse.
A companion bill will be introduced in the US House of Representatives next week by Republican Representative Mark Sanford and Democratic Representative Jim McGovern.
New Greek PM voices 'discontent' with EU stmt blaming Russia for Mariupol attack
Judge in S.C. tosses sit-in convictions for Friendship Nine
A South Carolina judge on Wednesday threw out the convictions of the Friendship Nine, who were jailed in 1961 after a sit-in protest in Rock Hill, South Carolina, during the civil rights movement.
"Today is a victory in race relations in America," said Bernice King, daughter of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., said in a news conference following the ruling. "It is a new day."
The prosecutor who pushed for this momentous day, 16th Circuit Solicitor Kevin Brackett of Rock Hill, cited King's father when explaining to CNN on Tuesday why he was motivated to take up the cause of the Friendship Nine: "The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice." ...
When Circuit Court Judge John C. Hayes III, the nephew of the judge who sentenced these largely unsung civil rights heroes almost 5½ decades ago, announced that the convictions and sentences were officially vacated, the 250 people in the courtroom broke into a 20-second standing ovation. Another 250 spectators looked on in two overflow rooms within the courthouse.
The Strange Case of Darren Wilson’s Mysterious Disappearing Duty Belt
On August 9, after he shot and killed 18-year-old Michael Brown, Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson called his superiors to the scene.
Wilson then drove himself to the Ferguson Police Department where he washed his hands and inspected his gun. He sealed it, still bloodied, in a yellow envelope he handed over as evidence.
After he took off his uniform shirt, Wilson was brought to a local ER to treat his injuries; he left the shirt and duty belt at the police station. According to both a 200-page police report on the investigation and testimony given to the grand jury tasked with deciding whether or not to indict Wilson, an unnamed St. Louis County Police officer then took the belt into custody.
But for some reason, that belt did not remain in police custody. According to testimony, the belt somehow ended up in the trunk of Wilson's personal car — the grand jury was never told how or why the belt was returned to Wilson — where it remained for more than a month until his lawyer submitted it to authorities as evidence in the ongoing investigation into Brown's death.
"Officers in officer-involved shootings don't drive themselves anywhere. They do not wash up. They do not handle evidence. They are sequestered, escorted to the station or hospital, and monitored for stress or trauma," Ron Martinelli, a forensic criminologist specializing in police practices and a former cop, told VICE News. "After an officer-involved shooting, the officer's gun and his duty belt are going to be confiscated, and they're not going to be given back to the officer. They're going to be sequestered so we can forensically examine those objects."
Obama Proposes Pissing Away $534 Billion - A Record Pentagon Budget for 2016
It’s time once again for a new annual military spending bill. Not only has President Obama decided that he is going to once again ignore spending caps and seek $35 billion more in the baseline defense budget than the caps allow, he is also gunning for a record.
The $534 billion base defense budget will be largest in American history. surpassing the $530 billion he got in 2012. At least on paper, overall spending is supposed to be less than back then, as the emergency war funding tacked on top of that baseline budget was greater in 2012.
Hellraiser Preview
Sherman, set the time machine for tomorrow's Hellraisers Journal which will feature the statement of Mother Jones on Rockefeller's proposed employee representation plan: "You can't fool my boys."
Tune in at 2pm!
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Sen. Sanders Presents $1 Trillion Infrastructure Bill as Job Creator
The Evening Greens
Could Drilling Moratorium be 'Nail in Coffin' for Fracking in Scotland?
Citing public health and safety concerns, the Scottish government on Wednesday announced a ban against fracking until "the voices of the communities likely to be most affected are heard."
Introduced by Energy Minister Fergus Ewing, the new policy places an open-ended moratorium on granting permits for unconventional gas drilling in the country.
"Fergus Ewing’s announcement today is huge victory for the communities, individuals and groups who have been campaigning to stop this dirty industry in Scotland," said Dr. Richard Dixon, director of Friends of the Earth Scotland. "This moratorium is a very big nail in the coffin for the unconventional gas and fracking industry in Scotland."
