BrainWorms

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/30114584

Archived at https://archive.is/9z4kT

cross-posted from: https://sh.itjust.works/post/38551804

Panamanian President José Raúl Mulino had said earlier Thursday that the strike was illegal and included some 5,000 workers.

“Unfortunately, following the unjustified abandonment of work at our plantations and operations centers since April 28 and continuing today, (the company) has proceeded with the termination of all of our daily workers,” the company said in a statement. It said the company had suffered losses of at least $75 million.

Protests marches and occasional roadblocks have stretched from one end of the country to the other as teachers, construction workers and other unions expressed their rejection to changes the government said were necessary to keep the social security system solvent.

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/22456117

The world’s biggest polluters are also the most protected from the environmental harm they helped create, a new study finds.

archived (Wayback Machine):

• EcoWatch article
• research cited

cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/64465252

Other source: https://www.npr.org/2025/05/19/nx-s1-5403891/el-salvador-arrest-prominent-human-rights-lawyer

cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/64388203

Great investigative journalism from the New York Times.

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The Washington DC Heritage Foundation recently dispatched a team to Israel to meet with major players in Israeli politics, including the Israeli Foreign Minister, the Israeli Defense Secretary, and U.S. ambassador Mike Huckabee.

The Heritage team was in Israel, in part, to discuss a secret policy paper: Project Esther, the foundation’s proposal to rapidly dismantle the pro-Palestinian movement in the United States, along with its support at schools and universities, at progressive organizations and in Congress.

Project Esther outlined an ambitious plan to brand critics of Israel as “effectively a terrorist support network” so that they could be deported, defunded, sued, fired from their jobs and ostracized

It singled out anti-Zionist groups that had organized pro-Palestinian protests, but the intended targets stretched much further.

In pitch materials for potential donors, Heritage presented an illustration of a pyramid topped by “progressive ‘elites’ leading the way which included Jewish billionaires such as George Soros and Governor JB Pritzker of Illinois.

cross-posted from: https://hilariouschaos.com/post/2729588

Author: Al Jazeera
Published on: 19/05/2025 | 00:00:00

AI Summary:
The provision would have given the executive branch authority to strip the tax-exempt status of nonprofits that it deems supportive of “terrorism” Advocates have warned that the legislative effort – which failed to pass as a stand-alone bill last year – could be abused to crack down on groups that the administration does not agree with. The reason for the disappearance of the provision remains unclear. Republicans can ill-afford unnecessary issues that could derail passage of legislation. ‘Chill free speech’ Rights groups have been rallying against the “Nonprofit Killer”. The proposal would have granted secretary of state power to unilaterally declare an NGO “terrorist supporting” and make it ineligible for tax exemptions. Hamadanchy said being accused of supporting terrorism could prompt banks to close down the accounts of the groups. He noted that existing laws make material support for a designated “terrorist” group a criminal offence with severe penalties. The legislative push coincided with the Trump administration’s crackdown on Palestinian rights supporters, especially on college campuses.

Original: 852 words
Summary: 166 words
Percent reduction: 80.52%

I'm a bot and I'm open source

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.blahaj.zone/post/26158484

Sharing information on social media is common for many people nowadays, but it's not always without consequence. In some cases, simple 'likes' can be used as evidence in court, as a Florida man recently discovered. His Star Wars and Minion 'likes' were presented as evidence to support allegations he may be a prolific BitTorrent pirate.

You should assume that dbzer0 will eventually get a legal request to turn over records.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/post/44442987

The GOP’s budget reconciliation bill includes a ban on state-level artificial intelligence regulations that could undermine efforts in several states to rein in pricing consultants like RealPage, a company that helps landlords use AI to “optimize” rent hikes.

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Republicans’ massive artificial intelligence giveaway in their must-pass budget reconciliation bill could kill crackdowns on real estate management company RealPage for raising rents and contributing to the country’s housing crisis. The move comes after RealPage drastically scaled up its lobbying efforts in Washington.

