Barbara Ehrenreich on slapping one's child

"If I'd slapped my son for every protest he's been in, he'd be brain-damaged by now."

Palestinians in solidarity with Baltimore protesters

The United States Palestinian Community Network (USPCN) stands in solidarity with the brave people of Baltimore who are rising up in justified anger at another instance of vicious police violence against Black communities in this country. A few weeks ago, Baltimore resident Freddie Gray, a 25-year-old African American, was chased down and arrested by Baltimore police, who still have not offered probable cause for even approaching him. Gray died a week later of spinal injuries that he clearly suffered while in police custody.

Two days ago, USPCN-Chicago responded to a call from the Black Youth Project 100, joining close to 1,000 people in protesting Gray’s murder at police headquarters on the southside of Chicago. Members and supporters of USPCN also participated in many other protests across the country, as we have since the killing of Michael Brown by police in Ferguson, Missouri, last year.

Enough is enough. That is what Black people in Baltimore are saying, and what they have every right to say. Police are killing Black people at an alarming rate, and the response from mayors, governors, even presidents, is nothing more than a call for calm. USPCN is not calling for calm. We are calling for unqualified support and solidarity with Black people in Baltimore, Chicago, New York, Detroit, Oakland, Ferguson, Miami, Milwaukee, and everywhere else police are killing their sisters, brothers, mothers, and fathers.

If there is no more discussion to be had, that is clearly understandable, as it would be if Black people were sick and tired of discussing race relations, and community relations with law enforcement, and issues of political representation. They have been victims of national oppression and racism for hundreds of years, and it is not their responsibility to remain calm. It is their right to do exactly what they are doing—rising up against white supremacy and systems of government that treat them as second-class citizens. We must stand with them.

http://uspcn.org/2015/04/30/uspcn-in-solidarity-with-the-black-community-of-baltimore/

Hillary Expected to Adopt All of Sanders’s Positions by Noon

Awaking at 8 A.M., Sanders, who had planned to run to the left of Clinton in 2016, discovered that, while he was sleeping, she had already begun running slightly to the left of him.

In an online video posted Thursday morning, Clinton welcomed Sanders to the race, adding, “To those who agree with Bernie Sanders on the issues, let me say this: I am Bernie Sanders.”

http://www.newyorker.com/humor/borowitz-report/hillary-expected-to-adopt-all-of-sanderss-positions-by-noon

these exercises have really helped my knee

some of you may remember I had a torn meniscus over 1 year ago. (march 2014).
I've done about 8-9 months of physical therapy.
Definitely it helped; initially I could barely drag myself from bedroom to bathroom.

when my medicare coverage for p.t. ran out about 6 weeks ago, someone turned me on to Robin McKenzie
(online).
he has exercises for knee, back, hip and neck. maybe more.
The knee exercises are simple and take just over 2 minutes to do.

When I started doing them, I felt intuitively that they were right for my knee.
He says to do them every 2 hours.
I can't do them every 2 hours. I do them when I can and when I think of them - several times a day.
Once when my right hip hurt, I did the hip exercise for that.

They work!
at least for me.
My knee is better than it has been. P.t. got me so far, but it didn't seem like I would go any further.
Now I definitely feel improvement, altho I am not where I was before the injury happened.

thought I'd tell others about them.
If anyone else does them, I'd be interested to know how/if they work for you.

Why Some of Us Will Not, Cannot, and Do Not Post about Baltimore

In today’s world, when anything of note happens, the place to discuss it is social media. There is a hashtag, a trending topic, a status to be made and shared. The importance of these platforms in situations of civilians versus the state is not to be underestimated. The ability to share information accurately from the frontline, without the filter imposed by authorities is one of the only ways we have to discern the truth.

However the ubiquity and constant nature of social media means that it is quite frankly exhausting. It is draining and demoralizing to scroll through reams and reams of the hurt done to our communities by white people, as well as to see the reactions of other white people to this state-sanctioned violence. But many Black people feel that they have a duty to keep posting and to keep engaging and to keep pushing past the deep pit of sickening hopelessness that opens up any time we are reminded that in the eyes of so many, a broken CVS window is worth more sadness and outrage than the broken spine of a young, Black man.
Some Black folks, however, keep quiet on social media, even when situations reach their peak. This is not a sign of apathy or disinterest. It is not because we just don’t care. It is not complicit silence.

It is because we are close to our breaking point. The mental toll of posting about state-sanctioned violence against people of color is monumental. It doesn’t seem to matter how many people peacefully protest online or scream and shout their throats raw in the streets crying for justice, the status quo just keeps rolling.



http://www.forharriet.com/2015/04/why-some-of-us-will-not-cannot-and-do.html#axzz3YmfnUtiI

my friend is having troubles logging in (long-time du'er)

so I sent her here.
duh.
of course she can't reach this forum to ask the question.

Can anyone send me instructions on logging in, so I can send to her.


thanks.

Israel Evacuates Surrogate Babies From Nepal but Leaves the Mothers Behind

The rescue process, coupled with widely published photos of the newborns being cradled by Israeli medics on the Tel Aviv tarmac, has thrust Israel’s reliance on Nepalese surrogates into the spotlight, revealing a little known link between Nepal and Israel and starting a debate here about the ethics of international surrogacy.

http://time.com/3838319/israel-nepal-surrogates/


(before some moron juries this - note - this is NOT about Israel/Palestine.
this is about international surrogacy- READ - you do know how to read, right?)

Freddie Gray protests: No more business as usual

"After days of protesting Gray's murder, only to be met by more violence and repression from the robo-cops, it's not surprising when there are bitter expressions of anger among protesters. But these examples are not the real crime--far from it.

Accepting "business as usual" in Baltimore might feel like "peace" to the city's elite, but what it actually means is more police brutality, more mass incarceration, more economic violence, the devastation of Black communities and more deaths--and that deserves to be disrupted until we have justice."

http://socialistworker.org/2015/04/27/in-the-streets-for-freddie

Julian Assange speaks with Tavis Smiley & Cornel West

Bloods and Crips Team Up to Protest Baltimore’s Cops

Things are apparently so bad in Baltimore that even the city’s gang adversaries—along with the Nation of Islam—are joining forces.

Before protests over Freddie Gray’s death turned chaotic, an unlikely alliance was born in Baltimore on Saturday: Rivals from the Bloods and the Crips agreed to march side by side against police brutality.

The alleged gang members are pictured on social media crowding together with Nation of Islam activists, who told The Daily Beast they brokered the truce in honor of Gray, who died last week after sustaining spinal injuries while in police custody.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/04/27/the-bloods-and-crips-anti-cop-ceasefire-in-baltimore.html