thenation--2020-06-18--When Police and Public Health Collide in the Age of Covid-19

At the beginning of August last year , the Boston Police Department rolled out Operation Clean Sweep , several nights of terror for the city ’ s drug-using homeless community dwelling on the streets where Boston ’ s South End and Roxbury neighborhoods meet , near the Boston Medical Center and many of the city ’ s largest substance use and homeless service providers .
Operation Clean Sweep lingered for weeks , with increased police presence and constant harassment of people in the area who use drugs or were suspected of doing so .
In one incident last summer , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a patient who ’ d been admitted to the hospital was arrested by police when he stepped outside for a cigarette , and though he was released from custody later that day , had his care interrupted thanks to the caprices of the Boston Police Department .
While Boston Mayor Marty Walsh defended the arrests of dozens of people and the destruction of their personal property—including several wheelchairs belonging to homeless residents—many involved with public health criticized the raids .
Even Boston District Attorney Rachael Rollins spoke out : “ Public safety begins @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ve long made clear , we can not arrest our way out of a health and resource crisis .
People who suffer from homelessness , substance use disorder , or mental illness are not debris ; they can not be ‘ swept ’ away.
” During the Covid-19 pandemic , these same people have been the forgotten , an inconvenient afterthought , even though we know that addressing the spread of the virus means making sure everyone is protected and taken care of—no matter who they are .
Leaving people living with substance @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the streets , homeless , without proper shelter and supportive care is a recipe for disaster .
Especially since during the pandemic , services that require face-to-face contact have been restricted to limit transmission .
While health care workers have been stretched thin in responding to Covid-19 , many traditional shelters have closed temporarily or significantly reduced their capacity lest they become hot spots for SARS-COV-2 .
Suggestions from health care workers on how to deal with the colliding crises of Covid-19 , homelessness , substance addiction , and mental illness start with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ dorms for single occupancy for the unhoused , linked to the social services people need .
Many of these proposals come from those working right in the center of the storm where Operation Clean Sweep took place .
The Pandemic Is a Threat .
The President Is Worse .
But the current situation in Boston for people experiencing homelessness , substance addiction , and mental illness “ is a shit show , ” in the words of one observer I spoke to , while another called it “ dystopian and scary.
” The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ repeat performance of Operation Clean Sweep could come at any time .
I ’ ve spoken to several people this week about what is happening on the ground .
All were fearful of reprisals by the City of Boston , and thus all asked to remain anonymous .
The threat of reprisals is real : After one complaint against a Boston Police Department officer , certain shifts in the area were boycotted , so service providers and health care workers had to walk from their offices to their cars without any police presence @ @ @ @ @ @ @ worst-of-both-worlds approach to drug users who are experiencing homelessness .
In a more conservative American city , they would be arrested , jailed , and hounded from all public spaces ; in a more liberal one , there might be a more laissez-faire approach to these individuals , with more people visible on the streets across the city—often without enough services to meet their needs .
Think San Francisco .
But what Mayor Marty Walsh and his police department have done is to corral drug-using homeless people into small tracts of industrial no-man @ @ @ @ @ @ @ End and Roxbury , the heart of the city ’ s African American community .
One observer told me it was if the city had decided to “ concentrate all its social despair into a couple of blocks ” of real estate to keep it hidden from view .
As of last week , in the parking lot at Massachusetts Avenue and Melnea Cass Boulevard , originally set up as a pandemic-time comfort station—with the Boston Health Commission just trying to provide shade , bathrooms , and handwashing sinks wherever the police are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in , with gardening cloth along the fence obscuring what is going on inside , and with only one way in and one way out .
As in the “ Hamsterdam ” episode of David Simon ’ s The Wire , the parking lot has become a place where people go to do their business : buying , selling and using drugs .
It ’ s largely a self-regulated space with people who use drugs themselves giving naloxone to those who overdose and with services nearby for any serious complications that happen inside @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for the ostensible purpose of monitoring the site for safety or for building cases for arrest and prosecution later—and the lot emptied out for a while .
Business is now back to usual , but a single incident of violence in the crowded space could set off a spark , with the police sweeping in like they did last summer .
If that happens , those who most need help could end up going to jail ( where Covid-19 infection risks remain extremely high ) , or going underground , dispersing across the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ t help them , and where they won ’ t get tested for Covid-19—though they are the population most at risk of acquiring the infection .
Boston is the capital of one of our most progressive states , with a medical community that is second to none in the country .
Now it needs a mayor and police commissioner who will do the right thing on substance use and homelessness .
There are examples of cities whose approach Boston could replicate ; Trieste , in Italy , and the Finnish capital , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ homelessness and drug use .
But adopting them would require building or converting more housing for those who are now homeless or in danger of becoming so , and hiring more social support workers rather than police to support those with substance use or mental health problems .
In the long run , though , such a strategy could also save money .
Some studies suggest that every homeless person in properly supported housing reduces the need for spending on emergency health care , social services , and the criminal justice system by @ @ @ @ @ @ @ raging all over the country about how to repurpose municipal budgets and shift money away from police departments , Boston could make a difference in the lives of its most vulnerable citizens by putting its money to a better purpose .
Mayor Walsh has already announced that he ’ s shifting 20 percent of the police overtime budget , about $ 12 million , to social services in the city .
As DA Rachael Rollins has said , “ Investing resources in evidence-based solutions isn ’ t just the right thing to do @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to do .
Clearing the streets will not clear up the underlying problems , and in the end will cost us more money and more lives.
” Covid-19 has exposed the weaknesses in American society .
The pandemic has also shown us that we ’ re only as safe as the most vulnerable among us .
Not caring before Covid-19 was a moral failing—or a political one .
But unless we address the conditions of people who use drugs , people who are homeless , we ’ ll never rid ourselves of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by its current policy of giving these individuals no safe quarter , by jamming people into close proximity in squalid conditions , but by rising to the occasion to try something new , at least for the United States .
Massachusetts did this once before , with Romneycare , which became a template for the Affordable Care Act .
A repeat of Operation Clean Sweep this summer in Boston would be a catastrophe for those now seeking refuge in the only place where the city will let them exist .
It would also @ @ @ @ @ @ @ would come at our collective peril .
Just last week , Aubri Esters , one the city ’ s leading advocates for harm reduction and overdose prevention efforts , who championed the rights of people struggling with substance use disorders , died at the age of 35 in her apartment .
She worked tirelessly for the dignity and rights of people who used drugs .
I tried to reach her for this story before the news of her death was released .
Many in Boston , including the mayor , are now eulogizing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as one doctor who knew her said , “ I can hear Aubri saying , ‘ Nice words , Mayor .
Now use your power and privilege to make Safe Consumption Spaces a reality , though maybe not so politely.
’ ” We ’ ve all got to stop being so polite when it comes to the rights of people who use drugs , people experiencing homelessness , and people living with mental illness .
Right now , during this pandemic—and long after it ’ s over .

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At the beginning of August last year, the Boston Police Department rolled out Operation Clean Sweep, several nights of terror for the city’s drug-using homeless community dwelling on the streets where Boston’s South End and Roxbury neighborhoods meet, near the Boston Medical Center and many of the city’s largest substance use and homeless service providers. Operation Clean Sweep lingered for weeks, with increased police presence and constant harassment of people in the area who use drugs or were suspected of doing so. In one incident last summer, according to his health care provider, a patient who’d been admitted to the hospital was arrested by police when he stepped outside for a cigarette, and though he was released from custody later that day, had his care interrupted thanks to the caprices of the Boston Police Department.
