A planned event at the temporary publicly funded “Volksbad” pool in front of Berlin’s Volksbühne theater has been canceled following an alleged surge of online hostility and threats. The initiative, organized in collaboration with the association Each One Teach One (Eoto), was set to reserve the public bath exclusively for Black children and young people for a six-hour window on Friday before opening to the general public.

The organizers are claiming that they could no longer protect participants. According to a statement from the Volksbühne, the event was canceled because the initiative “has become the target of right-wing and racist incitement.”

If we may allow for some editorializing here, this claim is pure propaganda. As much as the fever dreams of the left would like to believe it, KKK members and rabid neo-Nazi extremists are not going to show up to an art project in Berlin and target Black kids.

Germany: Young teen reportedly beaten by girl with ‘migrant background,’ but police seize mother’s phone when she filed complaint

In short, the organizers got called out for their racist and exclusionary plan, some people complained about it online, and now they need a dramatic pretext to cancel a project that made them look racist.

While the event has been canceled, the theater stands behind the initiative. Lilienthal defended the policy, arguing that the approach aligns with local policy by “implementing Berlin’s anti-discrimination law,” which allows for protected spaces for individuals affected by discrimination.

The question is who gets to define “marginalized groups” and “discrimination.”

For example, there is no doubt that across Germany, young White people are increasingly the target of structural and organized attacks based on their race, especially in the German school system, where they are often a minority. Cases have been exhaustively documented time and time again, yet, it is important to remember that this group would never be permitted to have their own exclusionary swimming day. After all, the dominant ideology governing Germany is that White Germans could never face systematic discrimination. Even commissioning a study to document these incidents would be highly controversial for the left.

A young German girl spoke of the nightmare she experiences from her Muslim classmates.

"Sometimes they say to me that I’m German. And yeah, then they laugh at me, curse at me and tease me. Others are always Muslim, and they ask me why I am not a Muslim. I said I am a… pic.twitter.com/gggVOm9IPs

— Remix News & Views (@RMXnews) August 21, 2025

Eoto, which receives taxpayer money to empower Black people and runs Berlin-Wedding’s Black Communities Center, is also claiming the event was under threat, according to German newspaper Tagesschau. The organization reported receiving “racist threatening emails as well as threats of violence and discriminatory comments on social media” once public outrage began around the event. Consequently, Eoto stated that physical and mental safety for the children “cannot be guaranteed on Friday at the public bath, not even by security forces and police.”

Volksbühne director Matthias Lilienthal confirmed to RBB hat bathing operations will be suspended between 12:00 p.m. and 6:00 p.m. entirely on Friday. Instead, Lilienthal said he plans to be on-site at noon to engage in open discussions with the public.

Yara was the last German in her classroom, and she ended up being bullied and stabbed.

Yara was only 6 but was "bullied and ostracized, and in the end even seriously injured."

Yara's father said that parent-teacher meetings required a translator.

"I had the feeling that… pic.twitter.com/KHk1QFYJnA

— Remix News & Views (@RMXnews) September 16, 2025

Claiming that all Black people face blanket discrimination while implementing an openly discriminatory practice that actually favors them is something the theater should perhaps reflect on. However, Lilienthal’s claim that Berlin’s anti-discrimination policy actually allows for openly discriminatory practices such as this one is open to legal challenges.

Berlin does legally permit and provides taxpayer money to support dedicated spaces for certain racial groups already, such as the Black Communities Center in Wedding. Again, no White “safe space” would ever be permitted.

So, even if this pool initiative is no doubt racist and exclusionary, it could very well be legal under Berlin law but still very open to legal challenges. For example, for typical public events like concerts, club nights, or festivals, the General Equal Treatment Act (AGG) applies strictly. In theory, you cannot reject people from a swimming pool based on skin color and suddenly say that “no White people allowed.”

Blacks only: New taxpayer-funded Berlin pool will only accept Black people on Aug. 14

However, under German constitutional law, the freedom of association and assembly allows groups to host focused political workshops, empowerment meetups, or educational panel discussions intended specifically for marginalized groups. These events are legally classified as “targeted empowerment” or educational platforms that compensate for structural disadvantages or create temporary psychological safety.

Again, the definition of a “marginalized group” raises further legal gray areas that can be challenged. In fact, the entire law creates a problematic form of discrimination.

‘Someone gets beaten up every break’ – German child beaten in her multicultural Berlin school 4 different times, police charges go nowhere due to age of perpetrators

It is also true that certain community groups and organizations have already secured an exclusive time slot, such as the Gangway Crew, which works with homeless people. However, there is so far no record of any other racial group, such as Hispanics or Asians, securing a time slot at the swimming pool exclusively for themselves. The question is also why do only Blacks of all “discriminated” groups receive a time slot?

The leadership of the taxpayer-funded group is doubling down and is likely looking to pursue similar events in the future, despite the threat that evil neo-Nazis may be lurking in the bushes waiting to attack innocent Black children at the first chance.

“We will continue working with Eoto, we will continue our events, and we will also consider an initiative for these children and young people,” Lilienthal noted, confirming that a replacement event is being planned.

In terms of discrimination, Alternative for Germany (AfD) supporters are likely at the top of the charts in Berlin, where even the whiff of supporting the party can lead to job loss, social ostracism, and violent attacks from Antifa. In the major cities of Germany, being associated with the AfD in any manner is an open invitation to violent attacks.

‘All you damn MAGA freaks, you will follow Kirk to hell!’ – German Antifa claims responsibility for arson attack against AfD politician’s family vehicle

Sure, an AfD-only swimming event supported by taxpayer money is pretty laughable, but in terms of events that might actually be attacked in Berlin, it might be a top candidate. Yes, Antifa might literally be waiting in the bushes.

Meanwhile, taxpayer money will continue to flow to organizations that continue to idolize minorities, with most of them run by very privileged White people. The Volksbühne venue operates on a substantial budget, benefiting from over €20 million in annual public taxpayer subsidies. The pool itself, measuring 25 meters in length and 1.30 meters in depth, can host a maximum capacity of 46 swimmers simultaneously, with the total budget designed to accommodate an estimated 20,000 visitors over the course of the swimming season. Admission may be free but obtaining an online reservation for a spot is highly competitive.

"Why don’t you have any German friends?"

"Because they don’t belong to us. I can’t stand the Germans too much."

Thousands of German students now face discrimination and sometimes outright assault from foreigners in their school systems.

Yet, the narrative of the "evil… pic.twitter.com/3EtIdpGpna

— Remix News & Views (@RMXnews) August 19, 2025

Maybe in the future Germany can have a swimming day for “battered White kids” in Germany’s multicultural school system, but you shouldn’t hold your breath.

The post Germay: Racist plan for ‘Black-only’ swimming pool day canceled in Berlin over alleged safety concerns appeared first on Remix News.

Port authorities imposed a sailing ban from the ports of Lavrio and Rafina in south-eastern Attica on Friday, August 14, 2026, while some ferry itineraries from the port of Piraeus were cancelled on Friday morning due to gale-force winds. Mostly affected by the strong winds are the islands in the Aegean Sea and Crete. Modifications […]

The post Sailing ban, ferry itineraries modifications due to gale-force winds appeared first on Keep Talking Greece.

The U.S. government is attempting to use conspiracy charges to imprison organizers, just as it did in its war against the Black Panther Party, New Left, and other 1960s and ‘70s radicals through its counterintelligence program, COINTELPRO. Through this method, the Trump regime shares the goal of the Nixon administration of disrupting and attempting to destroy domestic opposition to its authoritarian agenda.

Two weeks after the September 2025 murder of right-wing activist Charlie Kirk, Donald Trump issued the National Security Presidential Memorandum 7 (NSPM-7), entitled “Countering Domestic Terrorism and Organized Political Violence.” The memorandum created a category of “domestic terrorist” that, while lacking legal authority, broadly includes anyone who believes in things deemed as constituting “anti-Americanism, anti-capitalism, and anti-Christianity; support for the overthrow of the United States Government; extremism on migration, race, and gender; and hostility towards those who hold traditional American views on family, religion, and morality.” NSPM-7 openly calls for “investigative” tactics designed to “disrupt” and “dismantle” political movements and organizations.

Following the recent use of conspiracy charges to successfully convict people in both the Prairieland case in Texas and the Spokane 3 case in Washington, 15 community members in the Twin Cities were indicted on June 16 for resisting the Trump administration’s December 2025 immigration crackdown dubbed “Operation Metro Surge.” According to the indictment, all defendants are identified as “members and associates of … Direct Action Minnesota (‘DAMN’),” which helped organize Minnesota’s resistance. That organization is now defunct in light of the arrests and revelations about government infiltration.

The primary charge against these 15 community members is that each of them “did knowingly conspire, with other persons known and unknown … to prevent by force, intimidation, and threats officers and employees of the United States Department of Homeland Security from discharging the duties of their officers.” Those accused of “conspiracy” are alleged to have done such routine organizing activities as moderating meetings, engaging in fundraising, posting on social media, and communicating on the secure texting app Signal. Some are also accused of participating in an anarchist speaking tour, called “Breaking the ICE: Lessons from the Resistance in Minnesota,” which followed the collapse of the government’s campaign against the people of Minnesota.

Though the mainstream media headlines touted an “Antifa conspiracy,” anarchists are mentioned more in the 94-page indictment, with references to anarchism on 17 pages. While there are many local anti-fascist groups, and exponentially more people who identify as anti-fascist, the way the government is using “Antifa” to signify a single organization is simply false. People with a wide variety of beliefs and political commitments consider themselves anti-fascist. Anarchists historically have fought fascists as far back as the 1936 Spanish Revolution, prior to World War II, as they believe in the possibility of a cooperative world that is diametrically opposite the one that fascists envision. In painting the defendants as members of antifa and as anarchists, the government is attempting to both scare the public and to marginalize and isolate the accused. The U.S. has a long history of targeting anarchists, going back to repression against immigrant anarchist labor organizers in 1880s Chicago, when four outspoken anarchists were hanged for organizing for the eight-hour workday.

Anarchists traditionally oppose all forms of hierarchy, exploitation, and domination, while both advocating and practicing democratic decision-making. Anarchists pose an intersectionally informed opposition to the contemporary cultural, political, and economic organization of society, while offering an alternative vision of a just, cooperative, and free society.

In the interview that follows, organizer Cameron Kennedy, one of the so-called “Minnesota 15” defendants, discusses his thoughts on anarchism, the role it played in organizing opposition to Operation Metro Surge, and how other communities can organize resistance.

