rawstory--2020-01-08--Lawmakers refused to increase an infamous prison’s funding — then all hell broke loose

One prisoner strangled another to death while other inmates cheered the killing .
Two convicts escaped a dilapidated building by walking out an open door .
Maximum-security detainees freely roamed hallways , beating and threatening others .
Violence has roiled the Mississippi prison system for more than a week , with state corrections officials imposing a statewide lockdown and a county coroner declaring that gangs in the prisons have launched an all-out war against one another .
At the center of the chaos is the Mississippi State Penitentiary at Parchman — one of America ’ s most notorious prisons .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ been killed by fellow inmates at what is supposed to be the most secure facility in the state .
In the prior eight years , there were four inmate killings .
The current violence comes after years of neglect by state officials , who allowed conditions at Parchman to deteriorate when federal courts ended oversight of the facility in 2011 , according to an investigation by the Mississippi Center for Investigative Reporting and ProPublica .
Inmates described themselves as being prey to prison gangs who control the supply of contraband drugs and weapons @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Photographs and videos reviewed by the news organizations show the most dangerous inmates , identified by their red-and-white striped uniforms , walking freely outside their cells , with no guards in sight .
A video purporting to show the killing of a Parchman inmate on Jan. 3 shows inmates shouting and cheering .
Parchman ’ s descent has put at risk the safety of corrections officers , the investment of hundreds of millions of dollars of Mississippi taxpayer funds and the health of the inmates the state is charged with protecting , the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ failed to fill hundreds of positions available for guards .
In a Sept. 6 email obtained by the Mississippi Center for Investigative Reporting , a correctional officer , Terrence Shaw , told state lawmakers how dangerous it had become working in Unit 29 , Parchman ’ s maximum-security unit .
A building at Unit 29 that should have at least five officers had only two , and some buildings had only one , he wrote .
“ The National Guard army should have been called in several years ago.
” “ Staff morale @ @ @ @ @ @ @ right , ” Shaw wrote .
“ All staff working deserve a pay increase that is fit to live.
” Inmates and experts alike say the current violence in no small part arises from the prison ’ s sheer state of disrepair .
Building facilities — water , lights , sewage — are crumbling .
The prison ’ s drinking water has violated the Safe Drinking Water Act dozens of times , and the Environmental Protection Agency has cited the prison ’ s sewage system for three years for violating the Clean Water @ @ @ @ @ @ @ accreditation by the American Correctional Association ,  which sets standards for prisons across the country ,  lapsed in 2017. Alger Retherford spent more than four decades behind bars at Parchman for murder and robbery .
A member of the prison ’ s repair crew , he was released in May .
“ We have come full circle , right back to 1975 , the same conditions , ” Retherford , 62 , said .
In response to the violence , Mississippi ’ s top prison official , Corrections Commissioner Pelicia Hall @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , private prison operators and others to make sure the prisons are as safe as possible , and she vowed that the Mississippi Department of Corrections , or MDOC , would pursue criminal charges “ to the full extent of the law.
” Hall has also repeatedly asked the Republican-controlled Legislature for more money to hire guards and to fix up Unit 29 , which replaced a different maximum-security unit that was closed down in 2010 in response to litigation filed by the ACLU .
The request went nowhere .
This year , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Hall asked for an extra $ 78 million in funding — nearly a third of it to renovate Unit 29 .
Unit 29 “ is unsafe for staff and inmates because of age and general deterioration , ” Grace Fisher , an MDOC spokeswoman , said last month .
The Joint Legislative Budget Committee , which sets spending priorities for the state , is recommending that representatives reject the request and instead cut the total corrections budget by $ 8.3 million .
What happens next will be up to the new Mississippi Legislature @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Asked if he was concerned about the prison violence and what needs to be done , House Corrections Committee Chairman Bill Kinkade , a Republican from Byhalia , said , “ We have been working diligently to … resolve ” the issues .
