The Rag Blog | The Latest in News and Views from the Progressive Front

Tom Hayden :
Battling Ebola: Cuba leads while U.S. lags

Posted on October 26, 2014 by Thorne Dreyer

The U.S. has 550 military personnel in Africa on counterterrorism missions while over 5,000 Africans have succumbed to the non-military threat of Ebola.

Cuban doctors on their way to West Africa to fight Ebola, October 2014. Photo by EFE via telesur.

By Tom Hayden | The Rag Blog | October 26, 2014

In what a New York Times editorial called “Cuba’s Impressive Role on Ebola” [Oct. 19], hundreds of Cuban doctors and nurses are being dispatched to West Africa to battle Ebola, train medical personnel, and create isolation and treatment centers. The Cubans are playing “the most robust role” of any country in battling the Ebola plague, which has erupted virulently because of a broad failure, according to the Times, “to produce medicines and vaccines for diseases that afflict poor countries.”

The U.S. has 550 military personnel in Africa on counterterrorism missions while over 5,000 Africans have succumbed to the non-military threat of Ebola. Cuba is taking action in part because Ebola, unchecked, will spread to the Caribbean, but also out a consistent sense of humanitarian duty which Washington fails to comprehend.
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Posted in RagBlog | Tagged Counter-terrorism, Cuba, Cuban Doctors, Ebola, Health Care, Humanitarian Aid, Medical Epidemics, Rag Bloggers, Tom Hayden, U.S. Foreign Policy, West Africa | Leave a comment

METRO | Lamar W. Hankins : The Supreme Court’s irrational Texas voter ID decision

Posted on October 22, 2014 by Thorne Dreyer

Justice Ginsburg called the law ‘purposely discriminatory’ and said it would disenfranchise ‘more than 600,000 registered Texas voters.’

Political cartoon by Nick Anderson / Houston Chronicle.

By Lamar W. Hankins | The Rag Blog | October 22, 2014

AUSTIN — The pre-dawn decision of a majority of Supreme Court Justices on October 18 to deny 600,000 Texans the right to vote in the upcoming election is among the court’s most patently irrational decisions since it declared George W. Bush the winner of the Florida presidential balloting 15 years ago by preventing the state from fairly counting all of the votes cast.

And make no mistake about this latest decision: it, too, is about votes — votes that the Republican majority on the Supreme Court worries will go overwhelmingly to Democrats. But it shouldn’t matter who receives the votes. What matters is that, in our system, the people should be able to vote without unnecessary and unjust interference from politicians in the legislatures and on the Supreme Court.
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Posted in Metro, RagBlog | Tagged Greg Abbott, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Lamar W. Hankins, Metro, Rag Bloggers, Supreme Court, Texas Voter ID Law, Voter Fraud, Voter Suppression | 1 Comment

METRO | Mercedes Lynn de Uriarte : Are Texas legislators just slow learners?

Posted on October 21, 2014 by Thorne Dreyer

Texas is not alone in its willingness to restrict its upscale education to a ‘possessive investment
in whiteness.’

Thousands marched on the Texas State Capitol in March 2011, to protest cuts in state education funding. Photo courtesy of Save Texas Schools Texas Public Radio.

By Mercedes Lynn de Uriarte | The Rag Blog | October 22, 2014

AUSTIN — The Texas legislature seems determined to govern with compulsive error repetition. Consider the recurring issue of education budgets and its subtext of directed disadvantage. This issue has ping-ponged between plaintiffs and state defendants for almost a half century.

The latest chapter came in August. District Judge John Dietz ruled that failing to provide enough money to educate all students adequately violates the state constitution. Dietz echoes rulings gaveled out years ago and repeatedly revisited.
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Posted in Metro, RagBlog | Tagged Austin Schools, Class Segregation, De Facto Segregation, Diversity, Education, Gentrification, Mercedes Lynn de Uriarte, Metro, Public Schools, Racism, Rag Bloggers, School Finance, Texas Legislature, Texas Politics | 1 Comment

METRO | Steve Russell : Bee Czar News

Posted on October 21, 2014 by Thorne Dreyer

Central Texas Bee Rescue is dedicated to seeing that bees scaring humans with their natural swarming behavior will help pay for their own preservation.