The interview that follows has been lightly edited for clarity.

Paul Messersmith-Glavin: What does anarchism mean to you?

Cameron Kennedy: I think anarchism is deeply misunderstood by most. To me, it’s an egalitarian blueprint for resisting oppression and building a better world that democratizes every aspect of society. That democratizes our communities and workplaces and gives each of us agency and responsibility; where resources are distributed evenly and fairly and not hoarded by the billionaire class.

This wasn’t just a movement without leaders — this was a movement where everyone became a leader.

Maybe more importantly to me personally, it’s a code of conduct that guides my actions and my thinking: to always treat others with respect and grace, to always question and adapt to my surroundings, to educate and work to better myself, to engage with my neighborhood and community, to recognize oppression in all its forms and have the courage to confront it in any capacity I can, as we struggle for a just society.

What aspects of the Twin Cities’ response to Operation Metro Surge, starting late in 2025 until earlier this year, resonate most with anarchist practices and principles?

I think the resistance we saw here in the Twin Cities is deeply and directly influenced by anarchism. There is a strong anarchist and labor history in the Twin Cities that goes back more than 100 years. Anarchists have been deeply involved in movements here, especially since the 2008 Republican National Convention, and in the many uprisings against police brutality, like those around the police murders of Jamar Clark, Philando Castile, George Floyd, and too many others. I think this involvement played a role in introducing the wider population to anarchists’ organizing.

The resistance to Metro Surge was entirely decentralized, meaning there were no leaders and everything was organized on a hyperlocal scale by average working people, connected through apps like Signal and WhatsApp, giving everyone the ability to coordinate in unison at a macro scale. Mutual aid, long associated with anarchism, became a practice that every neighborhood committed to — for instance, to get food and rent money to our immigrant neighbors who were too under threat to leave their houses.

The raids and indictments woke the Twin Cities up again.

The rapid-response loops and Whipple Watch were designed to observe and report all ICE [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] activity through this decentralized network, in which nearly 100,000 people participated at the height. [Whipple Watch is a counter-surveillance project comprised of locals using their constitutional right to observe law enforcement, specifically at the Bishop Henry Whipple Federal Building, where most ICE operations are based.] This gave us the ability to respond to ICE raids in as little as three to five minutes almost anywhere in the Twin Cities. This wasn’t just a movement without leaders — this was a movement where everyone became a leader, and that’s exactly what anarchism is. That self-agency, the air-tight community communication, confrontational nature, and adaptability are why our resistance was so successful against Operation Metro Surge.

How have the indictments of the 15 of you been received by the wider community, namely the 100,000+ people that turned out in subzero temperatures to resist ICE?

My co-defendant Cal said it best: “Homeland Security really kicked the hornets’ nest with this one.” The movement against ICE had burned out post-Metro Surge, after the state of Minnesota moved toward a strategy of local law enforcement cooperating with ICE to arrest immigrants on low-level offenses, turning folks over to ICE at county jails. This allowed ICE to quietly and more effectively carry out its work without the constant flashy confrontations of Metro Surge. The raids and indictments woke the Twin Cities up again. Hundreds have rallied at our court dates and the community is mobilizing for another wave of repression. Bluntly, the raids enraged the Twin Cities back into action.

For myself, I’ve received nothing but support here. My neighbors have offered to help my partner and I any way they can, donating money and food. People recognize me on the street and thank me for the work I’m alleged to have done. It’s very clear that the government’s claim that we are “a danger to our own community” is a load of horseshit and just about anyone in the Twin Cities will tell you as much.

Do you have any advice for how organizers can best use the Signal app for secure communication? What are the best protocols for using that app to organize securely and effectively?

The number one rule is: “Always assume there is a fed in the chat and don’t say anything you don’t want read back to you in court.” I firmly believe mass-oriented organizing is crucial, but in that type of approach, it is impossible to avoid infiltration from the state. I don’t think there is any point in vetting large rapid-response groups, but I don’t think we should then throw the baby out with the bathwater and abandon mass organizing just because of that. Smaller groups doing mutual aid in the Twin Cities, who were being directly targeted by ICE for supporting their neighbors with grocery runs and rent money, restricted their chats to small groups on a need-to-know basis with trusted individuals. There is no bulletproof way to do this work though. Right now, the State Department is using rapid-response chats that nearly 100,000 people were in as evidence of “conspiracy.” Under an authoritarian state, resisting means taking necessary risks to protect our community and even very legal methods will be targeted if they are effective.

Also in rapid-response chats, it’s really important to use the SALUTE method of reporting ICE activity. SALUTE stands for size, activity, location, uniform, time, equipment. So, for example, that might look like utilizing your constitutionally protected right to observe ICE in your neighborhood and reporting to your local rapid-response group something like: “It’s 8:17 am. There are six ICE officers armed with assault rifles, less-lethal weapons, and riot gear. At 38th and Chicago, that are currently detaining one person. No one else on scene.” By giving accurate and precise information, we avoid the rumor mill and unneeded panic that further confuses and spreads fear in the community.

What lessons have you learned from the successful resistance to the ICE surge that you can pass on to other communities that may be targeted in the future?

I think this decentralized hyperlocal organizing is key, as is being confrontational and taking risks (if you can). Protests still serve a purpose, but it’s clear our politicians aren’t listening and they aren’t protecting us; in fact, they are using local police to attack our community and protect ICE despite what they may say in speeches. This is why it’s up to us to take personal responsibility to protect our communities and not show fear when we confront the state that is murdering our neighbors in the streets.

The government’s claim that we are “a danger to our own community” is a load of horseshit and just about anyone in the Twin Cities will tell you as much.

Activating every element of society — from neighborhoods, workplaces, places of worship and even hobby groups — and then combining them in an informal alliance working together to resist ICE is also essential. Combining unions, activist groups, and rapid-response networks is what lead to the first successful general strike in the U.S. in generations. Those connections built a foundation for society to resist effectively together.

Final note: I want people to study what we did in Minneapolis with a critical lens, then apply and adapt it to where you are. The Twin Cites won the battle of Metro Surge while losing more than 1,700 people to deportations and two people to state-sanctioned street executions. The larger war ICE is waging against communities across the country is still raging and intensifying, and in the last few weeks, we have seen record amounts of families being ripped apart.

I firmly believe that solidarity with each other, including groups you might normally never work with, is key: organizing at a micro level with agency, like anarchists, instead of under the control of a large organization, taking orders from leadership like our dysfunctional political system has indoctrinated us to do. And having the courage to confront the brutality of ICE in a way that effectively protects our immigrant neighbors and isn’t merely performative.

Take responsibility, take risks, take care of each other, and never rely on the very state that is ripping our communities apart and murdering our people to solve the problem that both political parties created. Together, we will march arm-in-arm through the ruins that capitalism has brought on itself into a far better world of our own making.

Pat Caldwell is 69 years old and, as Chris Stanton gushes in this uproarious Q&A, “a legend to IMAX nerds.” Caldwell loves Vision3 film stock, hates Joker: Folie à Deux, and has discovered more than one dead body in a movie theater. His decades-long career as a projectionist includes a stint at a Tennessee porn theater with “very good equipment,” and he once spent half a year screening Lawrence of Arabia four times daily. When Stanton reached out to Caldwell on the occasion of The Odyssey, he may have landed the year’s most entertaining interview.

So Sam taught me how to run the projectors, and he got drunk, passed out on the couch. And after the concession stand in the box office closed, I would go up and run the rest of the movies for him. This went very nicely until one night there’s a knock at the door. I opened the door and here’s this old man standing there. And I said, “Well, who are you?” He says, “I could ask the same question. Who are you? I’m the business agent of the local projectionists’ union.” I explained what was going on. He woke up Sam, chewed him out. And the next day they made me an apprentice. I trained for a year with no pay at all the local theaters in Nashville.

The Hellenic Hoteliers Federation (HHF) acknowledges the significance of establishing the special spatial planning framework for Tourism as a necessary tool for national sector planning, according to a relevant announcement. However, the HHF has expressed concern that key provisions of the framework continue to rely on horizontal restrictions, that fail to adequately take into account […]

The post Greek Hoteliers Federation: Tourism spatial framework lacks realism appeared first on Keep Talking Greece.

As progressive, DSA, and DSA-adjacent candidates win primaries throughout the US, corporate media is rushing to prop up their favorite “centrist” and “moderate” critics—who, ostensibly, are just looking out for the wellbeing of the Democratic Party—to explain why these candidates people are voting for are actually dangerous and “unelectable.” What the media is refusing to do, on an institutional level, is disclose the glaring conflicts of interests these groups—backed by billionaires, health insurance giants, pro-Israel lobbying firms, and massive corporations —would have in attacking candidates who undermine their sponsors’ bottom lines and ideological agendas. 

As progressive, DSA, and DSA-adjacent candidates win primaries throughout the US, corporate media is rushing to prop up their favorite “centrist” and “moderate” critics—who, ostensibly, are just looking out for the wellbeing of the Democratic Party—to explain why these candidates people are voting for are actually dangerous and “unelectable.”

As I noted in TRNN in June, certain personalities and parties with blatant conflicts of interest are being boosted by US media—presented as mere neutral observers who are Deeply Concerned About Electability—to dump on insurgent candidates such as Claire Valdez, Darializa Avila-Chevalier, Melat Kiro and, most recently, Michigan Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed. El-Sayed’s primary victory in Michigan signaled serious upward momentum for the latest progressive insurgency within the Democratic Party—and triggered a PR crisis for the Democratic establishment. That momentum was stemmed this week, if only for now, as DSA-endorsed candidate for Wisconsin Governor Francesca Hong was narrowly defeated—a defeat that was reportedly due, in part, to voter concerns over “electability.” 

But who shapes “electability” perceptions in our media? 

Let’s examine a recent article in The New York Times, which broke the news on August 6, in the wake of El-Sayed’s primary victory, about a $15-million effort by “moderate” group Third Way to attack the DSA specifically and socialism more broadly (despite El-Sayed explicitly being neither a socialist nor a DSA member, but he still champions Medicare for All and cutting US support for  Israel, so the distinction to these groups is purely academic). In response to socialist and progressive primary wins, Third Way President Jonathan Cowan told the Times he is “preparing for war” against candidates he views as insufficiently “moderate.” Central to Third Way’s argument are supposed concerns over the “electability” of Democratic candidates facing MAGA Republicans in the November midterms—a motive taken at face value by The New York Times. 

