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MAGA makes its ugly priorities clear at the RNC
Further

Send Them Back: These People Are Hateful Human Locusts

Sorry, but much like your kids' projectile vomiting - remember it? - the them-and-us vitriol spewing from a crumbling, raving Grand Wizard and his Nazi-adjacent minions still persists in a "disinformation maelstrom" aimed at Fake News, "dumb women," raping-and-dog-eating "vile animals," windmills that "aren't wind," and Dems doing gender transition surgery on kids at recess as he pot-kettle-calls Bob Woodward, reporting on his Putin love-fest, "an angry little man, truly demented and deranged." Pleasemake it stop.

Trump's rancid word-salad has gotten so garbled even the both-sides New York Times finally deigned to write about it. Starting with the by-now-common lunatic moment when Trump claimed the audience "went crazy" for him at the Harris debate where there was no audience, they broke the shocking news it wasn't the only time he's seemed "confused," noting, "He rambles, he repeats himself, he roams from thought to thought," (sic) which are often incoherent, half-finished, or "factually fantastical." How does he ramble? Let us count the ways. Sharks, boats, Hannibal Lecter, his "beautiful" beach body, his "wide margin" in the polls, Komrade Kamala paying for “transgender operations on illegal aliens,” his "great day in Louisiana" which was in Georgia, his fear "North Korea is trying to kill me" though he meant Iran and his imaginary dystopian hellhole of an America where you can’t venture out to buy a loaf of bread without getting shot, mugged or raped by immigrants "living in those hotels and laughing at our soldiers."

Wednesday, the Times undid whatever meager good they may have done with a breezy piece on Trump's rallies - "freewheeling performances full of jokes and audience participation," presumably like shrieking "Send Them Back!" - to help readers see his "themes." WTF NYT? We wonder what "themes" they'd uncover in his call for a new Muslim ban, his plan to imprison people who oppose the overturning of Roe v Wade as well as climate protesters for up to 10 years, his strategy on Iran - "Hit the nuclear button first, that's what it's for, and worry about the rest later" - his "stunningly stupid," The Purge-like public safety idea for "one really violent day" - "and I mean real rough" - and "the word will get out and it will end immediately." He also said JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon endorsed him (not), charged migrants "are ripping down and burning our shopping centers," and mused about a fly at the podium: "I wonder where the fly came from? Two years ago, I wouldn’t have had a fly up here. We can’t take it any longer.”

Not just the crazy is escalating; so is the stomach-churning misogyny. Color us shocked. Fishing for any schoolyard diss that comes into his mean wee brain, the accomplished Kamala Harris is "stupid," “low IQ,” "mentally disabled," "a bad person": "Joe Biden became mentally impaired. Kamala was born that way." The master of projection on his debate loss: "We had a woman debating. She just talked about, like, the birds and the bees. She didn’t talk about...when you asked a question, there was never an answer...It's all lies. Everything she says is lies." The sexual predator on Roe v Wade: "And the women thing - they'll understand I did a great thing." The ultimate, infantalizing patriarch on a choice-free future: "I will be your protector. You will no longer be thinking about abortion.” On The View's hosts who welcomed Harris: They're “degenerates” and "dumb women." The ugly bottom line from women who know and want better than his "thoroughly stifling" 19th century vision of womanhood: "The truth is, he hates all of us."

Most grotesquely, the racism is spiraling, gushing, curdling, ever more vicious. Brown-skinned migrants are “vermin,” "foreign jihad sympathizers," "not humans," and "infesting" America, says the blood-and-soil eugenicist who's openly embraced Nazi race science: "I'm proud to have that German blood." "Murder is in a person’s genes, and we got a lot of bad genes in our country right now," he says. "American girls are being raped and sodomized and murdered by savage criminal aliens." His last Wisconsin rally featured huge photos of three people killed by undocumented migrants - two stabbings, one meth-crazed car crash - and banners urging, “Deport Illegals Now!" Each day, a local right-wing site helpfully highlights those "horrific" crimes by non-citizens, declaring, "Every state is a border state." Trump vowed to "liberate Wisconsin from the mass migrant invasion" of what he called "stone-cold killers and monsters" wanting to “rape, pillage, thieve, plunder and kill the people of America." The crowd roared, "Send them back!"