Speaking before the Members of Scottish Parliament, or MSPs, at Holyrood Palace in Edinburgh, Ewing said: "I want to ensure that the voices of the communities likely to be most affected are heard, and are heard in a more formal and structured way." ...
Though Ewing's proposal falls short of the outright ban sought by environmentalists and other concerned residents, Dixon said he is confident that any serious examination of the "mounting evidence of health and environmental concerns" will lead to a full ban.
Oil Should Stay in the Ground: Robert Redford on Republican Climate Change Deniers and Keystone XL
Amid Gas Drilling Boom, Investigators Warn of Systemic Pipeline Safety Hazards
A day after a pipeline exploded in West Virginia sending flames "hundreds of feet into the air," a new report by federal investigators israising concern that lax oversight of gas transmission pipelines may increasingly threaten people's lives and property.
The study(pdf), issued Tuesday by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), was released amid a growing push by the federal government to extract and exploit the vast gas holdings found in shale deposits around the U.S..
The report points to three recent pipeline explosions which prompted the investigation. In 2009, a pipeline explosion in Palm City, Florida sent 106 feet of buried pipeline into the air and released 36 million cubic feet of gas. A 2010 explosion in San Bruno, California killed nine people and destroyed 70 homes. And on December 11, 2012 a rupture in a pipeline that hadn't been inspected in 24 years destroyed three homes.
In each case, the report charges, gas companies failed to conduct inspections or tests that would have discovered problems before the explosions.
Polar Bears' Penile Bones Are Breaking Because of Industrial Pollution
Polar bears may be facing another threat, from pollutants that have been banned for decades. A study published in the January issue of Environmental Research linked elevated levels of PCBs to lower density in male bears' penile bones, which may disrupt the bears' reproductive abilities.
PCBs, or polychlorinated biphenyls, were introduced in the early 20th century for industrial purposes, but were banned in the United States in the late 1970s due to environmental and human health concerns. Because they can be stored in body fat, they're found in higher concentrations in animals further up the food chain, and in animals like polar bears that have a high-fat diet. ...
Lower density in the penile bone could mean a higher potential for fractures and less success in mating. And the penile bone is not the only aspect of polar bear reproduction affected by contaminants like PCBs, which are in a class of chemicals known as endocrine disruptors.
Blog Posts of Interest
Here are diaries and selected blog posts of interest on DailyKos and other blogs.
What's Happenin' Is On Hiatus
The Petulant Entitlement Syndrome of Journalists
'People Live Here. Don’t Shoot': The Atmosphere Darkens as Divisions Deepen in Eastern Ukraine
U.S. Should Stay Out Of The Russo-Ukrainian Quarrel: Why The Conflict In Ukraine Isn't America's Business, Part I
Kurt
A Little Night Music
Cab Calloway - Minnie the Moocher
Cab Calloway - Calloway Boogie
Betty Boop & Cab Calloway - The Old Man Of the Mountain
Cab Calloway & his Band - Geechy Joe
Cab Calloway - Zaz Zuh Zaz
Cab Calloway - Between The Devil And The Deep Blue Sea
Cab Calloway's - Jitterbug Party
Cab Calloway's - The Skunk Song
Cab Calloway - St. James Infirmary
Cab Calloway ~ Market Street Stomp
Cab Calloway - Hot Toddy
Cab Calloway - A Bee Gazindt
Cab Calloway on Sesame Street - Hi De Ho Man
Cab Calloway - Mama, I Wanna Make Rhythm
Cab Calloway - The Ghost of Smokey Joe
Cab Calloway - Some Of These Days
Cab Calloway and His Cotton Club Orchestra - Reefer Man
Cab Calloway - Smoking Reefers
Cab Calloway - The Viper's Drag
Cab Calloway - Black Rhythm
It's National Pie Day!
The election is over, it's a new year and it's time to work on real change in new ways... and it's National Pie Day. This seemed like the perfect opportunity to tell you a little more about our new site and to start getting people signed up.
Come on over and sign up so that we can send you announcements about the site, the launch, and information about participating in our public beta testing.
Why is National Pie Day the perfect opportunity to tell you more about us? Well you'll see why very soon. So what are you waiting for?! Head on over now and be one of the first!
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