Third Way does not publish their donors and refuses to answer media inquiries about who keeps their operation financially afloat.

Not once did Times reporter Shane Goldmacher inquire about or address—much less investigate and unearth—who is funding this operation. The money is simply said to come from Third Way. But Third Way does not generate revenue. They are backed by specific interests. “Who are these interests?” seems like a fairly obvious question that a reporter should ask. Alas, it’s not one Shane Goldmacher seems the least bit interested in. 

So who is backing Third Way? 

Third Way does not publish their donors and refuses to answer media inquiries about who keeps their operation financially afloat. But reporting in The Nation in 2013 revealed the group was being backed then by the US Chamber of Commerce, Deutsche Bank, Intel, the Business Roundtable, and the Pharma lobbying giant PhRMA (Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America). More recent digging by The Sludge revealed major donors now include the Republican-run insurance industry front group Better Solutions for Healthcare, PhRMA, CVS Health, pharma giant Johnson & Johnson, and the Business Roundtable. Other major corporate backers include Entergy, Yum! Brands, Amazon, and Meta––all corporations with much to lose in the event Congress passes measures to impose higher taxes on corporations and the rich, or to provide single-payer healthcare for all. 

Additionally, Goldmacher quotes two other “centrist” groups in his Times article—the Center for New Liberalism and Welcome PAC—without noting the patronage they receive from billionaire and corporate interests. The Center for New Liberalism, as I documented in 2023, is a front group for Third Way Foundation (which also goes by the name Progressive Policy Institute) and is funded by ExxonMobil, Big Pharma, Big Tobacco, Walmart, and Amazon. (The Third Way Foundation used to be related to the aforementioned Third Way, but is now its own independent corporate front group.) 

WelcomePAC, for its part, is funded directly by mega-billionaires: LinkedIn cofounder Reid Hoffman; six different relatives and heirs of Walmart founder Sam Walton (the richest family in America); Bain Capital co-chairman Joshua Bekenstein; Rupert Murdoch’s son James Murdoch; and Mark Heising, the founder of private equity firm Medley Partners, among others.

Shouldn’t these obvious conflicts of interest at least be mentioned? Noted in passing, maybe? Especially in an article specifically about one of these groups spending $15 million to attack “the left,” shouldn’t a reporter be asking where exactly the $15 million came from?

Shouldn’t these obvious conflicts of interest at least be mentioned? Noted in passing, maybe? Especially in an article specifically about one of these groups spending $15 million to attack “the left,” shouldn’t a reporter be asking where exactly the $15 million came from? Or where the money behind these other Deeply Worried Centrist Groups comes from? Isn’t it relevant to note Third Way’s long history of being funded by Wall Street and the health insurance lobby? For a high school reporter, this would obviously be the first line of questions to ask. Presumably, Third Way didn’t just manifest the money out of thin air… So who is footing the bill? And shouldn’t potential voters know who is paying for this campaign, and others like it, to bombard them with falsely “objective” arguments about who is and isn’t “electable” in America? 

The Times isn’t alone. Recent softball coverage of, op-eds by, or interviews with Third Way and other “moderate groups” in mainstream media also did not disclose who is bankrolling Third Way, which has quickly emerged as a Sensible Voice opposed to the “radical left.” 

Shouldn’t potential voters know who is paying for this campaign, and others like it, to bombard them with falsely “objective” arguments about who is and isn’t “electable” in America? 

Last week, CBS News did a five-and-a-half-minute puff interview with Third Day’s Jon Cowan, in which Cowan was given free rein to bash the DSA and El-Sayed without mentioning that Cowan’s salary is paid by private health insurance companies and other corporate America behemoths that would all stand to lose a lot of money and power in the event Medicare For All became a mainstream Democratic position. The Washington Post, likewise, published an op-ed by Cowan and Third Way Executive Vice President Matt Bennett the next day, in which they lambast El-Sayed and other progressives’ supposed lack of “electability” without disclosing who backs their astroturf “think tank.” Earlier that same week, CNN ran an otherwise balanced segment on “The Left Insurgency” that nevertheless featured an interview with Cowan and introduced Third Way as a “Democratic centrist group” without mentioning the corporate funders paying him to go on CNN and lament about “electability concerns.”

Why is discussion of “electability” almost entirely being shaped by astroturfed corporate front groups with obvious conflicts of interest? 

It’s not that US media should never report on potential “electability” dynamics—with both the center and left––but why not turn to parties with fewer obvious conflicts of interest? Why not consult independent pollsters or academics? Why not ask Left-aligned experts as well as those on the dole of the Health Insurance lobby? Why is discussion of “electability” almost entirely being shaped by astroturfed corporate front groups with obvious conflicts of interest? 

Journalism is supposed to, at least in theory, be about questioning the motives of the powerful, following the money, and connecting the dots. It’s not supposed to be the practice of credulously reprinting the opinions of powerful people presenting themselves as having only the noblest of motivations. 

But here’s the rub: these billionaire- and corporate-backed groups, and their media mouthpieces, can’t talk about the forces propping them up, because to do so would give the game away. They can’t openly discuss or defend their attendant ideologies of capitalism, deregulation, imperialism, and Zionism because these are increasingly unpopular among the Democratic voters whose interests they allegedly care about. So what’s left? If they can’t speak openly about their elite patrons and make arguments from first principles, all that’s left is feigned concern over the “electability” of the “other guy.” That’s why it’s all they talk about. They can’t make arguments for “centrism” or against Medicare for All, so all they have is a nonstop posture of Deep Concern Over Electability, which, over time, gets repeated into becoming conventional wisdom despite no empirical basis for the narrative that “moderate” “centrists” are more electable. It apparently doesn’t matter how many times the centrist wing of the party loses Congress or blows it to Trump, they still claim, through sheer assertion and dogma and endless media spots, that they are uniquely positioned to “defeat republicans.” And this is a posture our media pundits echo without an ounce of skepticism. 

It apparently doesn’t matter how many times the centrist wing of the party loses Congress or blows it to Trump, they still claim, through sheer assertion and dogma and endless media spots, that they are uniquely positioned to “defeat republicans.”

“Moderate” groups like Third Way are fronts for corporate America and billionaire interests; they’re not just aw-shucks groups of concerned citizens with organic worries about Democrats losing in November. Those claiming to be journalists should ask deeper questions, follow the money, and provide readers essential context that the person being held up as a neutral—if vaguely ideological—expert on winning elections is sponsored by the very health insurance industry that stands to lose a great deal should the progressives they’re bashing ever ascend to positions of power.  

Ahead of the 40th anniversary of Stand By Me, Alec Joyner takes up Rob Reiner’s classic film and considers it from a few dozen angles. It’s a canny piece of critical writing on time, memory, masculinity, and tenderness, forces that often work against each other. (Joyner doesn’t raise the subject of Reiner’s violent death last year, though he pauses briefly on Chris, a character “freakishly knifed to death . . . trying to break up a fight.”) Stand By Me‘s two days of summer are a “vital pause” in the life of its characters, a “portal . . . into the expanse of time.” Here, Joyner illuminates that pause, and captures some of its elusive grace.

Stand by Me was slapped with an R rating, for the boys’ profanity, as well as the prominence of child abuse and death. This may have hampered ticket sales, but it also made it the first R-rated movie that many ’80s and ’90s kids saw. It made it a fitting rite of passage.

Still, there’s something lamentable in the verdict, the MPAA telling a faulty story much like the fictional adults of Castle Rock. How many blockbusters have promoted horrendous violence, only to make the PG-13 grade because they feel safely unreal? Stand by Me was received as dangerous because its horrors and its dirt live at home.

Effective public safety policy is founded on preventing crime and repairing harm, but these are not the foundations of America’s reactionary criminal justice establishment. This week on Rattling the Bars, we host a roundtable discussion about the DC Justice Lab’s 2026 Public Safety Policy Agenda, which has been endorsed by 30 progressive organizations working directly with system-impacted individuals, and about criminal justice reforms that would ensure safer communities through restorative justice, not draconian punishment.

Additional links/info:

• DC Justice Lab website, Facebook page, X page, and Instagram
• DC Justice Lab, 2026 DC Public Safety Policy Agenda

Credits:

• Producer / Videographer / Editor: Cameron Granadino

Transcript

MANSA MUSA:  Welcome to this edition of Rattling the Bars, I’m your host, Mansa Musa.

Today we are at the True Reformer Building talking to representatives from DC Justice Lab. I’m talking to Clinique Chapman, CEO, Bethany Young, the policy director. We’re here to discuss a roadmap for a safer and more equitable District of Columbia through the lens of the public safety policy agenda that DC Justice Lab has developed.

Welcome to Rattling the Bars.

CLINIQUE CHAPMAN:  Thank you. We’re happy to be here.

MANSA MUSA:  OK. Let’s start with transparency and technology. Clinique and Bethany, your agenda highlights surveillance oversight and the need for virtual testimony from the jail. Why are these two so critical for ensuring the justice system remains accountable to public safety and accessible to those inside? 

And when we talk about the virtual, for the benefit of our audience, DC Code offenders can vote. And because DC Code offenders can vote, they also should have the right — I think this is the attitude that we have in the city — They should have the right to be able to testify before City Hall around issues relative to whatever’s going on in the city and whatever’s going on with the jail. So, it’s that landscape that we’re talking about virtual testimony.

CLINIQUE CHAPMAN:  Thank you for having us. I think to start, I’d love to just introduce the 2026 DC Public Safety Policy Agenda, which was co-created by DC Justice Lab. We convened nearly 30 organizations to come and talk to us about what are the solutions that we want to see as we know that the landscape is shifting, a new mayor is coming, new city council members, new congressional representative. And so we knew that it was a very important time to really pull together all of those organizations who are working on the ground, in policy, different spaces to really put together what those solutions should look like and that roadmap for the next administration, whoever that is in the city.

And so that was the impetus to creating this document. And there are many priority areas for each organization, whether it be the youth orgs or our organization spanning different policing, punishment, prosecution, prevention. 

And so for us and your question related to the virtual testimony, that’s something that DC Justice Lab has been working on through the EASE Act. It is something that we recognize is a civic requirement, a civic necessity. Just because someone is incarcerated at the DC jail doesn’t remove their… We’ve already removed their liberty, right? So, the punishment is that they’re being held at the jail while they await sentencing or their case, but that doesn’t remove their responsibility as community members. They are still community members. They should still have the same rights as it relates to, as you mentioned, voting, as it relates to them being able to express and talk to their council members. Those are still their representatives. 