Of course the lunatic nadir of this racist frenzy was in Springfield, Ohio where, Trump famously declared during the debate, "They're eating the dogs!" Improbably for a party boasting puppy-murdering Kristi Noem and a Project 2025 author who killed a neighbor's dog with a shovel, the fictional story proved wildly popular: Incorporating the key "they are taking from us" concept, it extends the migrant threat to a blood libel against beloved pets, a perfect, wrenching parable of American decline. After the tale prompted 33 bomb threats against schools and terrified Haitians, city officials repeatedly insisted there is "no evidence" of said pet-eating by what are legal Haitian migrants revitalizing the economy, and a Haitian advocacy group filed seven charges against the idiotic Vance and Trump's "aggravated menacing" - after that, Miss Sassy Pants, the missing Maine Coon cat who started the insanity, emerged uneaten from a few days' nap in the basement of MAGA owner Anna Gilgore, who's likely leery of her new black neighbors - we love the poorly educated! - but apologized to them anyway.

Of course the return of Miss Sassy Pants did nothing - we also really love alternative facts! - to stem the flood of vile immigrant demonizing at the core of Trump's otherwise entirely hollow campaign. The bonkers, brazenly false claims that migrants are to blame for all of America's ills still rage: They've “unleashed a deadly plague of migrant crime," they're draining social services, trying to vote, making housing expensive, taking jobs, bringing fentanyl, boosting inflation - all ugly fiction. Often, state and local officials take their purported leader's malevolent lead and run with it. Arizona is furiously combing voter rolls to look for illegal voters; so far they've found 97,688, but they're all old, white Republicans. Ohio's Portage County Sheriff Bruce Zuchowski asked constituents to report nearby homes with yard signs for Harris, aka "the Flip-Flopping, Laughing Hyena"; that way, when they arrive in the neighborhood, he'll know where to direct the perpetrators of the "migrant crime wave," aka the "illegal human locusts.”

He has much deplorable company. Louisiana GOP Rep. Clay Higgins, a failed ex-cop and David Duke fan who argued the FBI brought feds to Jan. 6 on "ghost buses" and once filmed a selfie inside an Auschwitz gas chamber, called the Haitians "wild thugs" and “slapstick gangsters” from "the nastiest country in the western hemisphere" who needed to "get their ass out of our country.” He later deleted the post, but when confronted he dug in. "It's all true," he squawked. "We do have freedom of speech - I’ll say what I want. It’s not a big deal to me. It’s like something stuck to the bottom of my boot. Just scrape it off and move on with my life." Jasmine Crockett had a word; so did Hakeem Jeffries, calling Higgins "an election-denying, conspiracy-peddling racial arsonist - this is who they've become. Still, fellow Louisiana Nazi MAGA Mike defended "the gentleman": "Look, he prayed about it, and he regretted it, and he pulled the post down...But you know, we move forward. We believe in redemption around here."

They also believe in mass deportation so fervently they won't let facts - like Miss Sassy Pants is fine, thanks - get in the way of their racist narrative. Vance, who also blames kids' car seat rules for bringing down American birth rates (don't ask), never apologized for starting the Springfield furor, but he did pivot to attack the media: “Did you ever think about listening to people instead of harassing them...Listening to people speak their truth?" (Weirdo Scumbags 'R Us). Meanwhile Trump, whose enduring daddy issues spark outbursts like, "THE WORLD IS LAUGHING AT US AS FOOLS, THEY ARE STEALING OUR JOBS AND OUR WEALTH. WE CANNOT LET THEM LAUGH ANY LONGER,” has lumbered ahead with rants about the "beautiful little town (he's never seen) taken over by 32,000 illegal immigrants" - though they're legal and it's about 10,000 - who will be "the first rounded up...That's a terrible thing that happened. They've gotta get much tougher. We’re gonna get these people out. You have to get them the hell out."