While Boston Mayor Marty Walsh defended the arrests of dozens of people and the destruction of their personal property—including several wheelchairs belonging to homeless residents—many involved with public health criticized the raids. Even Boston District Attorney Rachael Rollins spoke out: “Public safety begins with public health. As I’ve long made clear, we cannot arrest our way out of a health and resource crisis. People who suffer from homelessness, substance use disorder, or mental illness are not debris; they cannot be ‘swept’ away.”
During the Covid-19 pandemic, these same people have been the forgotten, an inconvenient afterthought, even though we know that addressing the spread of the virus means making sure everyone is protected and taken care of—no matter who they are. Leaving people living with substance use or mental health disorders out on the streets, homeless, without proper shelter and supportive care is a recipe for disaster. Especially since during the pandemic, services that require face-to-face contact have been restricted to limit transmission.
While health care workers have been stretched thin in responding to Covid-19, many traditional shelters have closed temporarily or significantly reduced their capacity lest they become hot spots for SARS-COV-2. Suggestions from health care workers on how to deal with the colliding crises of Covid-19, homelessness, substance addiction, and mental illness start with housing: repurposing hotel rooms and university dorms for single occupancy for the unhoused, linked to the social services people need. Many of these proposals come from those working right in the center of the storm where Operation Clean Sweep took place. More From Gregg Gonsalves These New Alzheimer’s Drugs Are a Travesty July 27, 2023 It's Not “Unreasonable” to Want to Change Our Rotten Health Care System June 1, 2023 Now More Than Ever, We Need to Fight, Not Despair May 11, 2023
But the current situation in Boston for people experiencing homelessness, substance addiction, and mental illness “is a shit show,” in the words of one observer I spoke to, while another called it “dystopian and scary.” The environment there is so volatile that a repeat performance of Operation Clean Sweep could come at any time. I’ve spoken to several people this week about what is happening on the ground. All were fearful of reprisals by the City of Boston, and thus all asked to remain anonymous. The threat of reprisals is real: After one complaint against a Boston Police Department officer, certain shifts in the area were boycotted, so service providers and health care workers had to walk from their offices to their cars without any police presence at all. Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life Chris Lehmann Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life Chris Lehmann
Boston has taken a worst-of-both-worlds approach to drug users who are experiencing homelessness. In a more conservative American city, they would be arrested, jailed, and hounded from all public spaces; in a more liberal one, there might be a more laissez-faire approach to these individuals, with more people visible on the streets across the city—often without enough services to meet their needs. Think San Francisco. But what Mayor Marty Walsh and his police department have done is to corral drug-using homeless people into small tracts of industrial no-man’s lands between the gentrified South End and Roxbury, the heart of the city’s African American community. One observer told me it was if the city had decided to “concentrate all its social despair into a couple of blocks” of real estate to keep it hidden from view.
As of last week, in the parking lot at Massachusetts Avenue and Melnea Cass Boulevard, originally set up as a pandemic-time comfort station—with the Boston Health Commission just trying to provide shade, bathrooms, and handwashing sinks wherever the police are pushing people—the men and women are fenced in, with gardening cloth along the fence obscuring what is going on inside, and with only one way in and one way out. As in the “Hamsterdam” episode of David Simon’s The Wire, the parking lot has become a place where people go to do their business: buying, selling and using drugs. It’s largely a self-regulated space with people who use drugs themselves giving naloxone to those who overdose and with services nearby for any serious complications that happen inside. The police recently installed surveillance cameras—whether for the ostensible purpose of monitoring the site for safety or for building cases for arrest and prosecution later—and the lot emptied out for a while. Business is now back to usual, but a single incident of violence in the crowded space could set off a spark, with the police sweeping in like they did last summer. If that happens, those who most need help could end up going to jail (where Covid-19 infection risks remain extremely high), or going underground, dispersing across the Boston area, where their friends can’t help them, and where they won’t get tested for Covid-19—though they are the population most at risk of acquiring the infection. Current Issue View our current issue
Boston is the capital of one of our most progressive states, with a medical community that is second to none in the country. Now it needs a mayor and police commissioner who will do the right thing on substance use and homelessness. There are examples of cities whose approach Boston could replicate; Trieste, in Italy, and the Finnish capital, Helsinki, both have innovative approaches to homelessness and drug use. But adopting them would require building or converting more housing for those who are now homeless or in danger of becoming so, and hiring more social support workers rather than police to support those with substance use or mental health problems.
In the long run, though, such a strategy could also save money. Some studies suggest that every homeless person in properly supported housing reduces the need for spending on emergency health care, social services, and the criminal justice system by over $15,000. With discussion now raging all over the country about how to repurpose municipal budgets and shift money away from police departments, Boston could make a difference in the lives of its most vulnerable citizens by putting its money to a better purpose. Mayor Walsh has already announced that he’s shifting 20 percent of the police overtime budget, about $12 million, to social services in the city. As DA Rachael Rollins has said, “Investing resources in evidence-based solutions isn’t just the right thing to do; it’s the smart thing to do. Clearing the streets will not clear up the underlying problems, and in the end will cost us more money and more lives.”
Covid-19 has exposed the weaknesses in American society. The pandemic has also shown us that we’re only as safe as the most vulnerable among us. Not caring before Covid-19 was a moral failing—or a political one. But unless we address the conditions of people who use drugs, people who are homeless, we’ll never rid ourselves of the coronavirus. Boston could lead the way—not by its current policy of giving these individuals no safe quarter, by jamming people into close proximity in squalid conditions, but by rising to the occasion to try something new, at least for the United States. Massachusetts did this once before, with Romneycare, which became a template for the Affordable Care Act. A repeat of Operation Clean Sweep this summer in Boston would be a catastrophe for those now seeking refuge in the only place where the city will let them exist. It would also be an indictment of all of us—and would come at our collective peril.
Just last week, Aubri Esters, one the city’s leading advocates for harm reduction and overdose prevention efforts, who championed the rights of people struggling with substance use disorders, died at the age of 35 in her apartment. She worked tirelessly for the dignity and rights of people who used drugs. I tried to reach her for this story before the news of her death was released. Many in Boston, including the mayor, are now eulogizing her and praising her work, but as one doctor who knew her said, “I can hear Aubri saying, ‘Nice words, Mayor. Now use your power and privilege to make Safe Consumption Spaces a reality, though maybe not so politely.’” We’ve all got to stop being so polite when it comes to the rights of people who use drugs, people experiencing homelessness, and people living with mental illness. Right now, during this pandemic—and long after it’s over.


thenation--2020-06-18--The US Needs to Be Treated Like the Racist Pariah State It Is

The first time I really became aware of apartheid was in a Foot Locker in 1988 , when I was around 10 years old .
I had seen the movie Cry Freedom , though I kind of thought Stephen Biko , Desmond Tutu , and Nelson Mandela were all the same guy at various stages of life .
I knew apartheid was “ bad , ” kind of like segregation but way worse , and not really a problem for me , an African American boy who was freed by Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X .
Apartheid didn @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was sitting in that Foot Locker trying on a pair of Reebok ’ s new Pump sneakers .
I was positive those shoes would literally make me jump higher , and I was excited to get my hands on them .
I couldn ’ t understand why the Foot Locker guy , a black man whom I had just seen sell the shoes to a white customer , sat down next to me and told me I couldn ’ t buy those shoes .