Walter Schumacher is the “Bee Czar.” Image from The American Honey Bee Protection Agency & Central Texas Bee Rescue.

By Steve Russell | The Rag Blog | October 22, 2014

AUSTIN — Last year, there was an emergency around a public housing project in Georgetown, just up IH-35 from Austin. A swarm of honeybees had ensconced itself in a tool shed and the residents, mostly elders, were scared. One of the residents had an allergy to bee stings, and so for him a mishap could be fatal.

The Fire Department was called, Animal Control was called, and eventually the bees were dispatched with insecticide. Lots of people questioned that action at the time. Time had published a cover story back in 2013 warning that nearly one third of U.S. honeybee colonies had died or disappeared since Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) broke out in 2004. Most people who pay attention to the news have by now heard of CCD, even though the causes of it are still hotly disputed.
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Posted in Metro, RagBlog | Tagged Bee Czar, Bee Rescue, Central Texas, Colony Collapse Disorder, Honey Bees, Metro, Rag Bloggers, Steve Russell, Walter Schumacher | Leave a comment

Bill Meacham :
IDEAS | Mental parasites

Posted on October 21, 2014 by Thorne Dreyer

Just as a parasitical lancet fluke can direct an ant to climb up a blade of grass, we are unknowingly manipulated by cultural memes.

Ant on leaf of grass. Free will or “fluke” of nature? Image from The Telegraph.

By Bill Meacham | The Rag Blog | October 21, 2014

What if your brain were taken over by a parasite and made you want something you would not ordinarily want? What if it took over your second-order thinking and made you want to want that thing? Would your will then be free?

This is not so far-fetched a scenario as it might seem. There are numerous examples of parasites infecting the brains of animals to make those animals act contrary to their own well-being. Here is one:
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Posted in RagBlog | Tagged Bill Meacham, Cultural Memes, Free Will, Ideas, Lancet Fluke, Nature, Parasites, Philosophy, Rag Bloggers, Second-Order Volition | 2 Comments

Harry Targ :
On democracy: ‘Can we talk?’

Posted on October 21, 2014 by Thorne Dreyer

The United States’ political system, we are told repeatedly, is the gold standard for the world.

Image from Philosophers for Change.

By Harry Targ | The Rag Blog | October 21, 2014

Through her decades of entertaining on stage and screen, [Joan] Rivers developed numerous classic bits and catchphrases, but three small words stand above the rest: “Can we talk?” (Kelli Bender @kbendernyc, 09/04/2014, also at People.com)

I never liked comedienne Joan Rivers who died recently. But her famous one-line introduction to talk show interviewers and stand-up performances is a powerful reminder that certain subjects might be dangerous to discuss in polite company. Whether the United States’ political system is a democratic one is such a subject.

Everything we Americans have learned since infancy suggests that the United States is a democracy. In fact, the United States political system, we are told repeatedly, is the gold standard for the world.
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Posted in RagBlog | Tagged American Society, Campaign Finance, Democracy, Electoral politics, Harry Targ, Rag Bloggers, Voter Suppression | Leave a comment

Murray Polner :
Silent rabbis

Posted on October 20, 2014 by Thorne Dreyer

Arthur Hertzberg believed that the quasi-religious reverence for Israel, right or wrong, tainted the beauty and grandeur of Judaism.

Protest in Manhattan over Israel's action in Gaza

New York Jews say “No!” to the Israeli occupation, August 2011.

By Murray Polner | The Rag Blog | October 21, 2014

One of the smartest, most courageous and provocative rabbis I ever knew was Arthur Hertzberg, raised in a Hasidic family, a congregational rabbi, historian of Jewish life and Zionism, university professor, a member of the Zionist Jewish Agency who once publicly rebuked Prime Minister Golda Meir for her pro-Vietnam War views, and regularly criticized Israel’s occupation and settlement policies.