And so, we recognize that and have been in coalition with individuals and organizations to really push forward this act. And nearly 10 council members agree that it was something that should at least come to the table for conversation. And so, we have a hearing, we’ve held a hearing. And so now we’re really just waiting for them to pass that to move it forward. 

But would love Bethany to also chime in on that as well.

BETHANY YOUNG:  The specific recommendations you named around surveillance oversight and expanding advocacy opportunities to people in the DC jail are a part of one of the agenda’s primary focus areas, which is oversight and resident-led policymaking.

And so, surveillance oversight is one piece of work we’re doing around, first of all, we don’t even really know the expanse of the surveillance program in DC. We know it is expansive and growing. The mayor’s budget included additional money to further expand the use of surveillance in DC. 

What we also know is that that information gets shared with federal agencies. It gets shared with some private corporations. There is informal and formal surveillance. There’s a gangs database as one form of surveillance, and where we’ve heard from journalistic reports that infants have been listed on the gang database because of where they live or who their name is associated with in their household. We know that there are drones operating in DC, CCTV cameras, ShotSpotter. One of those, ShotSpotter, is one of the things that does not have a strong evidence base. In fact, in the last six to nine months, many cities have eliminated that program because of the issues that have been uncovered around its reliability and accuracy.

So, our push around surveillance is these residents deserve to know what’s being used, what of their information is being collected without their knowledge and who has access to it, and what are the implications of that. 

Another piece of that is an oversight piece. DC residents should be at the table, an integral part of the conversation to understand, first of all, the extent of the use of this technology and to weigh in on whether it is a viable use of taxpayer dollars and whether it is actually contributing to improving public safety. 

And so advocating from the DC jail is related to that in that it’s about people who are impacted by policies, being able to understand what the policies are, having the tools and access to do that, but also to offer their insight. The council often is dealing with issues related to what happens in the jail, so without having people in the room who are experiencing it, it’s a question how sound decision making can happen without the people who are most directly impacted being a part of the process. 

In recent examples, the use of solitary confinement in the DC jail has been not contested by anybody outside of government, but there have been years and years of denials from the DOC that it does not happen. It does not take place. They don’t use it. That conflicts with evidence from [the] DC government about the use of solitary confinement in the DC jail. But they continue, as recently as a few weeks ago, to say, we don’t do that. Easy way to get a good answer about that question: Ask somebody who’s in there who’s experienced it. We need a more meaningful tool to allow people to do that. 

So, all of it is about giving people who are impacted by the policies, the tools, the access, and requiring the decision makers who are charged with taking care of all of us to listen, to hear them out, and to engage with them about how their government is serving them.

MANSA MUSA:  And speaking of solitary confinement, your organization has been intentional in waging this campaign. So, where are y’all at with this? I know that we getting some leeway in it, but where are y’all at in terms of ending solitary confinement, in DC jail more specifically? And what is the transition from that in y’all policy? You have a controlled environment where the jail is saying we have a need for certain people to be confined in certain areas. What’s y’all policy? OK, eradication, but then what?

CLINIQUE CHAPMAN:  Well, I’d love to even expand on what you’re saying the jail said. The jail is saying it doesn’t exist, so we have to start there. They’re saying it doesn’t exist — Although they’re just being very simplistic with it in terms of saying solitary confinement doesn’t exist. They’re using that title versus there is restrictive housing, there’s segregated housing, you can go in protective custody, voluntary, you have safe cells. Safe cells are functioning as solitary confinement based on the definition. And so that is the issue right there with the jail, just even common language. We’re not even having shared language with the jail in terms of how they’re defining solitary confinement.

But yes, you are right. DC Justice Lab has been, honestly, one of the most vocal voices as it relates to the building the coalition around Unlock the Box in DC for years now as it relates to the ERASE Act. We have advocated, we’ve pushed for it with council. We spoke to the jail before over the years. We spoke to council before over the years. And the commonality between both is that they’re saying, well, the jail is saying it doesn’t exist. And so we really do need council to really take a more active approach and saying, well, they’re saying it doesn’t exist, let’s go in there and see it for ourselves. 

And so that is really, in my opinion, what the next step should be as it relates to what council should do. They should be doing two things: They should go to see it for themselves, and they should be holding a hearing so that those who are experiencing it, those who have experienced it, the family members who know when their loved ones are in solitary confinement and they can’t talk on the phone, they can’t visit, they know that it’s still happening. Let those folks come in and actually be able to testify for themselves.

And so, we haven’t even had an opportunity to have a hearing where people can share their experiences, their current experiences with solitary confinement in DC. And so that really is the next step of moving toward a hearing for ERASE. And so, once solitary confinement is erased, that is the goal. The ultimate goal is that solitary confinement in DC jail will no longer exist. We will move toward measures — I’m saying we’ll move toward, the goal will be for the jail. For the jail, for the government to see ways to implement. It’s happening across the country. There are many states who are doing this currently, and it’s working for them in terms of how you treat people when acts do happen, where harm has happened to someone. They’re using restorative justice in jails. They are using more preventative measures so that those issues that arose in the first place won’t even be necessary.

And so, I think there are various ways that the jail can put things in place to eliminate the use of solitary confinement and move toward a more humane way of holding people accountable when they think there are issues that need to be addressed. And currently that is not happening.

MANSA MUSA:  And I think from, like I said, full disclosure, I did four and a half years in what they call a supermax. And I think the problem that we see when you say solitary confinement, you have a misnomer that a person is in a cell getting bread and water, never nobody come and seeing them, open the door a year later, let them out. But the reality is that you’re being isolated for inordinate amount of times. You’re not allowed to… everything is regulated. You got an hour out. Within an hour, you got to take a shower. That’s your rec. The next day, you might get an hour out or you might not. 

So, I think that to y’all credit, it’s important that what y’all are doing in terms of educating people about understanding what isolation is. If you want to play word play, oh, we don’t have solitary confinement. But you got what they call 24 on one. I’m locked in 24 hours a day.

But let’s talk about y’all’s solutions. Y’all got when they deal with solutions. Y’all have on y’all agenda of record relief and earned compliance credits. Talk about what this is and how is this playing into the… Well, how do y’all look at this in terms of reentry? Wilhelmina Rolark, which would be one of the city council persons, they passed the Good Time Credit Act. And when they closed Lorton, that didn’t follow them. And so, they had to hassle and haggle with the VOP to get that. Now they’re getting the benefit of that in y’all policy agenda and then enforcement.

BETHANY YOUNG:  Reentry is one of the smartest investments a city can make into public safety. Prevent crime by giving people a path when they come home to not wind up back in jail or prison. So as a framing, reentry is a significant and meaningful and impactful investment in improving public safety.

The two policies you mentioned, earned compliance and record relief, earned compliance credits and record relief are policies that, if implemented, would improve people’s chances at successful reentry. So, earned compliance credits, you mentioned good time credits. It’s like a good time credit on supervision. So, for every 30 days of compliance with supervision requirements, someone could earn 30 days off their supervision sentence. Because what the evidence shows is that incentives work better than penalties. And if people have something to work towards, they’re going to be more likely to follow the rules that are part of someone’s supervision setup. 

We also know why this is important is that parole, probation, community supervision are also drivers of mass incarceration. And so, if you want to think about decarceration, people think about probation or parole as forms of decarceration, but it ends up being an expansion of incarceration because people can end up back in prison for violations that aren’t crimes on their own but that are violations of their supervision. So, things like being late for an appointment, missing a phone call, things like that. Things that someone may not really have any real control over, especially when you think about all the challenges someone is up against when they’re coming home. So, to ding them and potentially re-incarcerate them for traffic or missing a bus or not having a ride or hanging out with people that they’ve known since childhood who they may be prohibited from hanging out with because of the terms of their supervision. So, that’s earned compliance.

Record relief would allow people who, for certain crimes after certain waiting periods, depending on the crime, to have their record either sealed or expunged. And so, we know that employment is an important part of somebody returning home and being successful. We also know that a criminal record can have a devastating impact on someone’s employment opportunities. So, by removing that as a barrier pursuant to certain parameters that are in the Second Chance Amendment Act, which is a law DC passed to simplify and expand that process, those are all investments in public safety is making sure that people can live free, can not be on papers their whole life, can be free members of society, and that they have access and are not blocked from supporting themselves and their families.

MANSA MUSA:  I know from being in that space, being on parole and probation, if you give a person the incentive saying like, well, in five years, if you stay this course, your parole and probation is up in 20 years, but you stay this course, you’ll be off paper — That’s the terminology that we use — You’ll be off paper in five years because compliance with this and it’s being recognized. And don’t cost the city nothing. That’s the other part of it.

But let’s talk about y’all public safety policy agenda and the core principles in it, and briefly go over what those principles are and how y’all envision this taking shape. Because right now, y’all saying that to y’all credit, we have a solution, public safety solution. All right. So, how do we see this public safety agenda and the core principles playing out? So, a person, the lay person can say, oh, I can see it. That’s why I support that. I can see these principles because I see the conditions in my neighborhood, and I see that these principles are directly related to addressing the conditions in my neighborhood.

CLINIQUE CHAPMAN:  I think Bethany used the word “doable.” Was that you that used that word? It’s doable. It’s a doable set of recommendations that any elected official — And so we’ve moved this toward the new administration coming in, but any, even the current administration could pick up this document and use it as a tool to implement solutions that they know work. It’s rooted in evidence. It’s rooted in things that we know work, whether it be here or in other places. It’s rooted in things that we’ve seen work before and the investment be taken from. 

And so it’s nothing remarkable. I think what’s remarkable is that all of the organizations that came together saw now was the time to really put this forward. But it’s something that the average resident, the average, even the youth can pick up and say, hey, hey city councilman, hey ANC member, hey, anyone that matters to them that they’re trying to move and advocate for with something, they can pick this document up and say, this right here, this is the pathway forward. It gives you the steps. It gives you the resource inside. 

And so it’s really just rooted in evidence. It’s rooted in a community. Community voices were a part of building this document and the support is there for it. And so it is not something that a resident shouldn’t be able to get behind. If a resident in DC, whoever that may be, is ready for change, for a sustainable change, it is something that the city can definitely get behind in terms of investing in. 