Weeks ago, he said he was going to deep, dark Springfield. "You may never see me again, but that’s OK. I gotta do what I gotta do," he said. "'What ever happened to Trump? Well, he never got out of Springfield." (Cue Gary Larson's Far Sidecartoon of a dog trying to lure a cat into a washing machine with a scribbled "Fud" sign as he mutters, "Oh please, oh please...") After both the GOP mayor and governor said it'd be "fine" if he didn't visit, Trump instead descended on Charleroi, Penn., another now-"totally different place" with another "foreign invasion" he promptly "warped and weaponized." Seething about "the cruelty Kamala Harris has inflicted" with "thousands and thousands of migrants from the most dangerous places on earth," Trump seethed, "You have to get 'em the hell out." Again, local officials pushed back, noting it's 700-800 Haitians and they've really helped rebuild their post-Covid economy. The Manager Joe Manning: “There’s what the former president is saying, and then there’s easily observable reality."

Regrettably, the former president is wholly uninterested in observable reality, which is why he's doggedly charging on with his plan for "the biggest deportation force this country has ever seen." Appropriately, key to this dystopian, despicable initiative to deport over 10 million people is dystopian, despicable Stephen 'Goebbels' Miller, whose last project of brutally separating screaming babies from their distraught mothers at the border and/or putting them all in cages we all remember so fondly. Reportedly using as a model Eisenhower's infamous, deadly Operation Wetback to push migrants back into Mexico, a vast militaristic venture using trucks, planes and cargo ships later compared to slave ships, Miller giddily envisions a nationwide “detain-and-remove strategy”; for this noble cause, he will build enormous prison camps, each housing up to 70,000 immigrants, that he excitedly boasts will be "greater than any national infrastructure project in American history" - a vision one former DHS official likens to "Schindler’s List."

In this election season, the loathsome Miller has been popping up in interviews to confirm he's implausibly grown ever more vile. This week, he inexplicably appeared on Fox to offer "vomit-inducing" dating tips to other white supremacist ghouls. (Please don't ask). Last month, he had an on-camera hissy fit after NTN24 reporter José María del Pino challenged numbers he was spouting to support his claim that Venezuela is now safer than the U.S. after sending all their criminals here, a theory based on a debunked story about Venezuelan gangs taking over a Colorado apartment complex. As the Venezuelan-born del Pino kept asking, "Are you trusting the figures of the dictatorship?" Miller got redder, and louder, and burst. “I am trusting the fact (Harris) is letting illegal immigrants into this country who are raping and murdering children,” shrieked the reviled-by-his-family descendant of immigrants. "CHILDREN ARE BEING RAPED AND MURDERED!" Del Pino: "Why are you yelling?" Miller stalked off. Only the best people.

Clutching at the only sorry facsimile of a "policy" he has - hatemongering and scapegoating poor people of color (along with Dems) for everything wrong in the world - Trump continues to play the vicious race card. The details can vary: In a recently unearthed audio from an August fundraiser in Colorado, he unleashes, for bootlickers willing to pay up to $500,000 to listen to it, a foul tirade claiming Democratic Republic of Congo officials just dropped 22 newly released prison inmates into the U.S - a charge the DRC flatly denies. In his supposed encounter with the supposed former inmates, "We said, ‘Where do you come from?’ They said, ‘Prison’. ‘What did you do?’ ‘None of your fucking business.'" "You know why? Because they're murderers," he sneered. "These are the toughest people, coming in from (all) the bad parts, the parts where they’re rough, and the only thing good is they make our criminals look extremely nice." He only left out one exquisite bit of the supposed story: He flew in on Jeffrey Epstein's former jet.