Hertzberg, who died in 2006, also took on American Jews for their unquestioning worship of Israel, wondering as well if Zionism and Judaism were identical. Judaism, he once told me (he wrote a regular column in a magazine I edited) was a faith of universal morality, not a nationality. The quasi-religious reverence for Israel, right or wrong, tainted the beauty and grandeur of Judaism. Too many rabbis, he wrote (in an article which inspired me to write a book about American rabbis), resembled “institutional executives” and were “entertainers” in sparsely attended non-Orthodox synagogues.
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Posted in RagBlog | Tagged American Jews, Arthur Hertzberg, Israel Lobby, Israeli Peace Movement, Judaism, M.J. Rosenberg, Murray Polner, Palestinian Occupation, Rag Bloggers, Zionism | Leave a comment

Thorne Dreyer :
PODCAST | Author Michael Harris on the Digital Revolution and ‘The End of Absence’

Posted on October 20, 2014 by Thorne Dreyer

Journalist and editor Harris, our guest on Rag Radio, discusses ‘Reclaiming What We’ve Lost in a World of Constant Connection.’

Michael Harris was our guest on Rag Radio, September 26, 2014.

Interview by Thorne Dreyer | The Rag Blog | October 20, 2014

Our guest on Rag Radio, journalist Michael Harris, is a magazine editor and the author of the critically-acclaimed The End of Absence: Reclaiming What We’ve Lost in a World of Constant Connection.

On the show we discuss the nature of the digital revolution in relation to earlier transformative communication events — like the invention of the Gutenberg printing press and the 20th century television invasion.

And Harris recounts a personal epiphany, his “overload moment,” when, sitting in front of his computer, he looked up and realized he had more than a dozen windows open on two computer monitors and was engaged in multiple email conversations and text messages.
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Posted in RagBlog | Tagged Authors, Books, Digital Revolution, End of Absence, Internet, Interview, Michael Harris, Podcast, Rag Bloggers, Rag Radio, Thorne Dreyer | Leave a comment

Johnny Hazard :
Thousands of public university students in Mexico City go out on strike

Posted on October 16, 2014 by Thorne Dreyer

They are protesting the police killings and forced disappearances of students in the Mexican
state of Guerrero.

Thousands of striking university students and representatives of social organizations demonstrate in Mexico City, Wednesday, October 14, 2014. Photo by Mario Marlo / Somoselmedio.org

By Johnny Hazard | The Rag Blog | October 16, 2014

MEXICO CITY — Students at most public universities in the Mexico City metropolitan area are on strike for 24 to 48 hours. The student strike is part of the continuing protests against the September 26 police killings of five and forced disappearance of 43 students from the teacher preparation school in Ayotzinapa, Tixtla, Guerrero.

The students were ambushed — some shot, some kidnapped — by local police in Iguala, Guerrero, on September 25 and 26. On Tuesday, federal officials announced that, based on DNA evidence, at least some of the mass graves — which, according to cops who have been detained in connection with the crimes, contain the bodies of the students — in fact contain other corpses.
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Posted in RagBlog | Tagged Angel Aguirre, Educational Reform, Guerrero, Instituto Politecnico Nacional, Johnny Hazard, Mexican Massacre, Mexican Student Movement, Mexican Student Strike, Mexico, Police Repression, Rag Bloggers | Leave a comment

Ken Wachsberger :
My friend Davey Brinn

Posted on October 16, 2014 by Thorne Dreyer

The first time I remember his face it had a smile directed toward me and I smiled back. From then on, when we saw each other we smiled.

Davey Brinn. Photo courtesy Lisa Belli.

By Ken Wachsberger | The Rag Blog | October 16, 2014

My friend Davey Brinn died. It’s been over a year, closer to 18 months, but I just found out. We hadn’t seen each other for over 20 years. Somewhere along the way we lost touch with each other. Then we reconnected. Our reunion was only via email but it was one of my best days of this millennium. I wanted to see him — in my mind I started making plans. But I didn’t. And then he died.

Life plays funny tricks on you if you take it for granted. I thought I was pretty good in that regard. I slipped up on that one.
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Posted in RagBlog | Tagged Austin Activists, Austin History, Civil Disobedience, Davey Brinn, Direct Action, East Lansing, Ken Wachsberger, Kent State, Mental Health, Michigan State, Radical Politics, Rag Bloggers, Sixties, Underground Press | 29 Comments

Ron Jacobs :
BOOKS | Redefining urban renewal: Squatting
in Europe

Posted on October 15, 2014 by Thorne Dreyer

‘The City is Ours’ examines both politically and socially the squatters’ movement in Europe over the past 40 years and provides a template for the movement’s future.