The language in the bill amounts to a ten-year ban on state governments passing any new regulations on artificial intelligence technology. According to congressional staffers and outside policy advocates monitoring the reconciliation package, that section would apply to the growing industry of pricing consultants using AI tools across various sectors, the most powerful player being RealPage.

RealPage, which offers an “analytics” platform for landlords, is currently facing a bipartisan crackdown in a number of states for helping landlords “optimize” rent increases. Those reforms would be preemptively nullified if the current language in the budget bill makes it into the final version. The House Energy and Commerce Committee voted on an initial markup of the bill yesterday afternoon.

RealPage has been hit with a torrent of class action lawsuits since 2022 for allegedly facilitating a price-fixing cartel among landlords, including an active antitrust case from the Department of Justice.

In response to these threats, RealPage has dramatically staffed up its Washington lobbying team...

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/post/44364106

I wrote the book Copaganda based on my years of being a civil rights lawyer and public defender representing the most vulnerable people in our society. I watched as the police and the news media distorted how we think about our collective safety. Copaganda makes us afraid of the most powerless people, helps us ignore far greater harms committed by people with money and power, and always pushes on us the idea that our fears can be solved by more money for police, prosecution, and prisons. Based on the evidence, this idea of more investment in the punishment bureaucracy making us safer is like climate science denial.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.bestiver.se/post/384667

Comments

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/29694956

U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. showed just how "out of touch" he is after claiming $40,000 a month for rehab was affordable for Americans.

On Wednesday, RFK Jr. presented the health department's fiscal 2026 budget to the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee. During an interaction with California Rep. Josh Harder, the health secretary attempted to defend sweeping cuts to Medicaid, a health insurance program for low- and middle-income households. But Harder pushed back.

Harder told RFK Jr. that the rehab program Kennedy participated in to overcome his heroin addiction would cost Americans $286,000 out of pocket today.

"There are, Congressman, there are many really gold star rehabs that do it for a tiny fraction, like $20,000 to $40,000 a month," RFK Jr. interrupted to say in an X clip shared by journalist Aaron Rupar Wednesday.

Our problems have addresses

cross-posted from: https://sh.itjust.works/post/37353869

Under the Republican administration, the Federal Emergency Management Agency has denied federal assistance for tornadoes in Arkansas, flooding in West Virginia and a windstorm in Washington state. It also has refused North Carolina’s request for extended relief funding in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene.

White House officials are signaling a new approach to federal emergency response, even as Trump and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem threaten to shut down FEMA altogether.

“The Federal Government focuses its support on truly catastrophic disasters—massive hurricanes, devastating earthquakes, or wide-scale attacks on the homeland,” Brian Hughes, a spokesman for the National Security Council, which advises the president on issues of national security, said in a statement to Stateline.

Hughes said state and local governments “often remain an impediment to their own community’s resilience.” He called on states to take on a more extensive role.

cross-posted from: https://quokk.au/post/5382550

The landmark ruling, which could be appealed, also directs the federal and state governments to adopt measures that block regularization, a process by which illegally-acquired land becomes legal. The expectation of regularization has been one of the main drivers of deforestation in the Amazon. Land-grabbers clear land in the hope that it will eventually be titled thanks to lax land laws or government amnesties.

In addition, authorities must seek compensation from landowners responsible for illegal and intentional destruction, according to the decision by Justice Flávio Dino.

The case stems from a petition filed by the party Rede Sustentabilidade, Sustainability Network, with the support of several environmental organizations. It demands stronger federal and state policies to protect the Amazon rainforest and Pantanal wetlands. Both regions have suffered devastating, mostly man-made wildfires since 2020. Brazil’s Minister of Environment, Marina Silva, is the founder and the main leader of this party.

cross-posted from: https://piefed.social/post/699228

Resources on social ecology, communalism, and democratic confederalism