Reebok had officially joined the economic boycott of South @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the African American community that the company was still doing business in or somehow involved with the racist South African regime .
The Foot Locker guy explained to me that protesting against apartheid wasn ’ t enough , that we ( black people ) didn ’ t have enough economic power to make directly boycotting South African businesses effective .
We also had to boycott companies that didn ’ t boycott South Africa .
The Foot Locker guy was persuasive .
Not buying one particular brand of shoe seemed like the very @ @ @ @ @ @ @ international brothers and sisters .
I left the store with a pair of Jordans .
I never was able to jump high enough to dunk .
Lots of factors brought white South Africa to heel—most important , the tireless work of black South Africans , who demanded their humanity despite terror , torture , and imprisonment .
But the moral suasion of the international community , the shaming and the economic boycotts , also helped .
White South Africa was defeated in my lifetime , during my formative years .
So , I @ @ @ @ @ @ @ community would ever rise in solidarity against the white American regime of oppression and violence—the one that operates at home as well as abroad .
The white ruling class in America has nothing on the visceral brutality and structural terrorism of the South African apartheid regime .
There ’ s a difference between fighting Loki and fighting Thanos .
But black Americans could still use some help in our own centuries-long struggle against white oppression .
Nobody who fights racism should fight alone .
The spread of the George Floyd protests across the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ve ever had hope that the international community—even the Europeans , who can still largely be blamed for all of this—might someday start treating white America with the kind of moral outrage and economic distancing it deserves .
Black Lives Matter protests have broken out in nearly every European nation , Australia , Japan , Brazil , and , of course , South Africa .
The world is watching and , apparently , is appalled by America ’ s version of brutalizing its own citizens .
It ’ s also heartening that these @ @ @ @ @ @ @ biases in their own societies .
Statues of King Leopold II are being removed in Belgium .
King Leopold would be on everybody ’ s top 10 list of the most destructively racist men ever to have lived , if everybody actually knew about him .
Black people living under white rule around the world are having a moment .
The Rev .
Mark Thompson surfaced the idea of divestment from America , in the wake of George Floyd ’ s murder .
A unified global community against American-style police and military brutality @ @ @ @ @ @ @ do not think any of this global solidarity would be happening without the traveling shame-circus that is Donald Trump .
Since the latter years of the 20th century , American presidents have shielded white Americans from international moral opprobrium over the country ’ s racist policies by saying all the right things on the international stage .
American presidents talk about human rights .
They talk about healing and respect for different peoples .
They hold the United States out as a beacon of human potential , a place where , no matter @ @ @ @ @ @ @ look like , you can expect a fair shake and an opportunity to succeed .
If you are a person of color living anywhere else in the world , you can always imagine that coming to America will be better , if not for you , then for your children .
That message has never been true for black people .
Nonetheless , the belief in that message hampers the standing of African Americans on the global stage .
African Americans who have traveled internationally know that in many parts of the world @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for the discrimination we face in our own country .
When the United States is thought to be the “ land of opportunity , ” some international observers assume that black people can ’ t “ make it ” here because of our own cultural flaws .
When America is viewed as oppressive , some observers wonder why black people here don ’ t “ rise up ” against the white man .
I ’ ve got a whole Thomas Friedman book worth of stories from cab drivers , born in far-off countries @ @ @ @ @ @ @ so “ lazy ” or “ docile , ” depending on whatever they heard on Rush Limbaugh before I asked them to turn it off .
“ Barack Obama did it , why can ’ t the rest of you ?
” Those conversations do not happen to me anymore .
This was true even before the murder of George Floyd and the eruption of mass protests against police brutality .
Trump , unintentionally , has shown the world the truth about American-style racism .
In his words and actions , the international @ @ @ @ @ @ @ he holds all nonwhite people , from those who live in “ shithole ” countries to his own fellow citizens .
They see him praising and retweeting white nationalists .
They see him advocating police brutality .
And now they ’ ve seen him threaten to use the most lethal military on Earth against his own people .
The Bravery of Marching for Black Lives in the Middle of a Pandemic To the White People Who Keep Asking How to ‘ Help ’ People Can Only Bear So Much Injustice Before Lashing Out @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of white Americans steadfastly approve of his message .
Even as Trump ’ s approval generally craters , he still holds a five-point advantage in the polls over Joe Biden among white voters .
Oh , white people can ( and will , repeatedly ) say “ not all white people ” or “ I didn ’ t vote for him.
” But being members of the ruling ethnicity in a racially oppressive country carries collective benefits , and collective complicity .
I ’ m not sure white Americans are prepared for the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as likely supporters of an overtly racist regime .
Americans are already thought to be crass , thoughtless , and uneducated ; on the world stage , their country is seen as an aggressor nation , starting wars and squeezing the economic life out of poorer , browner countries .
The injustice of its foreign policy is already well known .
But a country that “ gases its own people ” reaps its own kind of censure .
White South Africans can tell you that “ most racist nation ” status is hard @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is too big and too critical to world markets for the international community to “ divest ” from America like it once did from South Africa .
But that doesn ’ t mean the United States is immune from global economic retribution .
Trump has already postponed the G-7 summit ( the one he initially intended to have at his golf course ) , but it wasn ’ t clear that everybody would come , seeing how poorly this country has handled the coronavirus pandemic .
If world leaders start getting pressure from @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Trump regime , that could lead to an economic cooling the markets would notice , especially now that we are officially in a recession .
But the most important economic pressure could be brought to bear on American corporations themselves .
K-pop fans have been flexing serious muscle on social media .
Fans of the boy band BTS recently took over the “ white lives matter ” hashtag to drag racists all over these here interwebs .
What happens if those fans decide to stop streaming blockbuster American movies as a way @ @ @ @ @ @ @ European consumers stop buying iPhones ?
What if Mexicans and Canadians stop buying American-branded cars ?
Losing the moral high ground can come with a serious economic downside .
I ’ m 42 years old .
South Africa has been free for over 25 years , and I ’ ve still never bought a pair of Reebok sneakers .
Some habits stick long after the reason you adopted them pass on .
The world is watching how white people here react to the George Floyd protests .
I suggest they govern themselves accordingly @

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The first time I really became aware of apartheid was in a Foot Locker in 1989, when I was around 11 years old. I had seen the movie Cry Freedom, though I kind of thought Stephen Biko, Desmond Tutu, and Nelson Mandela were all the same guy at various stages of life. I knew apartheid was “bad,” kind of like segregation but way worse, and not really a problem for me, an African American boy who was freed by Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X.
Apartheid didn’t become my problem until I was sitting in that Foot Locker trying on a pair of Reebok’s new Pump sneakers. I was positive those shoes would literally make me jump higher, and I was excited to get my hands on them. I couldn’t understand why the Foot Locker guy, a black man whom I had just seen sell the shoes to a white customer, sat down next to me and told me I couldn’t buy those shoes.
Reebok had officially joined the economic boycott of South Africa in 1987, but rumors persisted in the African American community that the company was still doing business in or somehow involved with the racist South African regime. The Foot Locker guy explained to me that protesting against apartheid wasn’t enough, that we (black people) didn’t have enough economic power to make directly boycotting South African businesses effective. We also had to boycott companies that didn’t boycott South Africa.
The Foot Locker guy was persuasive. Not buying one particular brand of shoe seemed like the very least I could do to support my international brothers and sisters. I left the store with a pair of Jordans. I never was able to jump high enough to dunk.