David Fathi , director of the ACLU ’ s National Prison Project , said it would be easy to write off what is happening as strictly a Mississippi story .
Instead , he said , it ’ s an American story .
In state after state , he said , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ high levels of violence , lack of proper health treatment and other woes , but when that oversight goes away , conditions get worse again .
“ State officials complain about federal court , but that seems to be the way to maintain conditions of basic decency , ” he said .
Fathi has no doubt that the current conditions at Parchman are unconstitutional , he said .
“ There ’ s no place for this kind of treatment in a civilized society.
” Parchman prison opened in 1901 .
Inmates lived in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in nearby plantation fields .
By 1905 , the state of Mississippi was raking in $ 185,000 every two years from harvests , the modern-day equivalent of more than $ 5 million .
The disciplinary system was infamous .
Whippings came from a 3-foot-long , 6-inch-wide whip named “ Black Annie.
” Rather than hire more guards , prison officials often relied on favored inmates , known as “ trusty shooters , ” who often abused their power over fellow inmates , sometimes shooting and killing them .
In 1971 , Parchman inmates @ @ @ @ @ @ @ later , U.S. District Judge William Keady concluded that “ inhumanities , illegal conduct and other indiginities ” corrupted the trusty system , that inmates ’ quarters were “ unfit for human habitation ” and that they had been deprived of wholesome food , medical treatment and basic hygiene .
He ordered improvements in health care and almost every aspect of prisoner life .
The landmark decision shut down the trusty system across the South .
In the years that followed , Keady continued his oversight , sometimes showing up unannounced at the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 35 million to modernize Parchman , replacing the work camps with more than two dozen buildings surrounded by razor wire .
The reforms slowly took effect .
In 2003 , the American Correctional Association , or ACA , certified that Parchman met all modern standards for prison operation .
In response to litigation brought by the ACLU , prison officials shut down Parchman ’ s notorious Unit 32 , a violent supermax unit that a federal judge concluded suffered from unconstitutional conditions .
“ We felt like it was mission finally accomplished , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ lawyer who represented the state ’ s inmates before the courts for much of that time .
Three years later , Chris Epps , the corrections commissioner at the time and a champion of prison reform , was arrested on bribery charges .
Epps , a former Parchman guard who served as president of the ACA , pleaded guilty and is now serving nearly 20 years in prison .
By 2017 , when Parchman ’ s accreditation lapsed , the facility was failing to meet basic industry standards , according to Robert Reeves @ @ @ @ @ @ @ served as manager of ACA compliance at South Mississippi Correctional Institution .
Reeves , who retired in 2016 and continues to communicate with MDOC employees , said staff members are not able to keep up with repairs in the facilities .
Outside contractors hired by the agency have not made up the gap .
“ They ’ re in such bad shape , ” Reeves said of Mississippi ’ s corrections facilities .
Welch , the lawyer who monitored Parchman for 36 years , said the latest report and photographs show conditions much @ @ @ @ @ @ @ monitoring .
If just a fraction of Parchman ’ s problems took place in a public building other than a prison , it would be shut down , he said .
He called the prison ’ s conditions an “ unbelievable nightmare.
” His assessment was echoed by J. Cliff Johnson , the director of the University of Mississippi ’ s MacArthur Justice Center , who regularly visits the prison .
“ Parchman is held together with baling wire and bubble gum , ” Johnson said .
“ We put facilities like Parchman @ @ @ @ @ @ @ people don ’ t have to think about the humans inside those facilities or their inhumane treatment .
We don ’ t want to hear about it .
We don ’ t want to see it .
We don ’ t want to think about it.
” “ I ’ ve got him in a chokehold ” In 2014 , MDOC employed 1,591 correctional officers .
Although the inmate population in state prisons has fallen slightly , the number of correctional officers has plummeted to 731 — a loss of more than half @ @ @ @ @ @ @ fill its open positions .
This year , the prison had the authority to employ 512 officers but hired only 261 .