From Bob Woodward's new book - he's suing him - it also transpires that as "president" and in the face of 1,125,000 American deaths from COVID he was secretly talking with and gifting Daddy Putin much-needed tests. Vance in response to outrage: "Is there something wrong with engaging in diplomacy?" So many lies, so little time. At a Pennsylvania rally, he bragged of his "beautiful" rallies, “We never have an empty seat, look at it.” Cue video of half-empty arena. At a Michigan rally, non-auto-worker yahoos wore Auto Workers For Trump shirts. At a flamboyant return to Butler, "this hallowed place" where his ear was grazed - "This man cannot be stopped," "In a true miracle God saved him" - he honored "our beautiful Corey" who died instead though he's joked about him. Then he lied about Dems: "They impeached me, indicted me tried to throw me off the ballot (and) maybe even tried to kill me. We have a very sick world." No wonder "undecided" voters look bewildered when asked about his "policies."

Because, per Paul Krugman, "The Trump campaign rests entirely on denouncing things that aren’t happening," he has now turned to another "firehose of lies" about the federal response to Hurricanes Helene and Milton, which he obviously calls "the worst ever." The lurid charges mount: Biden was at the beach, "they" control the weather, "they" only care about diversity not disasters, "they" stole all the FEMA money "so they could give it to illegal immigrants to vote for them" - which it turns out is what Trump did as president to fund migrant detentions; he also repeatedly, repulsively tried to deny disaster funds to blue states. A furious Biden pushed back - "He's lying" - as did peeved GOP pols demanding an end to "completely false" MAGA lies dangerously obstructing recovery efforts, and, again, observable reality.. They are in fact "deeply appreciative" of feds who are "working quickly," "working well," "a great team effort" and doing a "superb" job. Trump on the other hand, notes The Liberal Redneck, stays busy "tellin' lies and stirrin' shit."

And whining: 60 Minutes "must be investigated!" for their "FAKE NEWS SCAM" of editing Harris' interview, like every interview on every show, to make her look “more Presidential"; it's also "a major Campaign Finance Violation." "TAKE AWAY THE CBS LICENSE!' he screeched. "An UNPRECEDENTED SCANDAL!!! The Dems (should) concede the Election? WOW!” Yes, wow. He's also making windmill word salad - "The wind is bullshit" - trashing Detroit in Detroit - "Fuck this guy"- and as usual grifting. Having claimed the economy is so bad nobody can afford bacon - "the stomach is speaking" - he's launched a $100,000 Trump Victory Tour watch - "These watches are truly special" - and a $600-ish “Fight Fight Fight” watch - "Don’t wait, they will go fast!" He's also hawking crypto - AI needs a lot of electricity? with brilliant Barron as “DeFi visionary”? - and of course his $59.99 “God Bless the USA” Bible, which is not only selling fast in Oklahoma but, it turns out, is made in China. For under $3. Get your patriotic Chinese Bibles here. Don't wait, they will go fast.

O God who avenges, shine forth. - Psalms 94:1-2.

“God will bring into judgment both the righteous and the wicked, for there will be a time (to) judge every deed.” - Ecclesiastes 3:17

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Hurricane Milton
News

Fossil-Fueled Hurricane Milton Hammers Florida With Violent Winds, Massive Flooding

Hurricane Milton made landfall south of Tampa, Florida late Wednesday as a Category 3 storm after rapidly intensifying in the Gulf of Mexico, bringing devastating flooding and powerful winds that destroyed homes and knocked out power for millions.

Several tornadoes triggered by the monstrous storm—which was made stronger by ocean temperatures pushed higher by fossil fuel-driven climate change—killed an unspecified number of residents on Florida's Atlantic Coast, according to local authorities.

The Associated Pressreported that "about 125 homes were destroyed before the hurricane came ashore, many of them mobile homes in communities for senior citizens."

More than a million Floridians were under evacuation orders as Milton barreled toward the state.

While Milton was downgraded to a Category 2 storm shortly after making landfall and was tracking away from Florida's East Coast Thursday morning, the National Weather Service warned that "life-threatening storm surge, extreme winds, and flooding rains will continue to occur."

Video footage posted to social media provided a glimpse of the flooding in downtown Tampa:

Experts characterized Milton, which followed closely on the heels of Helene, as a historically powerful hurricane, pointing to its rapid transformation from a tropical storm into a Category 5 hurricane.