Lots of factors brought white South Africa to heel—most important, the tireless work of black South Africans, who demanded their humanity despite terror, torture, and imprisonment. But the moral suasion of the international community, the shaming and the economic boycotts, also helped. Current Issue View our current issue
White South Africa was defeated in my lifetime, during my formative years. So, I’ve always wondered if the international community would ever rise in solidarity against the white American regime of oppression and violence—the one that operates at home as well as abroad. The white ruling class in America has nothing on the visceral brutality and structural terrorism of the South African apartheid regime. There’s a difference between fighting Loki and fighting Thanos. But black Americans could still use some help in our own centuries-long struggle against white oppression. Nobody who fights racism should fight alone.
The spread of the George Floyd protests across the globe marks the first time I’ve ever had hope that the international community—even the Europeans, who can still largely be blamed for all of this—might someday start treating white America with the kind of moral outrage and economic distancing it deserves.
Black Lives Matter protests have broken out in nearly every European nation, Australia, Japan, Brazil, and, of course, South Africa. The world is watching and, apparently, is appalled by America’s version of brutalizing its own citizens. Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life Chris Lehmann Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life Chris Lehmann
It’s also heartening that these protesters are confronting some of the racial biases in their own societies. Statues of King Leopold II are being removed in Belgium. King Leopold would be on everybody’s top 10 list of the most destructively racist men ever to have lived, if everybody actually knew about him. Black people living under white rule around the world are having a moment.
The Rev. Mark Thompson surfaced the idea of divestment from America, in the wake of George Floyd’s murder. A unified global community against American-style police and military brutality could be a powerful thing.
I do not think any of this global solidarity would be happening without the traveling shame-circus that is Donald Trump. Since the latter years of the 20th century, American presidents have shielded white Americans from international moral opprobrium over the country’s racist policies by saying all the right things on the international stage. American presidents talk about human rights. They talk about healing and respect for different peoples. They hold the United States out as a beacon of human potential, a place where, no matter where you come from or what you look like, you can expect a fair shake and an opportunity to succeed. If you are a person of color living anywhere else in the world, you can always imagine that coming to America will be better, if not for you, then for your children.
That message has never been true for black people. Nonetheless, the belief in that message hampers the standing of African Americans on the global stage. African Americans who have traveled internationally know that in many parts of the world, there are people who blame us for the discrimination we face in our own country. When the United States is thought to be the “land of opportunity,” some international observers assume that black people can’t “make it” here because of our own cultural flaws. When America is viewed as oppressive, some observers wonder why black people here don’t “rise up” against the white man. I’ve got a whole Thomas Friedman book worth of stories from cab drivers, born in far-off countries, asking me why African Americans are so “lazy” or “docile,” depending on whatever they heard on Rush Limbaugh before I asked them to turn it off. “Barack Obama did it, why can’t the rest of you?”
Those conversations do not happen to me anymore. This was true even before the murder of George Floyd and the eruption of mass protests against police brutality. Trump, unintentionally, has shown the world the truth about American-style racism. In his words and actions, the international community can see the contempt in which he holds all nonwhite people, from those who live in “shithole” countries to his own fellow citizens. They see him praising and retweeting white nationalists. They see him advocating police brutality. And now they’ve seen him threaten to use the most lethal military on Earth against his own people.
They also see that a dedicated majority of white Americans steadfastly approve of his message. Even as Trump’s approval generally craters, he still holds a five-point advantage in the polls over Joe Biden among white voters. Oh, white people can (and will, repeatedly) say “not all white people” or “I didn’t vote for him.” But being members of the ruling ethnicity in a racially oppressive country carries collective benefits, and collective complicity. More from Mystal The Bravery of Marching for Black Lives in the Middle of a Pandemic Elie Mystal To the White People Who Keep Asking How to ‘Help’ Elie Mystal People Can Only Bear So Much Injustice Before Lashing Out Elie Mystal
I’m not sure white Americans are prepared for the global derisiveness that comes from being viewed as likely supporters of an overtly racist regime. Americans are already thought to be crass, thoughtless, and uneducated; on the world stage, their country is seen as an aggressor nation, starting wars and squeezing the economic life out of poorer, browner countries. The injustice of its foreign policy is already well known. But a country that “gases its own people” reaps its own kind of censure. White South Africans can tell you that “most racist nation” status is hard to live with.
The American economy is too big and too critical to world markets for the international community to “divest” from America like it once did from South Africa. But that doesn’t mean the United States is immune from global economic retribution. Trump has already postponed the G-7 summit (the one he initially intended to have at his golf course), but it wasn’t clear that everybody would come, seeing how poorly this country has handled the coronavirus pandemic. If world leaders start getting pressure from their own people to stop dealing with the Trump regime, that could lead to an economic cooling the markets would notice, especially now that we are officially in a recession.
But the most important economic pressure could be brought to bear on American corporations themselves. K-pop fans have been flexing serious muscle on social media. Fans of the boy band BTS recently took over the “white lives matter” hashtag to drag racists all over these here interwebs. What happens if those fans decide to stop streaming blockbuster American movies as a way to honor George Floyd? What if European consumers stop buying iPhones? What if Mexicans and Canadians stop buying American-branded cars? Losing the moral high ground can come with a serious economic downside.
I’m 42 years old. South Africa has been free for over 25 years, and I’ve still never bought a pair of Reebok sneakers. Some habits stick long after the reason you adopted them pass on. The world is watching how white people here react to the George Floyd protests. I suggest they govern themselves accordingly.


thenation--2020-06-18--Jair Bolsonaro Isn’t Just a Hazard to Brazil’s Health

Buenos Aires .
The president of Argentina looked and sounded exhausted .
After first declaring a nationwide lockdown toward the middle of March , Alberto Fernández announced in a May 23 press conference that he would be extending the quarantine until June 7 .
In the days prior , confirmed cases of Covid-19 had spiked from approximately 150 to 700 daily , with the poorest villas of Buenos Aires hit the hardest .
So when a reporter asked him if he had considered how much distress his stay-at-home order was causing , independent of its politics , his answer was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the middle of a pandemic that kills people , understand ?
” he asked , his voice growing louder with each sentence .
“ This is an unknown virus that doesn ’ t have a vaccine or a treatment , understand ?
Stay home , take care of yourselves , and try to endure as best you can.
” “ ‘ Distressing ’ is when the state abandons you , ” Fernández continued .
“ ‘ Distressing ’ is when [ elected officials ] say ‘ nothing is happening here.
’ Serious things @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s why we ’ ve taken the action we have.
” Eighteen hundred miles away , the people of Brasilia were experiencing abandonment firsthand .
Hours after Fernández delivered his address presenting new shelter-in-place guidelines , Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro decided to grab a hot dog in his nation ’ s capital .
By then , more than 22,000 Brazilians had already died from Covid-19 , and the country was fast emerging as one of the pandemic ’ s new hot spots worldwide .
One month earlier , when asked about the nation @ @ @ @ @ @ @ responded , “ So what ?
I ’ m sorry , but what do you want me to do about it ?
” This May night , he was greeted with cries of “ assassino ” ( murderer ) from local residents .
At the end of May , Latin America accounted for 40 percent of daily coronavirus deaths across the globe , and arguably no country in the region has been rocked harder than Brazil .