Like we talked about before, all you have to do is move the money around and make sure that it reflects humanity, community, and not punishment and policing. If we put so much money in policing, where has that gotten us? We’ve put so much money into jail and in sending people to prison. Where has that gotten us? It’s just gotten us more people incarcerated, more people on paper. And so, why don’t we actually try something that we know works, try something that allows people to heal from harms? We have alternatives. We have a big section in there talking about prevention and youth before they ever even touch the system. How about focusing on those youth and focusing on investing in youth that just want somewhere to go every night? Instead of placing them inside of a YSC [Youth Services Center] or DYRS [Department of Youth Rehabilitation Services], why would we do that when we know that we can actually invest in the youth that are currently trying to do something positive?

BETHANY YOUNG:  So, we talk about prevention, investments in communities, behavioral health, and making sure that survivors and victim services organizations have what they need to really help people get from harm, being impacted by harm to being whole. We talked about it with reentry. I think it’s the same with victim services. People that find themselves victims of crime. It can be a bad, hard thing away from being a perpetrator of harm or being caught up with police or the criminal legal system in some form or fashion if they are not met with the services they need to get to a better position after harm has occurred. 

So, we have victim services, recommendations, behavioral health, things like we know DC has made the investment in alternative crisis response conducted by behavioral health professionals rather than police, but it’s not working. It’s not being used. It’s not been effective. And so, recommendations around a way to get that in order so that it’s working in the way that other cities have seen progress with alternative first response.

Clinique mentioned the youth investment. So, really upstream, making sure that kids are a part of the legislative process, that they have a voice before the council, a voice that carries some weight to it, giving them opportunities to be leaders in the city, but amongst their other peers. It also addresses what happens to kids once they are caught up in the system. How do we ensure that they are still treated as children even if they are in the system? That the facilities where they’re held have the resources and also oversight. We know that there are some major challenges happening in DYRS. There has been legislation passed that would create independent external oversight that has not been funded continuously. So, making sure that kids don’t get to the system, that we are doing things to prevent that from happening, but also if they wind up there, that we’re protecting them and that the adults that are charged with their care are being held accountable for their care.

We also talk about ways to limit our reliance, reduce our reliance on policing. Where police are not the best responders, what can we replace them with to minimize unnecessary contacts people are having with police, but also where contact does happen, where it does arise, making sure that we have accountability and oversight mechanisms in place to deal with that. 

The district passed the Comprehensive Policing and Justice Reform Amendment Act in 2022. Several of the measures in there related to accountability and oversight remain unfunded. Things like having a public database related to officers accused of misconduct, of giving the office of police complaints what they need to really thoroughly and meaningfully address bad actors in the department. 

And then the last section, we talk about what’s happening in the jails, what’s needed around reentry? How do we make sure that people who are incarcerated who are from DC have what they need while they’re away and when they come back and how to get them closer to home?

CLINIQUE CHAPMAN:  The policy agenda is something that starts off and is always rooted in community first, investing in the prevention and the community. And then if people get wrapped up in this terrible system that we have, making sure that the system doesn’t do more harm, making sure that the system still sees people as people and is people centered. 

So, I think for me, it’s both. It’s both and. Yes and yes, we want people to be home, not be contacted by the police, not interact with the jail, not go to court. But if they do, then what? Then how do we treat them while they’re there? And what should that system look like?

MANSA MUSA:  Thank y’all for enlightening us on this. Y’all taking a bold step. Y’all saying y’all got a DC public safety agenda that y’all offering as an alternative to what the city is offering, that y’all inserting y’allselves in this and y’all have a comprehensive program because y’all definitely rattled the bars today. 

And we want to make sure that everybody understand that when we talk about public safety, it’s all our responsibility. And we ask that you continue to look at these things, vet them, ask yourself, what would you do if you was given the responsibility to put a public safety agenda together? What would you do?

💾

When Saeed Jones gets a Lyft ride with Mister Anthony in New Orleans, he has no idea he’s in for brief but deep connection that will occupy his mind long after the trip is over. Anthony is a Black elder originally from Mississippi, “old enough to be retired but still taking gigs.” As the man recalls the racism he experienced in the Magnolia State, Jones is reminded of his own experiences, his own trepidation. In all his travels, Jones reveals that Mississippi is the only place he has ever felt scared for his safety as a Black man.

Maybe to distract myself from the question of loneliness, I’m working to chart the depths of my ride with Mister Anthony. I’m interested in how people unexpectedly find one another. I refuse to romanticize the labor conditions and racial terror, for example, that played a role in introducing him to me. If America was doing right by someone like Mister Anthony, I would not have met him today. I know that fact like I know the blade of his laughter. But I am grateful I met him. Maybe it’s easier, especially for men of his generation and journey, to set one’s burdens down with a receptive stranger. Or maybe Mister Anthony is just like that with everyone and I happen to be a poet riding co-pilot with deep feelings. I want to save Mister Anthony’s life. I want to make his life better. Writing about him won’t do either, but I bow before him all the same.

Greece’s central bank sees the further participation of foreign financial institutions in the share capital of Greek banks as absolutely desirable, Bank of Greece governor Yannis Stournaras said in statements to the German newspaper “Handelsblatt” on Monday. He noted that further participation of global financial institutions on the path toward a European banking union would […]

The post “Greece welcomes participation of foreign institutions in its banking system,” says BoG governor appeared first on Keep Talking Greece.

BREAKING NEWS ON AUGIUST, 11, 2026

Introduction by Fabio G.C. Carisio

Syrian court sentences Bashar al-Assad to death in absentia

A court in Damascus has handed down a death sentence to former President Bashar al-Assad in absentia, Qatari TV channel Al Jazeera reported.

According to it, former head of the political security directorate in the Syrian province of Daraa Atef Najib was also given a capital punishment sentence. The court found them both guilty of “crimes committed during the civil war.”

Although the sentence was pronounced by a court of judges, it should be remembered that the regime-change led by former jihadist terrorist Al Jolani assumed the interim presidency without elections but only with the approval of the NATO countries that have financed the Syrian Civil War since 2011 (and by CIA since 1983).

Intel Reminder. CIA TOP SECRET FILE: US WAR IN SYRIA PLANNED SINCE 1983

Since then, an Islamic dictatorship has been imposed that has changed all institutional hierarchies, eliminating from every center of power any official loyal to Assad or even those not aligned with the former jihadist regime.

Read below to better understand the political situation in the country.

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POSTED ON AUGUST, 10, 2026

MI6 in Damascus and Russia Agrees to train Al Qaeda Militia on the Coast

by British journalist Vanessa Beeley – originally published on her Substack

All links to previous Gospa News posts or videos have been added in the aftermath

UK National Security Advisor Jonathan Powell visited the ‘reformed’ Al Qaeda chief, rebranded as Ahmad Al Sharaa but better known as the head of some of the most savage terrorist factions in Syria since 2011 – Abu Mohammed Al Jolani.

Officially talks centred around ‘enhancing bilateral relations” and coordination ‘in a manner that serves shared interests and contributes to regional stability’. Stability however is not something that can be historically attributed to the British in West Asia.

Jonathan Powell, former Chief of Staff under former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair and strongly linked to the MI6 was very much a part of the history of grooming Jolani to become the brutal ruler of Syria. I covered Powell’s long-term involvement in a previous article here. The role that Powell played in supporting Blair and the Weapons of Mass Destruction narratives that took Britain to war against Iraq is a well-documented one.

Also attending was so-called Foreign and Expatriates Minister Asaad Al Shaibani, another former Al Qaeda Levant founder now coached by MI6 in international relations.

“The NEW SYRIA of TERRORIST CALIPHATE”. Exclusive Analysis on HTS Leader Al Jolani by Former Italian INTERPOL Officer in Jordan

What was not on the meeting agenda? The ongoing security vacuum in Syria, the daily abductions now expanding to include Sunni Muslim Syrians not only the routinely persecuted religious minorities including Christians, Alawites, Druze, Shia and Ismaili. The nation’s bankruptcy and crony capitalist regime bleeding the country dry and further impoverishing the Syrian people. The lack of water, electricity, fuel and hope.

The rising inflation and crippling food prices. The repression and extra-judicial executions, torture, sectarian violence and lawlessness. The descent of Syria into a rubbish tip with roads covered in detritus and filth and no functioning systems of authority other than Saudi-backed religious Sheikhs now determining regional laws based on their oppressive version of Islam.

Ngo ACN (Aid Church in Need): “HARSH PERSECUTIONS vs SYRIAN CHRISTIANS”. NATO & Trump legitimize Zionist and Jihadist Violence (video)

The role of the Russian personnel in Syria

Nope none of this was discussed. What was clearly discussed however was the role of the Russian personnel in Syria. Two days after Powell’s visit the following happened:

Syria and Russia reached a memorandum of understanding to “reorganise” Moscow’s presence on the Syrian coast. Civilians facilities are to be transferred to HTS state management which removes any slender hope of protection for the Alawite minorities should Jolani’s thugs escalate the attacks as they did in 2025.

SUNNI JIHADISTS’s MASSACRE OF CIVILIANS IN SYRIA. Dangerous Escalation and Ethnic Cleansing vs Assad’s Alawites after the NATO’s Jihad

Russian military bases will be transformed into joint training centres which means that Russia will be training alongside Al Qaeda, the terrorist entity that they had fought against since their entry into the war in 2015.

The agreement follows 18 months intensive negotiations between the Jolani quisling regime and Moscow which included visits by Jolani and Shaibani to the Kremlin where they were welcomed with the pomp and ceremony reserved for ‘heads of state’.

Their genocidal campaigns were not mentioned during these meetings to my knowledge. The Syrian people were secondary to Russian interests in maintaining a foothold on the Syrian coast as a launchpad to Africa.

Civilian facilities like Hmeimim Airport will be under the control of HTS and the fourth commercial shipping berth at Tartous Port.

The memorandum sets a deadline of no more than three months to complete the transition, after which the new arrangements will take effect, according to the ministry.

This serious capitulation by Moscow may be attributed to the build up of Ukrainian special forces in Syria or to the ongoing threats from factions within Jolani’s militia who want revenge for the Russian bombs that fell when they were slaughtering Syrians in the US/UK-led regime change war to topple the former Syrian government.

Russia miscalculated the longevity of their sphere of influence in Syria

The Shaibani Foreign Ministry has stated that this is the most significant development since negotiations began 18 months ago. “It opens the way for a new phase in Syrian-Russian relations”. One where Russia is increasingly isolated in the ‘Middle East’ and dependent upon forces allied with Ukraine to ensure the security of their bases and personnel inside Syria.