"Milton is the quickest storm on record to rapidly intensify into a Category 5 in the Gulf of Mexico," according toCBS News meteorologist Nikki Nolan.

Ahead of Milton's arrival in Florida, climate advocates and scientists pointed to the role of the fossil fuel industry and its political allies in misleading the public about the impacts of oil, gas, and coal emissions and obstructing action to confront the threat posed by warming temperatures.

"Things didn't have to be this way," Kathy Baughman McLeod, the CEO of Climate Resilience for All, wrote Wednesday. "If politicians had listened to scientists decades ago, and worked to gradually rein in fossil fuel pollution, the ocean wouldn't be so boiling hot—and Hurricane Milton wouldn't have had the fuel to balloon into such a monster storm."

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Dockworkers strike
News

Dockworkers Suspend Strike After Winning Tentative Deal With 62% Wage Boost

The union representing East and Gulf Coast dockworkers suspended its strike on Thursday after reaching a tentative agreement with shipping giants that reportedly includes a 62% wage boost over six years.

The International Longshoremen's Association (ILA) said in a joint statement with the United States Maritime Alliance (USMX) that the union would suspend its strike until January 15 so the two sides can "return to the bargaining table to negotiate all other outstanding issues."

"Effective immediately, all current job actions will cease and all work covered by the Master Contract will resume," the statement added.

The tentative deal followed three days on the picket line during which dockworkers—who are essential to the functioning of the U.S. economy—cast their fight as a critical struggle against multinational corporations that raked in huge profits during the Covid-19 pandemic and enriched their investors as wages failed to keep pace with inflation.

“These companies... they don't give a fuck about us," Harold Daggett, the ILA's president, said from a picket line in New Jersey earlier this week. "Well, we're gonna show them they're gonna have to give a fuck about us. Because nothing's gonna move without us."

According to one estimate, the dozens of ports affected by the strike handle a combined 25% of the United States' international trade.

The Associated Pressreported Thursday that the two sides reached a tentative deal after "the ports sweetened their wage offer from about 50% over six years to 62%."

The union originally sought a 77% raise, but in recent days Daggett said the ILA would pursue a 61.5% raise for workers over the course of a new contract. Daggett rejected the shipping industry's previous wage offers as "insulting."

"Congratulations to ILA members for making huge strides and thank you to the millions of union members who stood in solidarity with them."

Under the contract that expired earlier this week, starting pay for dockworkers was $20 an hour.

Any final agreement must be ratified by union members, who also demanded protections from automation and other benefit improvements. Reutersreported that automation is among the "key issues that remain unresolved."

"When we STRIKE, we WIN!" the AFL-CIO, the nation's largest federation of unions, wrote on social media late Thursday. "Congratulations to ILA members for making huge strides and thank you to the millions of union members who stood in solidarity with them."

U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) also congratulated "the 50,000 port workers who went on strike against the outrageous corporate greed of the shipping industry and won a historic increase in wages."

"Billionaires in the shipping industry must not be allowed to get even richer by replacing port workers with robots," the senator wrote.

Sanders added that Acting Labor Secretary Julie Su "did a great job negotiating a tentative agreement to increase the wages of port workers by 62% over six years."

The Biden administration declined to intervene on the side of industry to halt the strike, and President Joe Biden issued a statement earlier this week noting that "ocean carriers have made record profits since the pandemic and in some cases profits grew in excess of 800% compared to their profits prior to the pandemic."

"Executive compensation has grown in line with those profits and profits have been returned to shareholders at record rates," said Biden. "It's only fair that workers, who put themselves at risk during the pandemic to keep ports open, see a meaningful increase in their wages as well."

In a statement following news of the tentative deal, Biden said that "today's tentative agreement on a record wage and an extension of the collective bargaining process represents critical progress towards a strong contract."

"I congratulate the dockworkers from the ILA, who deserve a strong contract after sacrificing so much to keep our ports open during the pandemic," the president said. "And I applaud the port operators and carriers who are members of the U.S. Maritime Alliance for working hard and putting a strong offer on the table."