While it has thus far escaped the infection and death rates of Spain and the United @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of confirmed cases worldwide at approximately 830,000 on June 12 , along with the second-highest number of deaths per million residents on the continent ( 197 ) .
Argentina , by comparison , had over 28,000 confirmed cases and a death rate of 17 per million residents .
These numbers only hint at a growing political divide in the West—one that Brazil and Argentina have increasingly come to exemplify .
Whereas Fernández has mobilized the full power of the state during the pandemic to preserve human life , Bolsonaro has responded with a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ sabotaging local quarantine efforts , which he claims will reduce Brazil to a poor African nation .
This brand of anti-politics , of which Bolsonarismo is only a macabre expression , poses an existential threat not only to the marginalized communities of São Paulo , Rio de Janeiro , and Manaus , but potentially to South America itself .
“ The saying goes that when the economy of Brazil sneezes , Argentina catches a cold , ” notes German Feierherd , a political scientist and an assistant professor at the Universidad de San @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s principal trading partner , accounting for anywhere from 15 to 20 percent of imports .
It ’ s more important than China and the United States .
As the biggest country in South America , any kind of instability will have repercussions for Argentina and the continent.
” On June 12 , Argentina further postponed its negotiating deadline with bondholders looking to claim in excess of $ 65 billion in foreign debt , raising the possibility of the country ’ s defaulting for a second time since 2014 .
Nobel laureate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ both implored Argentina ’ s Wall Street creditors to reach a settlement that will not hobble the country during a global pandemic .
But there ’ s no compromising with Bolsonaro , whose response to the novel coronavirus has already contributed to the deaths of tens of thousands and could plunge Brazil into a prolonged downturn .
While some governors have successfully mitigated the damage of Bolsonaro ’ s actions , the outbreak in Brazil shows no immediate signs of abating , even as the country begins to reopen .
Since the president @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s seven-day moving average of daily coronavirus deaths has ticked up from 912 on May 23 to 979 on June 12 , with the average number of daily cases soaring from approximately 16,300 to more than 26,000 over the same period .
Towards the end of April , Manaus mayor Arthur Virgílio issued a plea for international aid after the city was forced to bury its dead in mass graves .
“ We aren ’ t in a state of emergency—we ’ re well beyond that , ” he lamented .
“ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ disaster…like a country that is at war and has lost.
” More recently , intensive care units in São Paulo , the epicenter of the outbreak , have reached a tipping point , as the virus continues its spread through the city ’ s densely populated favelas .
“ Local authorities can do a lot—arguably more than the president could , which is maybe fortunate at this moment , ” says Dr. Jeruza Lavanholi Neyeloff , an epidemiologist and planning adviser at the Hospital de Clínicas de Porto Alegre .
“ But Brazil @ @ @ @ @ @ @ able to respond exemplarily , and if the political circumstances were different , that could have happened .
We could have had an aligned , national response , sending the population a clear message of what needed to be done and aiding states in obtaining resources.
” Argentina Is Showing the World What a Humane Covid-19 Response Looks Like Instead , circumstances have grown increasingly dire .
In April , Bolsonaro fired popular Health Minister Luiz Henrique Mandetta , explaining at the time , “ Life is priceless , but the economy and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Mandetta ’ s successor , Nelson Teich , would quit less than a month later amid criticism from the president that he did not push hard enough for Covid-19 to be treated with the malaria drug chloroquine .
One week after Mandetta ’ s firing , Justice Minister Sergio Moro , whose Lava Jato investigation helped pave the way for Bolsonaro ’ s political rise , announced his resignation after accusing the president of interfering in police inquiries .
Now an investigation into those charges authorized by the Supreme Court could lead to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ justice , corruption , and abuse of power , putting him at the mercy of the more moderate conservatives he previously reviled .
And despite his inner circle ’ s threats of military intervention , his grip on power has never been more tenuous .
A Reuters investigation from May found that Bolsonaro played an even greater role in torpedoing Brazil ’ s coronavirus preparedness than previously reported .
On March 13 , before the World Health Organization declared Covid-19 a pandemic , Brazil ’ s Health Ministry issued a series of recommendations @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
But those recommendations were “ watered down ” less than 24 hours later at the behest of the Casa Civil , the office of the president ’ s chief of staff , led by Army Gen. Walter Souza Braga Netto .
Braga Netto , the report reveals , established an intergovernmental “ crisis cabinet ” that has effectively commandeered the country ’ s coronavirus response .
This cabinet has placed an impetus on preserving the economy—a strategy firmly in line with the priorities of the economic minister , Milton Friedman disciple Paulo @ @ @ @ @ @ @ official recalls Guedes ally Solange Vieira saying of the virus , “ It ’ s good that deaths are concentrated among the old .
That will improve our economic performance as it will reduce our pension deficit.
” Regional health authorities have subsequently accused the Bolsonaro administration of suppressing Covid-19 data , prompting a Supreme Court justice to order its restoration .
Brazil ’ s dual constitutional and public health crisis is years if not decades in the making .
Since the impeachment of President Dilma Rousseff , the opposition center-right Movimiento Democrático @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a rash of corruption charges stemming from the Lava Jato investigation .
Into that power vacuum has stepped Bolsonaro , a former military officer whose only discernible political project is the violent destruction of the left .
“ Since the pandemic began , he has really doubled down on defying whatever the mainstream consensus is on the coronavirus , ” says Vincent Bevins , the author of The Jakarta Method : Washington ’ s Anticommunist Crusade and the Mass Murder Program That Shaped Our World .
“ He saw Trump was doing it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ‘ Trump of the Tropics ’ because he believes it makes him look strong .
Then he saw his former allies , the governors of São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro , taking quick and decisive action , and that likely led him to do the exact opposite.
” It is poor people of color who will bear the brunt of Bolsonaro ’ s recklessness .
In São Paulo state , according to a May 7 report from Agence France-Presse , these communities had a 62 percent greater chance of succumbing to the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ likely to survive a hospital stay .
At the end of April , Alicia Bárcena , who leads the UN ’ s Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean , warned that the novel coronavirus could push as many as 29 million people across the region into poverty , wiping out the gains of the commodities boom from the 2000s .
As of 2019 , 41.4 percent of Brazilians worked in the informal economy—a segment of workers especially vulnerable during the pandemic—while the country ’ s sprawling favelas have proved a perfect incubator @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of this crisis are not lost on Alberto Fernández .
Along with a second ingreso familiar de emergencia ( emergency family income ) of 10,000 pesos ( about $ 150 ) for low-income earners that had been held up in May , his administration has introduced an interest-free line of credit for autonomous workers and monotributistas , the country ’ s bottom tax bracket .
Perhaps more significantly , he has pledged to focus testing and tracing on at-risk neighborhoods like Villa 31 , where confirmed case numbers have climbed over the last @ @ @ @ @ @ @ talking about the coronavirus in the past tense , the story will be the number of deaths in each country , ” offers Dr. Pedro Cahn , one of Argentina ’ s leading infectious disease specialists and a consultant to the president .
“ No one will remember the number of respirators that were added or even the number of infected .
Right now , there ’ s a certain symmetry between some countries and others , but that can all change .
In Argentina , we ’ ve done well so far @ @ @ @ @ @ @ we ’ re safe while we ’ re still at sea.
” Earlier this month , Fernández announced that he would be extending the nation ’ s quarantine yet again , this time until June 28 .
In the weeks since his last press conference , confirmed cases in Argentina had jumped once more from around 700 to more than 900 daily , raising fears that intensive care units could be overwhelmed .