Russian News Agency TASS reported the following:

Russia has two military facilities in Syria – a Russian navy logistics center in the port city of Tartus and the Kmeimim airbase located near the city of Jableh in the Latakia governorate. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said at a meeting with journalists from Arab countries on October 13, 2025 that Damascus was interested in preserving Russian military bases in Syria, which, however, could be reorganized to serve other purposes.

Gaza, Donbass, Syria: GENOCIDES of the Zionist, Nazi, Jihadist Regimes is US-NATO’s “New” Geopolitical WEAPON

In February 2025 Jolani spoke with Russian President Putin. According to the TASS press release:

Russian President Vladimir Putin and Syria’s new leader Ahmed al-Sharaa have exchanged views on the situation in the country, the Kremlin press service reported, citing the content of the telephone conversation between the heads of state.

“The sides held a substantive exchange of views on the current situation in Syria,” the statement said. “The Russian side stressed its principled position in support of the unity, sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Syrian state,” the press service said.

The Grim NATO’S JIHADs. How Atlantic Intelligence “14 Eyes” uses ISLAMIC TERRORISTS: from Italy to Libya, Ukraine and Syria

Under the former President Assad, Russia could negotiate from a position of strength. Since the fall of Damascus and the rise to power of foreign mercenaries (including Chechen terrorists) under the banner of a MI6-remodelled Al Qaeda, Russia negotiates from a position of vulnerability and will continue to do so until perhaps they no longer have a presence in the region.

by British journalist Vanessa Beeley – originally published on her Substack

Follow Vanessa Beeley here

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APPENDIX TO THE ARTICLE

The Jihadist Terrorists’ Support to Trump and NATO Wars

by Carlo Domenico Cristofori – originally posted inside the previous Gospa News analysis Weapons Lobby – 22

«As I had predicted in my first article related to Trump’s apparent decision to use the quisling, unelected Syrian “President” Abu Mohammed Al Jolani (Ahmed Al Sharaa rebrand) as a battering ram against the resistance in Lebanon»

British journalist Vanessa Beeley wrote in her Substack titled “What did Jolani and Trump agree at the Ankara NATO summit and was Erdogan sweet-talked into alliance?”.

Trump, an ARMS TRAFFICKER between two AL QAEDA BUTCHERS. Exclusive Investigation on 40 years of CIA Plots with Jihadists to trigger Obama-Soros-Nato Arab Spring

She pointed out two crucial topics:

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RELATED POSTS

UN Shame! Summit between NATO-CIA TERRORISTS. Syrian Jihadist Throat-Cutter Meets Ukrainian Neo-Nazi Sponsor. Coups’ Show at the United Nations

THE SYRIAN WHITE HELMETS INVADE VENEZUELA. To Assist Final Western Regime-Change? (VIDEO) Kit Klarenberg Investigation

SYRIA’s PRESIDENT ASSAD EXILED IN MOSCOW. Russian FM: “US-UK Using Terrorism for Geopolitical goals Unacceptable”

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As Festas em Honra de Nossa Senhora dos Mártires, em Castro Marim, vão decorrer entre os dias 13 e 17 de agosto, com uma programação que inclui várias iniciativas religiosas e culturais, sem esquecer as tradições do território.

No primeiro dia, a 13 de agosto, a partir das 21h00, haverá missa na Igreja de Castro Marim e sai para a rua a Procissão das Velas em Honra de Nossa Senhora dos Mártires, que vai percorrer várias artérias da vila.

No dia seguinte, a 14 de agosto, a Zona Envolvente à Casa do Sal recebe a abertura da Mostra de Artesanato e um baile com Hugo Madeira e Ângelo Correia pelas 19h00, seguido de um espetáculo do grupo de dança ARUTLA pelas 21h00.

O destaque deste dia é Ana Bacalhau, vocalista dos Deolinda, que apresentará um grande espetáculo em nome próprio, celebrando a música portuguesa. A noite termina com a continuação do baile.

O dia principal destas festas assinala-se a 15 de agosto, começando pelas 09h00 com o Hastear da Bandeira Nacional no edifício dos Paços do Concelho.

À tarde, pelas 17h30, na Igreja de Nossa Senhora dos Mártires decorrerá a Recitação do Terço, seguida de uma missa solene pelas 18h30.

O ponto alto destas celebrações decorre no mesmo dia, pelas 19h30, com a Procissão em Honra de Nossa Senhora dos Mártires, um dos eventos religiosos do concelho que tem mais impacto e importância para a comunidade, que se une num momento de fé pelas ruas da vila de Castro Marim.

Já no recinto da Mostra de Artesanato, iniciam-se os concertos pelas 20h00 com André Filipe Duo, seguido de um grande espetáculo com os The Gift às 22h00 e terminando a noite com o projeto Time Travel, assinado por Possessivo e DJ Karussa, pelas 00h00.

A 16 de agosto, o palco da Mostra de Artesanato recebe a atuação da dupla Só Nós Dois, pelas 20h00, antecipando um grande concerto de um dos cantores alentejanos mais conceituados: Buba Espinho. Para terminar, segue-se uma atuação energética da DJ Joana Faria.

As Festas em Honra de Nossa Senhora dos Mártires terminam a 17 de agosto, pelas 21h30, com o habitual Concerto de Verão da Banda Musical Castromarinense, no mesmo local. 

O evento é organizado pelo Município de Castro Marim, em parceria com a Junta de Freguesia e a Paróquia de São Tiago.

by Scott Ritter – originally published on his Substack

Scott ritter is a former US Navy Intelligence official, now writer, historian, geopolitical analyst, arms control specialist, military expert.

All links to previous Gospa News article or video have been added in the aftermath

When I was travelling to Israel on a regular basis back in the mid- to late-1990’s as part of my duties with the United Nations, I was always struck by how closely many Israelis identified with the United States. On national holidays, many Israeli motorists would fly two little plastic flags from the windows of their cars—one the blue and white Star of David, and the other the Stars and Stripes. “We see ourselves as little America”, my Israeli host would explain when I pointed this out.

The reality was far different. The Israelis conspired against their American counterparts behind their backs, and the US intelligence and security services viewed Israel as a threat to US national security.

I know—I was caught up in the middle of this power dynamic, and ended up being accused by the US government of spying on behalf of Israel. The charges were eventually dropped as unfounded and politically motivated, but the sentiment behind the accusations was real—a significant part of the US defense, intelligence and security establishment of the United States viewed Israel as a threat.

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Collaboration and cooperation ongoing between the US and Israel

Because Israel was a threat. This doesn’t mean there wasn’t collaboration and cooperation ongoing between the US and Israel—while I was in Israel, the hotels were full of CIA officers, US military officers, and State Department diplomats who were on official business.

But there was a Chinese Wall separating the US and Israel, and interactions were governed by strict protocols that kept this wall up at all times. After I left the United Nations, I worked for a while as an on-air analyst for NBC News.

I also signed with a New York City speakers bureau, Greater Talent Network (GTN). And it was these two experiences which exposed me to the level to which pro-Israeli interests had infiltrated every aspect of American media and information management.

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I was approached repeatedly by NBC producers who would hand me their business cards—not the NBC ones, but rather their AIPAC cards (the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee, a literal front for the Israeli government.)

AIPAC called the shots for influential Senators and Congressional Representatives, and Senate and House staffers

GTN networked me directly with AIPAC, as well as its affiliate entities that had taken root in American academia and the think tank industry.

Through these networks, I was brought into a secretive world of backroom connectivity with the US Congress, where AIPAC called the shots for influential Senators and Congressional Representatives, and Senate and House staffers openly collaborated with employees of various US government agencies to set policy.

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I was offered a great deal of money by Paul Wolfowitz, who at the time of the pitch was the Dean of the Johns Hopkins University Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), if I would join the team.

All I had to do was get onboard with the notion that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. I declined Wolfowitz’s offer, and walked away from the AIPAC cabal.

Unfortunately America’s elected representatives have not shown such moral clarity or loyalty to the Republic they ostensibly serve.

We live in an age where the Israeli Prime Minister openly brags about having bought the US Congress.

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Where AIPAC brags about spending $100 million to accomplish just that. Where pro-Israeli operatives spent $30 million to evict Thomas Massie from the US Congress because he dared challenge the surrender of American sovereignty to Israel.

Where the US Secretary of State has openly declared that criticism of Israel is grounds for being denied a visa into the United States. Where Israeli politicians openly advocate for the suppression of free speech in America.

And where the Chinese Wall that separated US and Israeli interests is being torn down by a compliant Congress, all the while the mainstream media, which long ago surrendered its independence and integrity to Israeli interests, remains silent.

The surrender document that signals the capitulation of the Constitutional Republic formerly known as the United States of America to a new entity which could more accurately be called the United States of Israel is the 2027 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), in particular Section 219 of the House version, and Section 1217 of the Senate’s version.

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Secretary of Defense to designate an Executive Agent (EA) to expand and accelerate deeper integration of Israel into US institutions.

Section 219/1217 directs the Secretary of Defense to designate an Executive Agent (EA) to expand and accelerate deeper integration of Israel into US institutions. The EA authority would take precedence over the authority of the other DoD Component heads per DOD Instruction 5101.01, meaning that the EA would be able to overrule determinations by other DOD agencies such as the Defense Technology Security Administration (DTSA) on Israeli access to US technology.

This new EA would end direct Congressional oversight with supervision by the Secretary of Defense. There would be no Congressional confirmation or ability for removal of an executive agent by Congress.

In short, it is the surrendering of the constitutional duties of Congress to a politically appointment agent of the Executive branch of government.This is not what the founding fathers had in mind when they wrote the Constitution.

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Section 2191217 integrates American and Israeli research and development programs in a way which makes the United States dependent on Israel’s provision of specific technologies, thereby granting Israel a significant amount of leverage over future American policy and infrastructure, entangling defense supply chains of Israel and the United States across government, private and academic sectors, blurring the lines of territorial integrity and political sovereignty.

Section 219/1217 targets defense related procurement and acquisition processes so that it will be impossible for future Administrations to separate Israeli technologies or agreements from major defense procurement programs, holding DOD Program Executive Offices and Program Managers hostage to the inclusion of Israeli-origin technologies in US systems. These procedures make moot current “Buy-America” provisions, and give Israeli companies access to intellectual property for weapons systems they are directly competing against.

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Section 2191217 grants the EA the authority to re-allocate the funding and focus of the Defense Department by prioritizing the integration of Israel into the US’ national defense structures. It is literally subordinating the totality of the most sensitive aspects of US defense to Israel, outside the purview of Congressional oversight.