That figure is far below ACA accreditation standards , which require no more than a 10 % vacancy rate in any 18-month period for correctional employees who work directly with inmates .
Hall , who plans to resign as corrections commissioner in mid-January , blamed the soaring number of job openings on low salaries .
MDOC has asked the Legislature to increase starting pay rates from $ 25,650 annually to $ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 2.79 million .
But the Joint Legislative Budget Committee has recommended rejecting this proposal .
The shortage of staff has been accompanied by an increase in inmate deaths from unnatural causes .
On average , Parchman records about two inmate suicides per year .
In 2019 , five Parchman prisoners killed themselves , all in single-person cells , according to the coroner ’ s office .
Solitary confinement and a failure to check regularly on inmates in one-man cells increases the likelihood of suicide , experts say .
“ In many prison systems @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in solitary confinement , even though prisoners in solitary account for only a small proportion of the prison population , ” Fathi said .
Seven inmates were killed by fellow detainees in the 13 months from January last year through the present month , according to the coroner .
From 2011 to 2018 , one prisoner was killed every 19 months on average .
On July 10 , Jeffery Allen , 40 , was beaten to death in the shower , according to the coroner .
Less than a month later , Samuel @ @ @ @ @ @ @ death .
Just before midnight on Nov. 12 , Jeremy Irons , 31 , was fatally stabbed by other inmates .
The death took place after an argument over a $ 40 debt , according to inmates .
On Nov. 19 , Michael Anderson , 26 , who was serving a 10-year sentence for armed robbery , was fatally stabbed by other inmates , according to the coroner .
Anderson ’ s father , Robert Coleman , said his son , before his death , shared that a prison gang “ wanted him @ @ @ @ @ @ @ t do ” and that he wasn ’ t under the protection of his “ brothers ” anymore .
Another three homicides have taken place since the new year began .
One factor in the soaring number of deaths is that prison gangs have become a de facto replacement for the old armed trusties , according to some prison experts .
“ We are talking to correctional officers who say that gang leaders are making decisions about who gets housed where , ” said Johnson , of the University of Mississippi ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ many prisoners in Parchman .
“ When people get ‘ out of line , ’ the severe gang disciplinary system rules the day.
” Travis Arnold , sentenced to five years in prison in 2018 for statutory rape and failing to register as a sex offender , said he and other inmates have long felt unsafe because “ there are not enough guards to protect us , and they never come around and check on us.
” Those fears became a reality when a gang war between the Vice Lords and the Gangsters @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , starting Dec. 29 .
In an attempt to stem the violence , Parchman officials last week reopened notorious Unit 32 , which had been closed in 2010 under the federal consent decree .
Inmates subsequently shot a video there that shows standing water , mold , peeling paint and cells where there is no running water for sinks or toilets .
“ This illustrates one of the shortcomings of litigation — sooner or later the lawsuit goes away , and defendants are then free to return to their old ways , unless @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , ” Fathi said .
Video circulating on social media purports to show the Jan. 3 killing of an inmate .
ProPublica could not verify the authenticity of the video with prison officials .
Though officially banned , cellphones are widely available to inmates .
Several inmates contacted said it appeared to show Parchman ’ s interior , and details in the video match the coroner ’ s description of the circumstances of the death of one inmate .
In the video , an inmate can be seen standing inside a cell , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by the most dangerous prisoners .
The inmate repeatedly strikes another man in the cell with his fists .
Loud shouting can be heard while an unnamed prisoner narrates the video : “ They ’ re straight up hitting the motherfuckers with knives and shit , beating them motherfuckers up .
They ’ re behind the cell while we ’ re on lockdown.
” A woman ’ s voice can then be heard , perhaps from a cellphone : “ He has his own family.
” An inmate can be heard boasting : @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a chokehold.
” Another inmate cheers him on : “ Oh , yeah , oh , yeah .
Dead .
Oh , yeah .
Dead .
Deaaaaad.