Among the president ’ s concerns were the growing health crises in Chile and Brazil , the latter of which @ @ @ @ @ @ @ province of Misiones .
Fernández also discussed his recent meeting with the nation ’ s preeminent business leaders .
Previously , he had told them that it was time they earn less , but here he struck a more conciliatory tone , suggesting the country ’ s captains of industry were in agreement with his view that Argentina ’ s brand of capitalism must be fairer—with all of the contradictions inherent in such a statement .
If Argentina is to prove that politics can not only be used to ensure people ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ radically redistribute resources , its government will have to build a new consensus .
In addition to supporting a one-time levy on the country ’ s biggest fortunes to offset the costs of the coronavirus , Fernández has proposed overhauling Argentina ’ s regressive tax system .
Only then , he says , can the nation reach what he has called a “ more just social equilibrium.
” To that end , the president revealed plans last week to nationalize Vicentin , a principal agro-exporter currently facing bankruptcy after receiving a $ 300 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ predecessor , Mauricio Macri .
Argentina needs food sovereignty , he reasoned , and the company would be used as a public utility .
Asked if he had heard the calls on the right that the country had taken one step closer to becoming Venezuela , Fernández could only chuckle .
“ I ’ ve always said there are two types of opposition , ” he quipped .
“ One that governs and one that tweets .
”

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Buenos Aires. The president of Argentina looked and sounded exhausted. After first declaring a nationwide lockdown toward the middle of March, Alberto Fernández announced in a May 23 press conference that he would be extending the quarantine until June 7. In the days prior, confirmed cases of Covid-19 had spiked from approximately 150 to 700 daily, with the poorest villas of Buenos Aires hit the hardest. So when a reporter asked him if he had considered how much distress his stay-at-home order was causing, independent of its politics, his answer was brusque.
“We’re in the middle of a pandemic that kills people, understand?” he asked, his voice growing louder with each sentence. “This is an unknown virus that doesn’t have a vaccine or a treatment, understand? Stay home, take care of yourselves, and try to endure as best you can.”
“‘Distressing’ is when the state abandons you,” Fernández continued. “‘Distressing’ is when [elected officials] say ‘nothing is happening here.’ Serious things are happening here, and that’s why we’ve taken the action we have.”
Eighteen hundred miles away, the people of Brasília were experiencing abandonment firsthand. Hours after Fernández delivered his address presenting new shelter-in-place guidelines, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro decided to grab a hot dog in his nation’s capital. By then, more than 22,000 Brazilians had already died from Covid-19, and the country was fast emerging as one of the pandemic’s new hot spots worldwide. One month earlier, when asked about the nation’s mounting death toll, Bolsonaro responded, “So what? I’m sorry, but what do you want me to do about it?” This May night, he was greeted with cries of “assassino” (murderer) from local residents.
At the end of May, Latin America accounted for 40 percent of daily coronavirus deaths across the globe, and arguably no country in the region has been rocked harder than Brazil. While it has thus far escaped the infection and death rates of Spain and the United States, Brazil claimed the second-largest number of confirmed cases worldwide at approximately 830,000 on June 12, along with the second-highest number of deaths per million residents on the continent (197). Argentina, by comparison, had over 28,000 confirmed cases and a death rate of 17 per million residents.
These numbers only hint at a growing political divide in the West—one that Brazil and Argentina have increasingly come to exemplify. Whereas Fernández has mobilized the full power of the state during the pandemic to preserve human life, Bolsonaro has responded with a gleeful denialism, antagonizing medical professionals and sabotaging local quarantine efforts, which he claims will reduce Brazil to a poor African nation. This brand of anti-politics, of which bolsonarismo is only a particularly macabre expression, poses an existential threat not only to the marginalized communities of São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, and Manaus, but potentially to South America itself. Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life Chris Lehmann Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life Chris Lehmann
“The saying goes that when the economy of Brazil sneezes, Argentina catches a cold,” notes German Feierherd, a political scientist and an assistant professor at the Universidad de San Andrés. “Brazil is the country’s principal trading partner, accounting for anywhere from 15 to 20 percent of imports. It’s more important than China and the United States. As the biggest country in South America, any kind of instability will have repercussions for Argentina and the continent.” Current Issue View our current issue
On June 12, Argentina further postponed its negotiating deadline with bondholders looking to claim in excess of $65 billion in foreign debt, raising the possibility of the country’s defaulting for a second time since 2014. Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz and Senator Elizabeth Warren have both implored Argentina’s Wall Street creditors to reach a settlement that will not hobble the country during a global health crisis. But there’s no compromising with Bolsonaro, whose response to the novel coronavirus has already contributed to the deaths of tens of thousands and could plunge Brazil into a prolonged downturn.
While some governors have successfully mitigated the damage of Bolsonaro’s actions, the outbreak in Brazil shows no immediate signs of abating, even as the country begins to reopen. Since the president ducked out for a cachorro-quente, Brazil’s seven-day moving average of daily coronavirus deaths has ticked up from 912 on May 23 to 979 on June 12, with the average number of daily cases soaring from approximately 16,300 to more than 26,000 over the same period.
Toward the end of April, after the city was forced to bury its dead in mass graves, Manaus Mayor Arthur Virgílio issued a plea for international aid. “We aren’t in a state of emergency—we’re well beyond that,” he lamented. “We are in a state of utter disaster…like a country that is at war and has lost.” More recently, intensive care units in São Paulo, the epicenter of the outbreak, have reached a tipping point, as the virus continues its spread through the city’s densely populated favelas.
“Local authorities can do a lot—arguably more than the president could, which is maybe fortunate at this moment,” says Dr. Jeruza Lavanholi Neyeloff, an epidemiologist and planning adviser at the Hospital de Clínicas de Porto Alegre. “But Brazil had everything going for it to be able to respond exemplarily, and if the political circumstances were different, that could have happened. We could have had an aligned, national response, sending the population a clear message of what needed to be done and aiding states in obtaining resources.” Related Article Argentina Is Showing the World What a Humane Covid-19 Response Looks Like Jacob Sugarman
Instead, circumstances have grown increasingly dire. In April, Bolsonaro fired popular Health Minister Luiz Henrique Mandetta, explaining at the time, “Life is priceless, but the economy and employment need to return to normality.” Mandetta’s successor, Nelson Teich, would quit less than a month later amid criticism from the president that he did not push hard enough for Covid-19 to be treated with the malaria drug chloroquine.
One week after Mandetta’s firing, Justice Minister Sergio Moro, whose Lava Jato investigation helped pave the way for Bolsonaro’s political rise, announced his resignation after accusing the president of interfering in police inquiries. Now an investigation into those charges authorized by the Supreme Court could lead to Bolsonaro’s impeachment for obstruction of justice, corruption, and abuse of power, putting him at the mercy of the more moderate conservatives he previously reviled. And despite his inner circle’s threats of military intervention, his grip on power has never been more tenuous.
A Reuters investigation from May found that Bolsonaro played an even greater role in torpedoing Brazil’s coronavirus preparedness than previously reported. On March 13, before the World Health Organization declared Covid-19 a pandemic, Brazil’s Health Ministry issued a series of recommendations to limit the virus’s spread. But those recommendations were “watered down” less than 24 hours later at the behest of the Casa Civil, the office of the president’s chief of staff, led by Army Gen. Walter Souza Braga Netto.