At a time when the majority of the American people are waking up to the horrific crimes committed by Israel against the people of Palestine, and the role played by Israel in getting America involved in permanent wars in the Middle East, Section 219/1217 will permanently tie the United States to Israel, making the US Department of Defense and, by extension, all of the American people, complicit in these crimes.

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The Greater Israeli Project in the Middle East is floundering.

The Greater Israeli Project, which seeks the territorial expansion of the Israeli State in the Middle East at the expense of Israel’s neighbors, is floundering. Israel itself is going through an existential crisis because of its permanent state of war.

I have previously written that the relationship between Israel and the United States is like that of a parasite to its host. Section 219/1217 would codify this status as law.And in doing so, destroy the Constitutional Republic.

Congress has specific duties and responsibilities demanded of it by the Constitution.Surrendering these responsibilities to a foreign nation is not one of these duties.

If Section 219/1217 becomes law, Israel will have permanently attached itself to the American enterprise.

Right now, we have a Congress which has considered criminalizing and criticism of Israel.This, or course, is an affront to the very notion of free speech.By making Israeli security and US security indistinguishable, as would happen if Section 219/1217 becomes law, the inevitability of the criminalization of speech critical of Israel is assured.

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The 2027 NDAA is America’s last stand.Remove Section 2191217, and we have a chance at survival.Turn Section 219/1217 into law, and we have lost the Republic.

I swore to defend the United States of America, a Constitutional Republic.

I will never serve the United States of Israel. And neither should anyone who calls themselves an American.

by Scott Ritter – originally published on his Substack

William Scott Ritter Jr. (born July 15, 1961) is an American former United States Marine Corps intelligence officer, former United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM) weapons inspector, author, and commentator.

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A Avenida 24 de Junho, em Altura, vai transformar-se num autêntico sambódromo no sábado, dia 8 de agosto, com a realização do Carnaval de Verão, a partir das 22h00, com entrada livre.

Inspirado no cortejo de Carnaval, que é um dos mais celebrados no sotavento algarvio, esta iniciativa contará com carros e estruturas alegóricas, com foco no aproveitamento e na reutilização de materiais da edição que decorreu em fevereiro deste ano.

Com o mesmo tema, “Culturas e Tradições do Mundo”, o desfile contará com centenas de foliões e figurantes, que vão encher de cor e alegria a zona central da Avenida 24 de Junho, ao mesmo tempo que decorre o Mercadinho de Verão.

Integrado na programação da Animação de Verão em Altura, o evento termina no palco da Zona de Lazer, com um concerto dos “Pau de Arara”. 

A iniciativa é organizada pela Junta de Freguesia de Altura, em parceria com o Município de Castro Marim.

When Jessica Black was 16 years old, she told a story to North Carolina police detectives that helped convict five friends of murder. Decades later, she’s still trying to correct the record. Matthew Bremner’s feature for Financial Times is a brisk tick-tock of efforts by Black and her incarcerated friends to overturn criminal convictions they claim were built on disturbing intimidation tactics.

The investigators do not accept these firm denials. To them, they seem likely to be the initial stories of a group of boys who know more than they are saying. As officers move in and out of interview rooms, carrying information from one interrogation to the next, the pressure intensifies. They tell the teenagers that their friends are already telling their side of it, that they should too. Under North Carolina law in 2002, police are permitted to exaggerate, even to suggest they have evidence they do not possess. There is no rule requiring a parent or other adult to be present while 14- and 15-year-olds are questioned. For most of their time in these rooms, the five boys are alone. When I interviewed him in late 2025, Tolliver told me that a detective asked him to hold out his arm. “That’s the vein,” he told him. “This is where the lethal injection would go.”

Hanoi (dpa) – Vietnam and the European Union on Thursday upgraded ties to a comprehensive strategic partnership, Vietnam’s highest diplomatic tier, amid a tumultuous period for global trade.

In a joint statement, Vietnam and EU stressed “the importance of a partnership based on common interests and shared values of peace, security, and prosperity in a rules-based international order, based on international law.”

Though US tariffs were not explicitly mentioned, at a press briefing held after meeting Vietnamese President Luong Cuong, European Council President António Costa said: “At a moment when the international rules-based order is under threat from multiple sides, we need to stand side-by-side as reliable and predictable partners.”

“Vietnam considers the EU one of its most important partners in the world and wishes to continue promoting and deepening its relationship with the EU,” Cuong said.

Cuong labelled the move a “historic milestone,” coming 35 years after Vietnam and the EU established diplomatic relations. The EU-Vietnam free trade agreement, signed in 2020, has helped drive a 40 percent increase in bilateral trade.

Vietnam is one of the EU’s largest trading partners in South-East Asia, while the EU is Vietnam’s fourth-largest trading partner. In the first 10 months of 2025, two-way trade reached nearly 61 billion Dollar (51 billion Euro), up 8.4 percent year on year.

Vietnam and the EU on Thursday also underscored the need to strengthen cooperation on peace, defence and security, and voiced support for multilateralism and respect for international law, including the UN Charter. (29 January)

In part two of our series on conservative attempts to use D.C. as a testing ground for harsh criminal justice policies, Rattling the Bars host Mansa Musa sits down with Chelsea Canterbury and Eric Franklin of Voices for a Second Chance. They discuss the danger of proposed measures—including charging 14-year-olds as adults, increasing mandatory minimums, repealing the Second Look Act, and reinstating cash bail—and explain why doubling down on mass incarceration won’t make the city safer.

Additional links/info:

• Voices for a Second Chance Instagram
• Sarah Staudt, Prison Policy Initiative, “Bad Omens: Reform rollbacks in Washington D.C. are a warning sign for state-level advocates”

Credits:

• Producer / Videographer / Editor: Cameron Granadino

Transcript

The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. It will be updated.

Mansa Musa:

We’re here in Washington DC, Massachusetts Avenue at Voices for a Second Chance. We’re talking about Congresses introducing certain bills to roll back progressive laws that impact District of Columbia residents. One such law is the Second Chance Act. The Second Chance Act has been very instrumental in allowing people to get out of prison after they demonstrate they have changed, but Congress want to change that. You’ll hear different testimonies today about how these things impact everyday citizens, people that want to do right. Stay tuned. Joining me today is Chelsea Canterbury. Chelsea Canterbury, welcome to Rattling the Bars. Hi,

Chelsea Canterbury:

Hi. Welcome. Thank you. All

Mansa Musa:

Right. So today we are in front of Voices for a Second Chance service organization in the District of Columbia. And full disclosure, I actually work here. Chelsea Canterbury is, and I’ll call her Chelsea from here on out. Chelsea is a case manager here at Voices for a Second Chance.

Chelsea Canterbury:

So I do connect one-on-one with clients. We’re client facing. The work we do here, we help individuals that have been involved within the justice system or are recently entering society from incarceration. We actually start connecting with clients prior to their release, and that’s part of our first responder services. So we are going into DOC. We’re connecting with individuals that have been released to the halfway houses from federal prison. So we’re actually connecting prior to release. And we offer wraparound services, making sure individuals have all their vital documentation. As you know, can’t get anything done without those documents. So that’s kind of where it all starts. We offer full case management services, employment services, housing, and any resource that we do not provide in-house, we do connect with our partners within the community.

Mansa Musa:

Okay. And I open up by making it known that Congress, they had centrality over the District of Columbia in terms of any bills or laws has passed. Congress has a finalacy on whether they’re going in effect or Congress has the authority to create laws. And recently it came out that they put 27 bills to impact some of the things that’s going on such as cash bail. How do you think changes in the law to make laws harsher in DC will impact the services that Voice for a Second Chance offer?

Chelsea Canterbury:

So yeah, definitely with certain bills being passed, it will in turn affect our community and also the resources that are available to individuals. It’s not reducing recidivism. It’s actually rising it. I don’t believe that’s the answer. I believe offering the proper resources for individuals while they’re still incarcerated prior to release and our youth.

Mansa Musa:

Our youth. And in terms of the youth, in the District of Columbia, they really got a target on the youth back. You hear a lot of negative reporting about the kids in District of Columbia, mainly in certain areas. What’s your views on, if you had the money and the authority to do something about what’s perceived as juvenile delinquency, what would you do? Well,

Chelsea Canterbury:

I definitely think it also starts in the home. So I think providing appropriate resources, I can’t say it enough, but as a community, we have to come together. We have to stand together. So even providing appropriate resources to not only the youth, but also the family. I think that will definitely help our community.

Mansa Musa:

And talk about how many people do y’all do Voices for a Circumchange service during the course of a week? What’s the caseload per week?

Chelsea Canterbury:

It definitely varies, but I mean, we can see up to 50 clients per week, but it definitely varies.

Mansa Musa:

So in terms of the 50 clients, and that’s on an average that you see 50 clients on a week, but in terms of the clients that you see, what are their major needs?

Chelsea Canterbury:

Definitely housing is a huge need. Housing employment is very scarce within our community and the district, providing more food resources.

Mansa Musa:

Right. And the general attitude about Congress interference in DC’s politics is the general consensus is they’re using the District of Columbia as a test case for how they can go throughout the nation and do these things. If you had the ability or the authority or you was able to talk to Congress about what you think should be done, what would you tell them?

Chelsea Canterbury:

I would definitely have a discussion on funding and just allocating that funding appropriately that will actually give back and assist in our community. For instance, we are, as you know, a nonprofit organization and we have seen the results of the services that we have provided to individuals. And if we had additional funding to do so, we could provide more, not only us, just throughout the district alone, more assistance to provide more food resources, shelter resources, employment resources. And in turn, that is what is going to reduce recidivism.

Mansa Musa:

I am talking to Lynwell Muse in front of Voice for a Second Chance. Mr. Muse, Congress is trying to pass a series of bills that’s going to have a devastating impact on the citizens of the District of Columbia. One such bill is to remove the second look at. Another one is what they call the Youth Act. And both of these bills they want to get rid of, both these bills lead to people upon being released under conditional term. The only way you can get access to them, you have to have certain behavior and certain attitude towards your change in life. What do you think if you had the authority or the ability to tell Congress, what do you think they should be doing? Well,

Lemuel Muse:

I don’t think that is a good idea because the Second Chance Act, people like me need that because I’m 67 years old and I’m just getting out of jail February the 20th.

Mansa Musa:

Okay, what wrong?