” Despite the loud shouting throughout the incident , no officer can be seen responding .
Though the identity of the man attacked in the video could not be confirmed , a prison doctor pronounced an inmate named Denorris Howell dead at 3:20 a.m. on Jan 3 .
Authorities initially thought Howell was stabbed to death by his roommate .
But Sunflower County Coroner Heather Burton @ @ @ @ @ @ @ fatal neck injury and that the blood stains on his clothing belonged to his roommate , who was also injured in the attack .
No charges have been filed , and MDOC officials have declined to comment .
Howell ’ s mother , Janice Wilkins of Memphis , Tennessee , said her son had called her on his cellphone and told her that the lights had been turned out .
Before hanging up the phone , he said that a guard was letting inmates out of their cells .
“ My son won @ @ @ @ @ @ @ said .
“ But I ’ m crying for other inmates who are incarcerated.
” “ We take thousands of people and lock them up in hellholes where they are forced to fight for survival on a daily basis while they unravel due to the effects of mental illness , addiction , disease and constant fear , ” Johnson said .
“ Events like this one are horrific not only because of the depraved behavior of the killers , but also because we as Mississippians have allowed this to happen , even encouraged @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on our hands , ” he said .
Mississippi Department of Health inspections from the past decade provided plenty of warning about the increasingly poor state of Parchman .
In 2012 , one year after federal oversight ended , six inmates lacked mattresses or bedding in Parchman .
Last year , more than 250 did — nearly 8 % of the prison ’ s inmates .
In 2012 , a dozen toilets for inmates in the prison didn ’ t work .
Last year , there were 64 .
The reports document holes @ @ @ @ @ @ @ collapsing ceilings ; broken commodes , sinks , drains and tiles ; exposed wiring ; and roaches and rats throughout the prison .
One photograph in the reports shows birds eating off inmates ’ food trays .
Unit 29 , the maximum-security building , was the focus of special scrutiny .
The roof of the building , which houses the state ’ s death row inmates , has holes that let rain pour into the facility .
Door and locks are broken .
Inmates have bored holes in the building ’ s unreinforced @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , drugs and phones , corrections officials have acknowledged .
The official reports are backed up by interviews , documents and photographs from prisoners inside Parchman and their family members .
Some prisoners said they washed their uniforms in toilets after laundry service stopped .
One prisoner said he fashioned homemade extension cords from stripped wires , using them to start fires and boil water in an effort to make it safe to drink .
At Parchman today , many inmates are living in darkness .
The latest inspection shows at least 300 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ stark contrast to 2012 when there were no cells without lights or power .
James Louis Manning , who was released from Parchman in June after serving time for grand larceny , said he had no light in his cell during his final year as a prisoner .
“ It wasn ’ t fixed before I left , ” he said .
Lack of light in a prison can have serious consequences , said Eldon Vail , former corrections secretary in Washington state .
Officers can ’ t check on prisoners to make @ @ @ @ @ @ @ periods of darkness can cause stress and exacerbate mental illness .
Beyond the cells , many of Parchman ’ s dayrooms , where inmates gather , lack lighting .
“ What officer would want to go into a dayroom with the prisoners out of their cells and no lights ?
” Vail asked .
The latest inspection showed at least 43 places where electrical wires were exposed , making it possible for inmates to set fires or cause other damage .
The inspection also shows some live wires near showers and water fountains @ @ @ @ @ @ @ received an 11-year sentence for forgery in 2012 , said dangers abound with “ live wiring hanging over , under and on the sides of the steel beds in which inmates have to sleep.
” Parchman ’ s water and sewer system are creating hazardous health conditions , according to experts .
The number of nonfunctioning sinks has ballooned from five in 2012 to 59 in the latest reports .
One building had a single working shower for more than 50 inmates .
Although MDOC policy calls for each inmate to get three @ @ @ @ @ @ @ weeks without the opportunity to clean themselves .
In one month , Manning said he received a total of five showers , three of them in one week .