Braga Netto, the report reveals, established an intergovernmental “crisis cabinet” that has effectively commandeered the country’s coronavirus response. This cabinet has placed the emphasis on preserving the economy—a strategy firmly in line with the priorities of the economic minister, Milton Friedman disciple Paulo Guedes. According to Reuters, one official recalls Guedes ally Solange Vieira saying of the virus, “It’s good that deaths are concentrated among the old. That will improve our economic performance as it will reduce our pension deficit.” Regional health authorities have subsequently accused the Bolsonaro administration of suppressing Covid-19 data, prompting a Supreme Court justice to order its restoration.
Brazil’s dual constitutional and public health crisis has been years if not decades in the making. Since the impeachment of President Dilma Rousseff, the opposition center-right Movimento Democrático Brasileiro has seen its legitimacy crater amid a rash of corruption charges stemming from the Lava Jato investigation. Into that power vacuum has stepped Bolsonaro, a former military officer whose only discernible political project is the violent destruction of the left.
“Since the pandemic began, he has really doubled down on defying whatever the mainstream consensus is on the coronavirus,” says Vincent Bevins, the author of The Jakarta Method: Washington’s Anticommunist Crusade and the Mass Murder Program That Shaped Our World. “He saw Trump was doing it, and he likes being called the ‘Trump of the Tropics’ because he believes it makes him look strong. Then he saw his former allies, the governors of São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, taking quick and decisive action, and that likely led him to do the exact opposite.”
It is poor people of color who will bear the brunt of Bolsonaro’s recklessness. In São Paulo state, according to a May 7 report from Agence France-Presse, these communities had a 62 percent greater chance of succumbing to the virus, while white Brazilians were more likely to survive a hospital stay. At the end of April, Alicia Bárcena, who leads the UN’s Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, warned that the novel coronavirus could push as many as 29 million people across the region into poverty, wiping out the gains of the commodities boom from the 2000s. As of 2019, 41.4 percent of Brazilians worked in the informal economy—a segment of workers especially vulnerable during the pandemic—while the country’s sprawling favelas have proved a perfect incubator for the virus.
The myriad dangers of this crisis are not lost on Alberto Fernández. Along with a second ingreso familiar de emergencia (emergency family income) of 10,000 pesos (about $150) for low-income earners that had been held up in May, his administration has introduced an interest-free line of credit for autonomous workers and monotributistas, the country’s bottom tax bracket. Perhaps more significantly, he has pledged to focus testing and tracing on at-risk neighborhoods like Villa 31, where confirmed case numbers have climbed over the last month.
“When we’re talking about the coronavirus in the past tense, the story will be the number of deaths in each country,” offers Dr. Pedro Cahn, one of Argentina’s leading infectious disease specialists and a consultant to the president. “No one will remember the number of respirators that were added or even the number of infected. Right now, there’s a certain symmetry between some countries and others, but that can all change. In Argentina, we’ve done well so far, but we can’t say we’re safe while we’re still at sea.”
Earlier this month, Fernández announced that he would be extending the nation’s quarantine yet again, this time until June 28. In the weeks since his last press conference, confirmed cases in Argentina had jumped once more from around 700 to more than 900 daily, raising fears that intensive care units could be overwhelmed. Among the president’s concerns were the growing health crises in Chile and Brazil, the latter of which he feared might spill into the northern province of Misiones.
Fernández also discussed his recent meeting with the nation’s preeminent business leaders. Previously, he had told them that it was time they earn less, but here he struck a more conciliatory tone, suggesting the country’s captains of industry were in agreement with his view that Argentina’s brand of capitalism must be fairer—with all of the contradictions inherent in such a statement.
If Argentina is to prove that politics can be used not only to ensure people’s survival during a pandemic but also to radically redistribute resources, its government will have to build a new consensus. In addition to supporting a one-time levy on the country’s biggest fortunes to offset the costs of the coronavirus, Fernández has proposed overhauling Argentina’s regressive tax system. Only then, he says, can the nation reach what he has called a “more just social equilibrium.”
To that end, the president revealed plans last week to nationalize Vicentin, a principal agro-exporter currently facing bankruptcy after receiving a $300 million loan from Banco Nación under his predecessor, Mauricio Macri. Argentina needs food sovereignty, he reasoned, and the company would be used as a public utility. Asked if he had heard the calls on the right that the country had taken one step closer to becoming Venezuela, Fernández could only chuckle. “I’ve always said there are two types of opposition,” he quipped. “One that governs and one that tweets.”


thenation--2020-06-18--For ‘Police Accountability With Teeth,’ Citizens Demand Elected and Empowered Oversight Boards

Seattle City Council member Kshama Sawant recognizes that the national uprising against police brutality is “ threatening to the right-wing and reactionary agenda of Donald Trump.
” The president ’ s tweets confirm that he is unsettled by what he claims is “ the Radical Left takeover of Seattle.
” But what Trump sees as threatening , Sawant sees as an opening to achieve fundamental change in Seattle as nationally .
So the council member is not just defending the activists who have established a “ Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone ” in a Seattle neighborhood ; she is also proposing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ accountability issues that protesters say must be addressed .
Declaring that she is determined to “ take this historic moment to win real victories against police violence , ” the Seattle socialist told a CNN interviewer that she ’ s working to “ defund the police by at least 50 percent and divert those funds for community programs , for restorative justice , so we begin to address the systematic racism.
” “ But we need [ to go ] beyond that , ” she added , “ we need an independently elected @ @ @ @ @ @ @ powers over the police.
” Sawant was talking about democratic oversight of policing long before the death of an unarmed African American man , George Floyd , in Minneapolis police custody stirred an outcry over policing in cities from coast to coast .
Now , however , the discussion about these issues has taken off , as protesters demand genuine community control over the police .
The Fight to Remove Georgia ’ s Secretary of Voter Suppression Has Begun Charles Booker Is Changing the Thinking About Who Beats Mitch Georgia Shows How Serious @ @ @ @ @ @ @ This November This is not a radical demand or a foreign construct .
We live in a country where civilian control over the military is enshrined in our Constitution .
This premise is so vital to the American experiment that retired Marine Gen. James Mattis made a point of reasserting it when he was under consideration to serve as defense secretary—telling the Senate Armed Services Committee in 2017 , “ I recognize my potential civilian role differs in essence and in substance from my former role in uniform .
Civilian control of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ American military tradition.
” It follows that cities should recognize the importance of clearly defining , and maintaining , civilian control of the police .
Yet in cities across the country , there is a lack of clarity about oversight of policing .
The actions of police chiefs and police departments are often overseen by obscure boards and commissions , which lack the authority and the resources that are necessary to demand accountability .
That lack of clarity has been highlighted in recent weeks , as the outcry over Floyd ’ s death @ @ @ @ @ @ @ we might , as Representative Ilhan Omar says , begin to “ reimagine public safety.
” “ This is a time for us to do real soul-searching , ” says Omar , a Democrat who represents Minneapolis .
“ We can ’ t continue to be on this path , where we continue to find ourselves in this place .
There has to be real systematic change on the city level , on the state level and on the national level.
” In Minneapolis , the majority of City Council members now support @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s police department and replace it with what the Minneapolis Star Tribune refers to as “ a new community-based system of public safety.
” In San Francisco , Mayor London Breed last week announced a plan to demilitarize the police that includes “ an explicit policy barring the use of military-grade weapons against unarmed civilians.
