August, 31 2018, 12:00am EDT
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Common Cause Urges Senate to Withhold Consent on Lifetime Appointments to Supreme Court Until a Complete Record of All That's at Stake is Public
Today, Common Cause urged the United States Senate to exercise its constitutional power to withhold its consent on any presidential nominee for a lifetime appointment to the United States Supreme Court until a complete record of what's at stake is laid bare, including all of a nominee's records relevant to the job, and until more is public concerning Department of Justice investigations involving the president and the electoral process.
WASHINGTON
Today, Common Cause urged the United States Senate to exercise its constitutional power to withhold its consent on any presidential nominee for a lifetime appointment to the United States Supreme Court until a complete record of what's at stake is laid bare, including all of a nominee's records relevant to the job, and until more is public concerning Department of Justice investigations involving the president and the electoral process.
The letter to senators emphasizes that the current situation is unprecedented in our nation's history with an ongoing investigation into a hostile foreign power's attacks aimed a swinging the 2016 presidential election to Donald Trump and multiple members of the President's inner circle under investigation or already convicted as a result of that investigation.
"These are uncharted waters and the risk of undermining public trust in the judiciary is very real right now at this juncture in our nation's history. The record is incomplete and the Senate does not yet have enough information to provide informed consent" said Karen Hobert Flynn, President of Common Cause. "The Supreme Court could well end up deciding a variety of issues related to presidential power involving ongoing DOJ matters, including the Special Counsel's investigation, that go to the heart of the electoral process. A cloud hangs over the very constitutional officer who is vested with the power to choose a person for a lifetime appointment to the highest court in our judicial system and who may later sit in judgment of them."
The letter says that "the Advice and Consent clause was intended by the Framers of the Constitution to be a serious and deliberative process, not one that is rushed, or timed to achieve maximum political leverage on key members of the Senate who are up for election in November, or logrolled through a vote of a simple majority of the Senate, as if there is little at stake."
The letter also emphasizes that the Senate will have an incomplete record of the nominee's (Judge Brett Kavanaugh) professional papers as it weighs his nomination. Hearings are currently scheduled two months month before the National Archives and Records Administration estimates it can produce the limited records Senate Judiciary Chair Chuck Grassley (R-IA) has requested. That request does not even include documents related to Kavanaugh's work as staff secretary to President George W. Bush, a position the nominee called the "most useful" and "most instructive" to his role as a judge.
"The American people deserve to see the full record of any nominee to the Supreme Court because that appointment is for life and the votes cast by that Justice will impact every American for a generation or more," said Flynn. "That standard cannot yet be satisfied. We are urging the Senate to use its brakes on the confirmation process of lifetime Supreme Court appointments and do what is right for the nation - and that is to wait until it knows all the facts."
To read the full letter, click here.
To view this release online, click here.
Common Cause is a nonpartisan, grassroots organization dedicated to upholding the core values of American democracy. We work to create open, honest, and accountable government that serves the public interest; promote equal rights, opportunity, and representation for all; and empower all people to make their voices heard in the political process.
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Israel's Water War Crimes in Gaza
"Israel is exterminating life in Gaza, and making the conditions unlivable," said one public health advocate. "Those supporting Israel are supporting genocide."
Jul 18, 2024
Since Israel began its bombardment and near-total blockade on humanitarian aid in Gaza almost 10 months ago, accounts of Palestinians spending hours each day searching for clean water and images of young children hauling jugs to fill up have been seen across the world, as aid groups document what Oxfam calls Israel's "water war crimes" in a new report of the same name.
The 66-page report, released Wednesday, documents how since October, Israel has systematically reduced the water available in Gaza by 94%, with just 4.74 liters per resident obtainable each day—less than a third of the recommended minimum amount in emergencies.
With Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant's announcement in October of a "complete siege" on Gaza—home to 2.3 million people, about half of whom are children—Israel began not only blocking humanitarian aid including water deliveries from its national water company, Mekorot, but also commenced air and ground attacks on Gaza's water infrastructure.
An average of five of Gaza's water and sanitation sites have been taken out of service every three days, Oxfam found, reducing water production from sources in the Gaza Strip by 84% by late May.
Gaza City, the enclave's most populous city before it was largely destroyed by the bombardment, has lost 88% of its water wells.
With Israel blocking fuel deliveries as well as food, medical, and other necessary aid, 100% of the city's water desalination plants have been put out of service, making it impossible to treat seawater and brackish water to make it safe to drink.
Seventy percent of sewage pumps and 100% of wastewater treatment plants have also been destroyed throughout the enclave.
In a video accompanying the report, Oxfam showed a worker named Ghada, based in the Gaza Strip, standing in front of polluted water.
"The sanitation situation is really dire," said Ghada. "This is sewage-contaminated water. The smell is overpowering and it is almost impossible for anyone to endure."