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workers replace a lead pipe
News

EPA Sets 'Landmark' Clean Water Rule—But Trump Victory Would Put It At Risk

The Biden administration on Tuesday set a final rule requiring the replacement of nearly all of the nation's lead pipes within ten years, a clean drinking water initiative that drew praise from public health experts and advocacy groups.

The new rule, which The New York Times and The Washington Post both called "landmark," was brought forth by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and requires the replacement of an estimated 9.2 million lead service lines serving millions of people across the country. Lead is a neurotoxin that can cause long-term damage to the brain and nervous system, particularly to children.

The administration of former President Donald Trump, the Republican nominee, had "slowed the pace of lead service line replacements," according to Food & Water Watch, an advocacy group.

"We applaud the Biden-Harris administration for strengthening the rule to remove lead from our drinking water," Mary Grant, a campaign director at Food & Water Action, said in a statement. "These long-awaited improvements will replace the weak regulation adopted by Donald Trump, and in doing so, will protect millions of people from lasting harm from this dangerous neurotoxin."

Grant said the new rule highlighted the stakes of the upcoming presidential election, in which Trump faces Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee.

"Today's action is yet another example of the stark difference between the two presidential candidates," she added. "Only Vice President Kamala Harris is serious about the safety of our drinking water. A Trump reelection could reverse progress on safe water."

Lead, prized for its durability, has been used in water pipes since Ancient Rome—the English word "plumbing" descends from the Latin word "plumbum," meaning lead.

Congress banned the construction of new lead pipes in the U.S. in 1986 and passed the Safe Drinking Water Act, which includes regulations on lead, in 1991.

However, phasing out the use of older pipes has gone very slowly, to the frustration of public health experts. There has been "no meaningful improvement in protecting communities" in three decades, until now, according to a statement from Earthjustice, an advocacy group.

"Lead contamination is a longstanding public health emergency, and the Biden-Harris administration's rule is a monumental step forward in addressing the urgent need for safe, clean drinking water," said Patrice Simms, Earthjustice's vice president of litigation for healthy communities.

People of color and on low incomes are disproportionately affected by lead contamination, which is often found in big cities. Chicago has more lead pipes than any other U.S. city.

Flint, Michigan—a majority Black city—faced a public health crisis caused by lead pipes starting in 2014. Then-President Barack Obama signed an emergency declaration and sent aid to the city in 2016. More than 100,000 residents were exposed to elevated lead levels.

Still, the federal government didn't move to tighten lead rules until November 2023, when the EPA issued a proposal to do so. The announcement of the final rule on Tuesday was accompanied by an outpouring of support—and relief.

"A game changer for kids and communities, EPA's finalized lead and copper rule improvements will ensure that we will never again see the preventable tragedy of a city, or a child, poisoned by their lead pipes," Mona Hanna, a pediatrician in Flint and a public health professor at Michigan State University whose research helped expose the crisis there, said in the EPA statement announcing the rule change.

Betsy Southerland, the former director of science and technology in the EPA's water division, also celebrated the agency's move, according to an Environmental Protection Network statement:

The American people have known for over 30 years that there is no safe level of lead and have waited too long for lead pipes to be replaced. Finally, the lead pipes that deliver water to over 9 million homes will be replaced before they damage the mental and physical development of another generation of children. Today is the first time there is an actual deadline for lead pipe replacement to happen and significant financial and technical assistance to get the job done.

The White House is counting on the initiative being popular, especially in swing states in the Midwest. President Joe Biden is scheduled to visit Wisconsin to "tout" the new policy, the Timesreported. The EPA's statement says it will "create good-paying local jobs."

Natalie Quillian, a White House deputy chief of staff, said that "all Americans, no matter where they come from, should have access to their most basic needs, including being able to turn on the tap and drink clean drinking water without fear," according to the Post.

The new rule, in addition to mandating the replacement of pipes, establishes a stricter standard for lead contamination, moving it from 15 parts per billion to 10 ppb and requiring public utilities to provide filters if that level is exceeded. Some advocates had called for a standard between 0 and 5 ppb.