Essays on the squatters’ movement in Europe.

By Ron Jacobs | The Rag Blog | October 15, 2014

[The City is Ours: Squatting and Autonomous Movements in Europe from the 1970s to the Present, edited by Bart van der Steen, Ask Katzeff, and Leendert van Hoogenhuijze (September 2014: PM Press); Paperback; 336 pp; $21.95.]

British novelist Doris Lessing wrote a novel titled The Good Terrorist. The story revolves around an autonomous leftist cell in London that decides to step up their participation in the struggle against capitalism and imperialism by providing material support to the IRA. Eventually, the cell moves on to taking their own armed actions, which result in the death of one of their members.

The main character in the novel, a woman named Alice, has political and moral disagreements with the course she and her comrades have taken but remains committed to the course of action. The cell’s living quarters is in a squatted building in London. Unlike her fellow squatters, Alice takes an active interest in making the squat a livable quarters. Lessing’s descriptions of the squat and the work undertaken to make it livable are why I mention this work of fiction.
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Posted in RagBlog | Tagged Autonomous Movement, Books, European Squatters' Movement, Rag Bloggers, Ron Jacobs, Squatters, The City is Ours, Urban Studies | Leave a comment

METRO | Beverly Baker Moore : Doulas in Austin have the life cycle covered

Posted on October 13, 2014 by Thorne Dreyer

People intent on taking back control of welcoming a child or saying goodbye to a loved one often find they don’t have the skills or information they need.

Birth doula, left, with newborn and mother. Fhoto from TheLawlys / Flickr / Wikimedia Commons.

By Beverly Baker Moore | The Rag Blog | October 13, 2014

A current national pretense: having a baby means cute baby stuff and competition for nursery school slots while death… well, death doesn’t exist at all, because aging is not allowed. Meanwhile, real life doesn’t happen without these defining events. Humans have honored the ultimate life transitions in their communities in many ways through the ages, but always they were honored.

During the past 100 years of American society these rituals have systematically been lifted from the hands and homes of family members and friends and subjected to laws, regulations and changing societal norms until these most basic personal rites hardly belong to us anymore, and there’s been a movement going on for a while to change that.
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Posted in Metro, RagBlog | Tagged Beverly Baker Moore, Birth Doulas, Birthing, Conscious Dying, Death and Dying, Death Doulas, Metro, Pregnancy, Rag Bloggers, Ritual | Leave a comment

The U.S. has 550 military personnel in Africa on counterterrorism missions while over 5,000 Africans have succumbed to the non-military threat of Ebola.

Justice Ginsburg called the law ‘purposely discriminatory’ and said it would disenfranchise ‘more than 600,000 registered Texas voters.’

Texas is not alone in its willingness to restrict its upscale education to a ‘possessive investment in whiteness.’

Central Texas Bee Rescue is dedicated to seeing that bees scaring humans with their natural swarming behavior will help pay for their own preservation.

Just as a parasitical lancet fluke can direct an ant to climb up a blade of grass, we are unknowingly manipulated by cultural memes.

The United States’ political system, we are told repeatedly, is the gold standard for the world.

Arthur Hertzberg believed that the quasi-religious reverence for Israel, right or wrong, tainted the beauty and grandeur of Judaism.

Journalist and editor Harris, our guest on Rag Radio, discusses ‘Reclaiming What We’ve Lost in a World of Constant Connection.’

They are protesting the police killings and forced disappearances of students in the Mexican state of Guerrero.

The first time I remember his face it had a smile directed toward me and I smiled back. From then on, when we saw each other we smiled.

‘The City is Ours’ examines both politically and socially the squatters’ movement in Europe over the past 40 years and provides a template for the movement’s future.

People intent on taking back control of welcoming a child or saying goodbye to a loved one often find they don’t have the skills or information they need.

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Texas is not alone in its willingness to restrict its upscale education to a ‘possessive investment
in whiteness.’

They are protesting the police killings and forced disappearances of students in the Mexican
state of Guerrero.