🚨 WATER WAR CRIMES: Israel's use of water as a weapon of war in #Gaza has cut water supply by 94%. The UK government has allowed arms sales to Israel, which could be used in targeted destruction of water systems. Sign the petition to #StopArmingIsrael:➡️ https://t.co/ekFBpX8c7N pic.twitter.com/fWwxHqZnLy
— Oxfam (@oxfamgb) July 18, 2024
Israel's "weaponizing of water," said Oxfam water and sanitation specialist Lama Abdul Samad, "is already having deadly consequences" for people in Gaza.
Sewage-contaminated water contains pathogens that can cause cholera, dysentery, hepatitis A, typhoid, and other easily preventable diseases.
By late May, according to the report, 727,909 people had reported cases of water- and sanitation-related diseases, including 485,000 cases of acute diarrhea—the third-leading cause of death among children worldwide.
The number of fatalities from waterborne diseases is not available currently, said Oxfam, but "as the risk of famine persists across Gaza, where more than two million people face dangerous food insecurity, malnourished children under five with diarrheal diseases are at an increased risk of mortality."
Withholding water and forcing people, including young children, to rely on contaminated water supplies, "is what genocide looks like," said Yipeng Ge, a public health practitioner.
"Water is life," said Ge. "Israel is exterminating life in Gaza, and making the conditions unlivable. Those supporting Israel are supporting genocide."
Abdul Samad noted that the Israeli government had been "depriving Palestinians across the West Bank and Gaza of safe and sufficient water for many years" before the IDF's bombardment began in retaliation for a Hamas-led attack on southern Israel in October.
In March 2023, Palestinians had 82.7 liters of water per person, per day—below the World Health Organization's recommended minimum. Groundwater was "severely contaminated due to over-extraction and contamination from seawater intrusion and sewage infiltration, leaving 97% of it polluted."
Now, said Abdul Samad, "the widespread destruction and significant restrictions on aid delivery in Gaza impacting access to water and other essentials for survival underscores the urgent need for the international community to take decisive action to prevent further suffering by upholding justice and human rights, including those enshrined in the Geneva and Genocide Conventions."
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Oil Giant Ran 1977 Article Linking Climate Change to 'Widespread Starvation'
"Pestilence, starvation, drought. To know one's product may bring that about, and bury the evidence, is unspeakable,” an expert said.
Jul 18, 2024
A Marathon Oil Company magazine from 1977 predicted that rising temperatures caused by industrial activity could one day lead to "widespread starvation and other social and economic calamities," The Guardianreported on Thursday.
The revelation comes as Big Oil faces a number of lawsuits for covering up its knowledge about climate change, propagating disinformation, and blocking a green transition.
Marathon Petroleum, the largest oil refinery company in the U.S. and a major spin-off of Marathon Oil Company, is among the defendants in one of the most prominent of those cases, City and County of Honolulu v. Sunoco et al. The city of Honolulu alleges that Big Oil engaged in a coordinated effort to "conceal and deny their own knowledge" of the impact of burning fossil fuels.
The company magazine, Marathon World, featured the 1977 article, titled "World Weather Watch." Summarizing the work of federal climate scientists, the unnamed author suggested that "industrial expansion during the last century may be affecting the weather through carbon dioxide pollution."
Observers of the fossil fuel industry on Wednesday indicated that the 1977 article fit with a larger pattern of Big Oil's early knowledge of climate change.
"I'm not surprised that Marathon would have documents that shed light on its awareness," Bryant Sewell, a research analyst at the corporate watchdog Majority Action, told The Guardian. "Whether it's Marathon, Exxon, or electric utilities, we have seen a longstanding strategy from these companies of climate denial, disinformation, and delay."
Timmons Roberts, a climate disinformation expert based at Brown University, reacted strongly to the article when The Guardian shared a copy with him.
"Pestilence, starvation, drought," he said. "To know one's product may bring that about, and bury the evidence, is unspeakable.”
It wasn't just Exxon and Shell tracking climate science decades ago.
I found a 1977 company mag from Marathon Oil predicting the climate crisis could cause 'widespread starvation.'
Marathon is now largest oil refiner in US.
My latest in @guardian https://t.co/Y6whc3q2Vd
— Geoff Dembicki (@GeoffDembicki) July 18, 2024
The 1977 article was uncovered by Guardian contributor Geoff Dembicki, an investigative journalist and author of the 2022 book The Petroleum Papers: Inside the Far-Right Conspiracy to Cover Up Climate Change. Dembicki told Common Dreams that he found the article in an archive and it's not available online.
The Marathon article quotes J. Murray Mitchell, a leading climatologist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration who warned in the 1970s that carbon dioxide levels could threaten the polar ice caps and have devastating consequences for humankind, as well as other climate experts. However, it also puts forth other possible causes for changes in climate and weather patterns which have since been debunked, according to Dembicki.