Since federal court monitoring ended in 2011 , the Health Department has issued nearly 100 major violations of the Safe Drinking Water Act to Parchman , finding multiple toxic contaminants in the drinking water .
Safety scores for water treatment have plummeted from 3.5 out of 5 in 2015 to 0.5 out of 5 in 2019 .
Inmates have posted online images of brown @ @ @ @ @ @ @ their cells .
Retherford , the former inmate who was released in May , said he and other inmates who drank the water “ were constantly getting stomach ailments .
I got into the habit of boiling my water in the microwave.
” Fisher declined comment on the deficiencies found in health and environmental inspections .
She downplayed the issues of discolored drinking water and said MDOC had fixed problems as they were reported .
Brown water “ comes out of my faucets at my homes in Jackson and in the Delta , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s conditions horrified former State Health Officer Dr. Alton Cobb .
“ If this state can ’ t afford to provide reasonable hygiene to inmates , that is ridiculous , ” he said .
Prison advocates say what is happening at Parchman is too serious to be ignored any longer .
“ They have to shutter that place , ” said Kevin Ring , president of FAMM , a national criminal justice reform organization that has asked for a civil rights investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice .
“ People can @ @ @ @ @ @ @ alone be rehabilitated .
”

One prisoner strangled another to death while other inmates cheered the killing. Two convicts escaped a dilapidated building by walking out an open door. Maximum-security detainees freely roamed hallways, beating and threatening others.
Violence has roiled the Mississippi prison system for more than a week, with state corrections officials imposing a statewide lockdown and a county coroner declaring that gangs in the prisons have launched an all-out war against one another.
At the center of the chaos is the Mississippi State Penitentiary at Parchman — one of America’s most notorious prisons. Since July 2019, seven prisoners have been killed by fellow inmates at what is supposed to be the most secure facility in the state. In the prior eight years, there were four inmate killings.
The current violence comes after years of neglect by state officials, who allowed conditions at Parchman to deteriorate when federal courts ended oversight of the facility in 2011, according to an investigation by the Mississippi Center for Investigative Reporting and ProPublica.
Inmates described themselves as being prey to prison gangs who control the supply of contraband drugs and weapons, bedding, food and cellphones. Photographs and videos reviewed by the news organizations show the most dangerous inmates, identified by their red-and-white striped uniforms, walking freely outside their cells, with no guards in sight.
A video purporting to show the killing of a Parchman inmate on Jan. 3 shows inmates shouting and cheering.
Parchman’s descent has put at risk the safety of corrections officers, the investment of hundreds of millions of dollars of Mississippi taxpayer funds and the health of the inmates the state is charged with protecting, the investigation found.
Corrections officials last year failed to fill hundreds of positions available for guards. In a Sept. 6 email obtained by the Mississippi Center for Investigative Reporting, a correctional officer, Terrence Shaw, told state lawmakers how dangerous it had become working in Unit 29, Parchman’s maximum-security unit.
A building at Unit 29 that should have at least five officers had only two, and some buildings had only one, he wrote. “The National Guard army should have been called in several years ago.”
“Staff morale is down, staff quitting left and right,” Shaw wrote. “All staff working deserve a pay increase that is fit to live.”
Inmates and experts alike say the current violence in no small part arises from the prison’s sheer state of disrepair. Building facilities — water, lights, sewage — are crumbling. The prison’s drinking water has violated the Safe Drinking Water Act dozens of times, and the Environmental Protection Agency has cited the prison’s sewage system for three years for violating the Clean Water Act, documents show. Parchman’s accreditation by the American Correctional Association, which sets standards for prisons across the country, lapsed in 2017.
Alger Retherford spent more than four decades behind bars at Parchman for murder and robbery. A member of the prison’s repair crew, he was released in May.
“We have come full circle, right back to 1975, the same conditions,” Retherford, 62, said.