” The proposal would “ divert non-violent calls for service away from SFPD to non-law enforcement agencies ” that can dispatch unarmed professionals in response to calls involving mental health , homelessness , and school discipline concerns .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ joined the mayor in announcing the initiatives and spoke of the need to “ embrace courageous changes to address disparate policing practices.
” Some of the most striking proposals for new approaches to public safety seek to realize the promise of civilian control that Sawant recognizes when she talks about the need for “ a democratically elected community oversight board in Seattle , with full powers to hold police accountable , including setting department policy and procedure.
” Sawant is not alone in arguing for a democratically elected oversight board .
In Salt @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Against Police Brutality is pushing to replace an existing Police Civilian Review Board with a democratically elected board that would have clearly defined oversight and accountability powers .
In Tallahassee , Fla. , members of the Tallahassee Community Action Committee are arguing for the creation of a democratically elected Civilian Police Accountability Council that would have the power to hire and fire police chiefs and a role in budget debates and police union contract negotiations .
They are asking the people of Tallahassee to “ Tell the City Commission : We Want Police @ @ @ @ @ @ @ City , there ’ s now an energetic campaign to replace the city ’ s weak Civilian Complaint Review Board with an Elected Civilian Review Board ( ECRB ) .
“ We need a board that actually has the ability to discipline cops , ” explains Tammie David , who has been active with the Campaign for an Elected Civilian Review Board .
The members of the proposed ECRB would be chosen at the neighborhood level in a process that would have strict campaign finance rules .
The elected board would have subpoena @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to address police misconduct with investigations , disciplinary actions , and retraining orders .
The board would maintain neighborhood offices , organize regular community meetings , and do outreach with communities that have been affected by police misconduct and violence .
Backed by elected officials , candidates , unions , Black Lives Matter activists , and Citizen Action , the Campaign for an Elected Civilian Review Board also seeks to establish an elected special prosecutor position in order to assure that there is unbiased prosecution of police officers who are accused of crimes @ @ @ @ @ @ @ achieve , especially in places where local and state rules may have to be restructured to create new elected positions .
But campaigners in New York are confident that the time has come to “ shift power into the hands of communities by empowering accountable representatives in every neighborhood to respond to cases of police abuse .
”

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Seattle City Council member Kshama Sawant recognizes that the national uprising against police brutality is “threatening to the right-wing and reactionary agenda of Donald Trump.” The president’s tweets confirm that he is unsettled by what he claims is “the Radical Left takeover of Seattle.” But what Trump sees as threatening, Sawant sees as an opening to achieve fundamental change in Seattle as nationally. So the council member is not just defending the activists who have established a “Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone” in a Seattle neighborhood; she is also proposing bold responses to the police oversight and accountability issues that protesters say must be addressed.
Declaring that she is determined to “take this historic moment to win real victories against police violence,” the Seattle socialist told a CNN interviewer that she’s working to “defund the police by at least 50 percent and divert those funds for community programs, for restorative justice, so we begin to address the systematic racism.”
“But we need [to go] beyond that,” she added.“We need an independently elected community oversight board, which has full powers over the police.”
Sawant was talking about democratic oversight of policing long before the death of an unarmed African American man, George Floyd, in Minneapolis police custody stirred an outcry over policing in cities from coast to coast. Now, however, the discussion about these issues has taken off, as protesters demand genuine community control over the police. More From John Nichols A GOP Debate Without Trump Is the Definition of Pointlessness August 11, 2023 A Win for Abortion Rights, a Win for Democracy: Ohio Voters Reject Issue 1 August 9, 2023 The Biggest Threat to Donald Trump Could Be the Constitution Itself August 4, 2023
This is not a radical demand or a foreign construct. We live in a country where civilian control over the military is enshrined in our Constitution. This premise is so vital to the American experiment that retired Marine Gen. James Mattis made a point of reasserting it when he was under consideration to serve as defense secretary—telling the Senate Armed Services Committee in 2017, “I recognize my potential civilian role differs in essence and in substance from my former role in uniform. Civilian control of the military is a fundamental tenet of the American military tradition.”
It follows that cities should recognize the importance of clearly defining, and maintaining, civilian control of the police.
Yet in cities across the country, there is a lack of clarity about oversight of policing. The actions of police chiefs and police departments are often overseen by obscure boards and commissions that lack the authority and the resources necessary to demand accountability.
That lack of clarity has been highlighted in recent weeks, as the outcry over Floyd’s death has opened a nationwide dialogue about how we might, as Representative Ilhan Omar says, begin to “reimagine public safety.” Current Issue View our current issue
“This is a time for us to do real soul-searching,” says Omar, a Democrat who represents Minneapolis. “We can’t continue to be on this path, where we continue to find ourselves in this place. There has to be real systematic change on the city level, on the state level and on the national level.” Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life Chris Lehmann Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life Chris Lehmann
In Minneapolis, the majority of City Council members now support a move to dismantle the city’s police department and replace it with what the Minneapolis Star Tribune refers to as “a new community-based system of public safety.”
In San Francisco, Mayor London Breed last week announced a plan to demilitarize the police that includes “an explicit policy barring the use of military-grade weapons against unarmed civilians.” The proposal would “divert non-violent calls for service away from SFPD to non-law enforcement agencies” that can dispatch unarmed professionals in response to calls involving mental health, homelessness, and school discipline concerns. San Francisco Chief of Police Bill Scott joined the mayor in announcing the initiatives and spoke of the need to “embrace courageous changes to address disparate policing practices.”
Some of the most striking proposals for new approaches to public safety seek to realize the promise of civilian control that Sawant recognizes when she talks about the need for “a democratically elected community oversight board in Seattle, with full powers to hold police accountable, including setting department policy and procedure.”
Sawant is not alone in arguing for a democratically elected oversight board. In Salt Lake City, the group Utah United Against Police Brutality is pushing to replace an existing Police Civilian Review Board with a democratically elected board that would have clearly defined oversight and accountability powers. In Tallahassee, Fla., members of the Tallahassee Community Action Committee are arguing for the creation of a democratically elected Civilian Police Accountability Council that would have the power to hire and fire police chiefs and a role in budget debates and police union contract negotiations. They are asking the people of Tallahassee to “Tell the City Commission: We Want Police Accountability WITH TEETH.” Accountability This Law Keeps Police Misconduct Secret Ross Barkan
In New York City, there’s now an energetic campaign to replace the city’s weak Civilian Complaint Review Board with an Elected Civilian Review Board (ECRB). “We need a board that actually has the ability to discipline cops,” explains Tammie David, who has been active with the Campaign for an Elected Civilian Review Board. The members of the proposed ECRB would be chosen at the neighborhood level in a process that would have strict campaign finance rules. The elected board would have subpoena power, as well as the authority to address police misconduct with investigations, disciplinary actions, and retraining orders. The board would maintain neighborhood offices, organize regular community meetings, and do outreach with communities that have been affected by police misconduct and violence.
Backed by elected officials, candidates, unions, Black Lives Matter activists, and Citizen Action, the Campaign for an Elected Civilian Review Board also seeks to establish an elected special prosecutor position in order to assure that there is unbiased prosecution of police officers who are accused of crimes.
Democracy reforms are rarely easy to achieve, especially in places where local and state rules may have to be restructured to create new elected positions. But campaigners in New York are confident that the time has come to “shift power into the hands of communities by empowering accountable representatives in every neighborhood to respond to cases of police abuse.”