Marathon Petroleum, which is in the process of merging with rival ConocoPhillips, hasn't received as much scrutiny for its historical role in climate denialism as Exxon and Shell, two companies that, as Dembicki put it, "privately studied catastrophic climate risks starting in the 1970s and then led public relations and advertising campaigns to undermine the science."
Yet the company, which owns 13 oil refineries and more than 6,000 gas stations in the U.S. and had a net income of nearly $10 billion in 2023, has received scrutiny for more recent events. It was the subject of a 2019-2020 Congressional investigation into a covert industry effort to push the Trump administration to roll back vehicle efficiency standards, following a New York Timesexposé. A group of senators, including Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), called Marathon "one of the most anti-climate companies" in an open letter at the time.
Whitehouse is among the lawmakers pushing the Department of Justice to investigate Big Oil disinformation, which could potentially lead to a federal lawsuit akin to the one previously brought against Big Tobacco. Dozens of cities and states, including Honolulu, have already filed such suits.
The lawsuits face bitter opposition from Big Oil. Industry interests have mounted an unusually public campaign to get the U.S. Supreme Court to dismiss the Honolulu case, which could be the first climate lawsuit against Big Oil to reach a jury trial.
The majority of Americans support legal accountability for Big Oil for its role in creating the climate crisis, a Data for Progress poll from May showed. Roughly half of Americans even support criminal charges, which have not yet been pursued anywhere in the world, though a case file has been opened in France.
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Push for Biden to Drop Out Reaches Very Top of Democratic Party
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries have reportedly urged the president to step aside.
Jul 18, 2024
The two highest-ranking Democrats in the U.S. Congress have reportedly warned President Joe Biden behind closed doors that his continued presence at the top of the party's ticket could imperil down-ballot candidates in November.
The New York Timesreported late Wednesday that Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) "each told Mr. Biden privately over the past week that their members were deeply concerned about his chances in November and the fates of House and Senate candidates" should he defy calls to drop his reelection bid against Republican nominee Donald Trump.
ABC Newsreported that Schumer "had a blunt conversation with Biden, making the case it would be best if Biden dropped out of the 2024 presidential race."
"A source familiar with the matter tells ABC News that House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries has expressed similar views directly to Biden, suggesting he should drop out of the race," the outlet added.
The conversations with Democratic leaders appear to have left Biden "more receptive" to calls to drop out, according to the Times—an attitude that contrasts with the incumbent president's furious dismissal of concerns expressed by rank-and-file Democrats in recent private conversations.
Twenty House Democrats and one Democratic senator have publicly urged Biden to step aside to date, and a poll released Wednesday showed that 65% of Democratic voters want the president to withdraw from the 2024 race.
"To argue that Biden staying in is good for Dems is to argue that you have a better grasp of the electoral situation than Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer, and Hakeem Jeffries."
Politicoreported Wednesday that Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.)—the former House speaker—told Biden directly last week that "she and other Democratic lawmakers worry that he's dragging down the party." One unnamed ally of Pelosi told the outlet that she intends to "do everything in her power to make sure" Biden is replaced at the top of the Democratic ticket.
"To argue that Biden staying in is good for Dems is to argue that you have a better grasp of the electoral situation than Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer, and Hakeem Jeffries," wrote progressive organizer Aaron Regunberg, a vocal proponent of replacing Biden at the top of the ticket.
The reported conversations between Biden and leading Democrats underscore the extent to which previously marginal calls for the incumbent to step aside have quickly spread to every level of the party, from grassroots activists to leadership to delegates to the party's convention.
Politicoobtained messages exchanged by Democratic National Convention (DNC) delegates and activists in California in the wake of Biden's disastrous debate performance against Trump last month.
"DNC delegate Susan Bolle in the days after the debate said she heard from more than 150 of the voters she represents asking her to call for Biden to step down," the outlet reported Thursday.
Despite protests from delegates and some House Democrats, the Democratic National Committee announced Wednesday that it plans to hold a virtual roll call vote to nominate Biden at the beginning of August, weeks before the party's convention in Chicago later that month.
"A virtual roll call before the convention would be unprecedented for a major party, with both Democrats and Republicans traditionally formalizing their nominee at their convention—even if the selection has already been made months earlier through the primary and caucus process," The Washington Postreported Wednesday.
Experts say claims that a virtual roll call is necessary to ensure the Democratic nominee is not kept off the ballot in several states, including Ohio, are false.
"I don't think it's serious to say that Democrats need to do a virtual roll call to assure their party's nominee will be on the ballot," Rick Hasen, a professor of political science at the University of California, Los Angeles, wrote in a blog post earlier this week. "This is about politics, not law."
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