Lemuel Muse:

And I did 35 months and I was placed on the street the next day. So in my situation, I don’t know what they expect me to do. I’m out here, I’m homeless. All the shelters are full. They got hundreds and hundreds of Black men out on the street just homeless. You know what I mean? And I just don’t think that’s a good idea because people like me need the Second Chance Act.

Mansa Musa:

The money be best spent on doing what?

Lemuel Muse:

The money would be best spent on helping the people, the citizens that live here. I’ve been here all my life. I’ve been here all my life. And the resources that I need, they seem like they cut them and taking them away from us and just leaving us out here with nothing. You know what I mean? Go ahead. Right now I’m going to Voices for a Second Chance to receive some help. And I’ve been to Marca over on Good Hope Road.

Mansa Musa:

Mayor’s office on return to.

Lemuel Muse:

Right. And all I want is just a little bit of help just to help me because being in jail 35 months and being placed on the street the next day, it’s just difficult. It’s difficult when you don’t have help.

Mansa Musa:

So the crime is not really in people committing crime. The crime is in the misappropriation of funds.

Lemuel Muse:

I agree with you. I agree with you because I didn’t have a chance to work my way back in the community slow. I’m just back on the street.

Charlina Mcbride:

Right. My name is Charlena McBride. I was incarcerated for about a year. I’m a DC citizen.

Mansa Musa:

All right. So today we’re talking about Congress trying to roll back some of the progressive laws that the District of Columbia City Council has passed, such as they want to reduce the age of charging kids to making them adults from 16 to 14. They want to roll back mandatory minimum. Mandatory minimum is that they’re taking it out the hands of the judge to give a person a sentence that he think they should get based on whatever crime they committed. It’s a mandatory sentence they got to get. So a judge don’t have no discretion. They try to institute cash bail, making it difficult for people to get out of prison. But more importantly, they try and roll back what they call a Second Chance Act. If you had the authority to tell, or if you was in front of Congress and you wanted to tell them what you should think they should do with this money, what would you tell

Charlina Mcbride:

Them? I would tell them that I think they should create an alternative plan for the youth or for people that make mistakes in the society that get locked up because it’s a lot of stressful times out here. The economy is constantly rising. Housing is being unaffordable to people that’s not making enough money. When people get locked up, I think they should have some more facilities where they can be rehabilitated versus getting a lot of time because people can change and I don’t think they should give them more time and take away their choices or their right to be able to get out, being locked up with no bail. And I don’t think the youth should be charged as an adult because they have a mind of a youth.

Mansa Musa:

That’s right.

Charlina Mcbride:

So they should have more programs or more facilities where they can go to versus going to jail to an adult jail. Having more outreach programs, having more voices for second chance to provide for people, more counselors, more mental health sponsors and mentorship programs so that somebody can help guide the youth into the right direction. Because everybody needs somebody to guide them. And if they’re not getting guided when they step off the porch from at home, then there should be other big brother programs, big sister programs that’s reaching out to the community and the youth so they don’t have to go through taking from somebody else or involved in something that’s going to cause them to go to jail.

Mansa Musa:

I’m talking to Jerry Mack, a client at Voices for a Second Chance. Mr. Mack, tell us a little bit about yourself first.

Jerry Mack:

Well, born and raised in Washington DC. Been in the city my whole life. There’s a lot of things that’s changed in the city from pretty much my youth to now. And I think that us as pretty much the older generation can pretty much reach out to the adolescents and pretty much try to see what it is that we can do for them to pretty much get back on track and just pretty much enjoy theirself while they’re in the city instead of having Congress and everybody else try to intervene and pretty much take their youth and stuff away from them. All

Mansa Musa:

Right. And you formally incarcerated?

Jerry Mack:

Yes.

Mansa Musa:

How much time did you serve? If you don’t mind me asking.

Jerry Mack:

A year and a half.

Mansa Musa:

Okay. So you served a year and a half. Where was you at now? DC Jail?

Jerry Mack:

I started at DC Jail. They transferred me to Philly. I left Philly and went to New Jersey in Fort Dix.

Mansa Musa:

Okay. Now while you was in DC Jail, did you see a lot of young individuals in there?

Jerry Mack:

Yeah, it’s a lot. You know what I’m saying? I mean, it’s just basically, it feels like that’s what they trying to do to pretty much the youth. They’re not trying to let them enjoy theirselves, not realizing that they was once kids at

Charlina Mcbride:

That

Jerry Mack:

Point in time. So it’s just basically kids going to be kids, but they really don’t have too much for them to do nowadays. So it’s just kind of hard for them to actually really enjoy theirselves.

Mansa Musa:

So if you was able to tell Congress what your views are on what they should do in terms of helping the city become a more profitable city, a more productive city, a more humane city, what would you tell them?

Jerry Mack:

I mean, I would practically tell them that instead of just trying to lock them up and pretty much push them out or put them in prison or jail and stuff like that, sit down and talk to them. Find out what it is that they want and what they need. You know what I’m saying? Because like I said, it’s basically they just kids. They being kids. So basically you could take the money that you’re trying to put into all these other bills and cash bonds or whatever. Have the kids, you know what I’m saying, really not even into some of the foolishness or whatever. But it’s just basically they just out enjoying themselves and they just getting a bad rap.

Mansa Musa:

And as Mr. Mack said, invest in them as opposed to try to penalize

Eric Franklin:

Them. Yeah. My name is Derek Franklin. I’m the reentry navigator here at Voices for a Second Chance, and I’m a returning citizen and also a IRA recipient.

Mansa Musa:

Today we’re talking about Congress introducing a series of bills to roll back some of the progressive laws that the DC City Council passed. And one of the bills that they’ve introduced is they want to roll back the Second Chance Act, which is basically IRA. Talk about, because you’re in that space and dealing with IRA, you’re IRA recipient, as you say. And talk about that and what that means.

Eric Franklin:

So yeah, these new laws that’s been introduced by Congress, the rollback IRA and all these other laws that changed in sentences for young people, young adults to get more time at the age of 14 sentences as adults. These things doesn’t work. They’re going back to what mass incarceration, which they did back in the 90s, the 80s and the 90s that didn’t curve the crime. So it’s all about rehabilitating the people, the young people and giving them a second chance. Like me, I was sentenced to 40 years to life. And I mean, I changed my life way before I even knew IRA was in existence. You know what I’m saying? So this shows that the people will change, especially the youth as they do their time. So locking them up and throwing away the key is not the answer. It’s not the answer.

Mansa Musa:

And how old were you when you got out there?

Eric Franklin:

When I got out there, I was 22 years old. I came out, I was 47 years old. You know what I’m saying? So I spent most of my 20s, all my 30s, most of my 40s in prison. And like I say, I changed my ways and my way of thinking, I want to say probably 15 years ago before I came home. You know what I’m saying? So these things, locking the people up, these young people up and saying, okay, look, what they was calling them, predators or whatever like that. No, the sign says what? The frontal lobes don’t fully develop to the mid – 20s. So the decision making of these teenagers, they don’t fully develop. So give them a chance. I’m not saying that they shouldn’t be held accountable for their crimes, but locking them up and not giving them a chance to come out, this is, I want to say, inhumane.

You know what I’m saying? This is something that you don’t do to people or do to your residence in DC. I said far as the law, especially containing to the youth. More programs for the youth. Giving them something to do as far as education. It goes back to their family, helping their families out with jobs so they won’t be just running the streets and getting to things. You know what I’m saying? This will change. This will help the youth and not to be on the streets like that. And another thing, the law should be changed, not just for a certain age. Take away the age and just give everyone who gets incarcerated another chance to come home. Instead of just locking the people up and having them in prison, which doesn’t help at all. You know what I’m saying? So we got the age where now, before the age of 25, have no age for someone who can have a time reduction.

This will help and have more programs and housing for the people when they return. You

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Ich habe oft darauf hingewiesen, dass die lokalen Mitglieder der Waffen-SS nicht nur in der Ukraine, sondern auch im Baltikum als Nationalhelden gefeiert und bis heute in jährlichen Aufmärschen geehrt werden. Die TASS hat am 1. August aus Anlass eines Jahrestages einen Artikel über die Nazi-Verehrung im Baltikum veröffentlicht, den ich übersetzt habe. Wer nun […]

MI5 directors secretly pushed for Britain’s decision to designate the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist organization

MI5 directors secretly pushed for Britain’s decision to designate the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist organization and helped the government adopt the draconian National Security Act, a report says.

The report, published by The Grayzone on Friday, revealed that MI5 Director General Kenneth Douglas McCallum and former MI5 chief Baroness Eliza Manningham-Buller privately worked to advance the IRGC designation and expand state security powers before the measure was adopted.

McCallum discussed the proposed IRGC proscription with then-Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper in 2023, while acknowledging that its “direct operational benefit” was likely to be “modest.”

Despite recognizing the limited practical impact, McCallum told Cooper that granting authorities such powers was still “sensible to contemplate” as Britain debated whether to formally proscribe the IRGC.

The leaked emails showed that the IRGC designation gained momentum amid false claims by British security officials that Iran had been involved in plots inside the UK, including McCallum’s statements that MI5 had disrupted multiple Iran-related threats without disclosing any evidence.

The UK government officially designated the IRGC as a terrorist organization on July 13, granting authorities expanded powers to prosecute individuals for activities to support or promote the group under Britain’s so-called terrorism laws.

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The intelligence campaign to the passage of the National Security Act,

The report also linked the intelligence campaign to the passage of the National Security Act, a controversial law that expanded government powers against activities considered threats to national security.

In one leaked email, McCallum thanked Manningham-Buller for helping secure the legislation, writing, “Many thanks for your support (and stamina) in getting the NS Act over the line.”

The report said the legislation introduced offenses targeting unauthorized disclosures of state information, while parliamentary debates explicitly referenced preventing future “WikiLeaks-type” disclosures.

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Grayzone: “The Act could have a “chilling effect” on legitimate journalistic activity”

The Grayzone also cited warnings from lawyers involved in drafting the legislation that the Act could have a “chilling effect” on legitimate journalistic activity. The leaked correspondence showed McCallum continued promoting warnings about foreign threats, including unfounded claims that Iran had carried out plots against British targets.

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In October 2024, Manningham-Buller praised McCallum’s public security warnings, writing, “You could not have hoped for fuller coverage. Hope it helps with SR,” referring to the government’s spending review.

The report said the exchange highlighted how claims of foreign threats were used to support calls for increased intelligence resources, with the government later announcing a seven-percent rise in spending on domestic and foreign intelligence operations.

originally published by Iranian Press TV

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