Utilities are expected to challenge the new rule in court, as they've done with the EPA's regulations on "forever chemicals" in drinking water.

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An Amazon delivery driver carries boxes
News

With NLRB Complaint, Amazon Drivers 'One Step Closer' to Conditions They Deserve

Weeks after the National Labor Relations Board ruled that retail giant Amazon is a joint employer of its delivery drivers and is legally obligated to bargain with their union, the board on Wednesday issued a formal complaint, saying the company "failed and refused" to negotiate with the Teamsters to secure a contract for the workers.

The company acted illegally, says the complaint, when it terminated its contract with Battle-Tested Strategies, a contractor that employs the drivers, after they unionized.

The complaint also accuses Amazon of making "unlawful threats and promises," holding anti-union captive audience meetings, discouraging union activities by delaying employee start times and increasing workplace inspections, and refusing to share information with the union.

Amazon has until October 15 to respond to the complaint, or the NLRB will prosecute the company before an administrative law judge in March 2025.

"Amazon wants to reap the benefits of drivers' labor without having to take on any of the responsibility for their well-being—and those days are over," said Teamsters general president Sean O'Brien. "This decision brings us one step closer to getting Amazon workers the pay, working conditions, and contracts they deserve. Amazon has no choice but to meet us at the negotiating table."

In August the NLRB concluded an investigation and found that although Amazon employs the drivers through a contractor, it exerts sufficient control over the workers to be considered their employer under federal labor law.

"Amazon can no longer hide behind its DSP [Delivery Service Partner] program to skirt responsibility for its driver workforce," said Bryant Cline, an Amazon driver and member of the Teamsters Local 396 union in Palmdale, California, which 84 drivers voted to join last year. "Today's decision by the labor board makes official what we've long known to be true—DSP drivers are Amazon employees, and we have a fundamental right to organize, unionize, and demand fair treatment and a contract from our multibillion-dollar employer."

Also on Wednesday, more than 100 delivery workers at a warehouse in San Francisco voted to join their local Teamsters union.

"The Amazon Teamsters movement grows bigger and stronger every day and will not be stopped," said the union. "Amazon workers: this is our moment."

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A veiled female Palestinian Red Crescent paramedic walks by a row of bombed ambulances in Gaza
News

'Crime Against Humanity': UN Inquiry Details Israeli 'Extermination' of Gaza Healthcare

For the second time this year, a United Nations commission tasked with investigating Israel's conduct during its yearlong invasion and blockade of Gaza has found that the U.S.-armed Israeli military is committing crimes against humanity against Palestinians.

The Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory released a report Thursday detailing how "Israel has perpetrated a concerted policy to destroy Gaza's healthcare system as part of a broader assault on Gaza, committing war crimes and the crime against humanity of extermination with relentless and deliberate attacks on medical personnel and facilities."

"The commission also investigated the treatment of Palestinian detainees in Israel and of Israeli and foreign hostages in Gaza since October 7, 2023 and concluded that Israel and Palestinian armed groups are responsible for torture and sexual and gender-based violence," the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) said in a summary of the report.

The report cites the U.N. World Health Organization's findings that Israel carried out 498 attacks on healthcare facilities in the Gaza Strip between October 7, 2023—when Hamas launched the deadliest-ever attack on Israel—and July 30, 2024.

"A total of 747 persons were killed directly in those attacks, and 969 others were injured, and 110 facilities were affected," the publication states. The report calls the attacks "widespread and systematic."

The commission continued:

Israeli security forces carried out air strikes against hospitals, causing considerable damage to buildings and surroundings, as well as multiple casualties; surrounded and besieged hospital premises; prevented the entry of goods and medical equipment and exit/entry of civilians; issued evacuation orders but prevented safe evacuations; and raided hospitals, arresting hospital staff and patients. Israeli security forces also obstructed access by humanitarian agencies.

"Israel must immediately stop its unprecedented wanton destruction of healthcare facilities in Gaza," said commission chair Navi Pillay. "By targeting healthcare facilities, Israel is targeting the right to health itself with significant long-term detrimental effects on the civilian population. Children in particular have borne the brunt of these attacks, suffering both directly and indirectly from the collapse of the health system."

OHCHR said that "attacks on medical facilities in Gaza, particularly those devoted to pediatric and neonatal care, have led to incalculable suffering of child patients, including newborns."

"In continuing these attacks, Israel has violated children's right to life, denied children access to basic healthcare, and deliberately inflicted conditions of life resulting in the destruction of generations of Palestinian children and, potentially, the Palestinian people as a group," the agency added.

The commission's inquiry found that as of July 15, "113 ambulances had been attacked and at least 61 had been damaged," including vehicles used by the U.N., International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), the Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS), and other organizations.

"Access was also reduced owing to closure of areas by Israeli security forces, [and] delays in coordination of safe routes, checkpoints, searches, or destruction of roads," the report notes.

The commission investigated the January 29 attack that killed 6-year-old Hind Rajab and six of her relatives, as well as two paramedics who had Israeli permission to attempt to rescue them.

"They were attacked while trying to evacuate in their car," the report said of the family. "The ambulance, carrying two paramedics, Yousef Zeino and Ahmed al-Madhoun, was dispatched after its route had been coordinated with Israeli security forces. It was hit by a tank shell at a distance of some 50 meters from the family's car."

"Hind was still alive at the time that the ambulance was dispatched," the publication noted. "The presence of Israeli security forces in the area prevented access. As a result, the family members' bodies could not be retrieved from their bullet-ridden car until 12 days after the incident."

Israel Defense Forces officials have repeatedly claimed that no IDF troops were in the area at the time of the attack. Multiple journalistic investigations, including one published Tuesday by Sky News, showed that Israeli tank and machine gun fire killed the family and paramedics.

The new report's authors also noted that "hundreds of medical personnel, including three hospital directors and the head of an orthopedic department, as well as patients and journalists were arrested by Israeli security forces" during raids on Gaza medical facilities.

"Reportedly, 128 health workers remain detained by Israeli authorities as of July 15, including four PRCS staff members," the publication states.

"The institutionalized mistreatment of Palestinian detainees, a longstanding characteristic of the occupation, took place under direct orders from the Israeli minister in charge of the prison system, Itamar Ben-Gvir, and was fueled by Israeli government statements inciting violence and retribution," said OHCHR.

The commission report also detailed crimes committed by Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups against Israelis on and after October 7, 2023, when more than 1,100 Israelis and others were killed—at least some by so-called "friendly fire" and under the fratricidal Hannibal Directive—and over 240 people abducted.

Hostages "were mistreated to inflict physical pain and severe mental suffering, including physical violence, abuse, sexual violence, forced isolation, limited access to hygiene facilities, water and food, threats and humiliation," OHCHR said. "Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups committed the war crimes of torture, inhuman or cruel treatment, and the crimes against humanity of enforced disappearance and other inhumane acts causing great suffering or serious injury."

In June, the same U.N. commission found Israel's far-right government responsible for a range of war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Gaza Strip, including "extermination, torture, forcible transfer, and the use of starvation as a weapon of warfare."

Over the course of its 370-day assault on Gaza, Israeli forces have killed at least 42,010 Palestinians in the coastal enclave—most of them women and children—and wounded more than 97,700 others, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health and international agencies.

At least 10,000 Palestinians are missing and believed to be dead and buried beneath the rubble of hundreds of thousands of bombed buildings. Israel's "complete siege" of Gaza has forcibly displaced more than 90% of Gaza's 2.3 million people, and has contributed to the starvation and sickening of hundreds of thousands of Gazans.

Israel is on trial for genocide at the U.N. International Court of Justice. Meanwhile, International Criminal Court Prosecutor Karim Khan is seeking arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, and three Hamas leaders—at least one of whom, political chief Ismail Haniyeh, has been assassinated—for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity, including extermination.

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