In response to the violence, Mississippi’s top prison official, Corrections Commissioner Pelicia Hall, said she was working with sheriffs, private prison operators and others to make sure the prisons are as safe as possible, and she vowed that the Mississippi Department of Corrections, or MDOC, would pursue criminal charges “to the full extent of the law.”
Hall has also repeatedly asked the Republican-controlled Legislature for more money to hire guards and to fix up Unit 29, which replaced a different maximum-security unit that was closed down in 2010 in response to litigation filed by the ACLU. The request went nowhere.
This year, even before the outbreak of violence, Hall asked for an extra $78 million in funding — nearly a third of it to renovate Unit 29.
Unit 29 “is unsafe for staff and inmates because of age and general deterioration,” Grace Fisher, an MDOC spokeswoman, said last month.
The Joint Legislative Budget Committee, which sets spending priorities for the state, is recommending that representatives reject the request and instead cut the total corrections budget by $8.3 million. What happens next will be up to the new Mississippi Legislature, which was sworn in Tuesday.
Asked if he was concerned about the prison violence and what needs to be done, House Corrections Committee Chairman Bill Kinkade, a Republican from Byhalia, said, “We have been working diligently to … resolve” the issues.
David Fathi, director of the ACLU’s National Prison Project, said it would be easy to write off what is happening as strictly a Mississippi story. Instead, he said, it’s an American story.
In state after state, he said, federal courts have intervened in prisons with high levels of violence, lack of proper health treatment and other woes, but when that oversight goes away, conditions get worse again.
“State officials complain about federal court, but that seems to be the way to maintain conditions of basic decency,” he said.
Fathi has no doubt that the current conditions at Parchman are unconstitutional, he said. “There’s no place for this kind of treatment in a civilized society.”
“Unfit for Human Habitation”
Parchman prison opened in 1901. Inmates lived in small camps and worked sunup to sundown in nearby plantation fields. By 1905, the state of Mississippi was raking in $185,000 every two years from harvests, the modern-day equivalent of more than $5 million.
The disciplinary system was infamous. Whippings came from a 3-foot-long, 6-inch-wide whip named “Black Annie.” Rather than hire more guards, prison officials often relied on favored inmates, known as “trusty shooters,” who often abused their power over fellow inmates, sometimes shooting and killing them.
In 1971, Parchman inmates filed a class-action lawsuit. A year later, U.S. District Judge William Keady concluded that “inhumanities, illegal conduct and other indiginities” corrupted the trusty system, that inmates’ quarters were “unfit for human habitation” and that they had been deprived of wholesome food, medical treatment and basic hygiene. He ordered improvements in health care and almost every aspect of prisoner life.
The landmark decision shut down the trusty system across the South.
In the years that followed, Keady continued his oversight, sometimes showing up unannounced at the prison. Mississippi spent more than $35 million to modernize Parchman, replacing the work camps with more than two dozen buildings surrounded by razor wire.
The reforms slowly took effect. In 2003, the American Correctional Association, or ACA, certified that Parchman met all modern standards for prison operation. In response to litigation brought by the ACLU, prison officials shut down Parchman’s notorious Unit 32, a violent supermax unit that a federal judge concluded suffered from unconstitutional conditions.
By 2011, the prison had turned a corner. After nearly four decades of court monitoring and an infusion of taxpayer dollars, new facilities had been built. Prisoner abuse had declined. A judge ended federal oversight, and Mississippi was once again entrusted with the care of its inmates.
“We felt like it was mission finally accomplished,” said Ronald Welch, a Jackson lawyer who represented the state’s inmates before the courts for much of that time.
Three years later, Chris Epps, the corrections commissioner at the time and a champion of prison reform, was arrested on bribery charges. Epps, a former Parchman guard who served as president of the ACA, pleaded guilty and is now serving nearly 20 years in prison.
By 2017, when Parchman’s accreditation lapsed, the facility was failing to meet basic industry standards, according to Robert Reeves, a certified ACA auditor who once served as manager of ACA compliance at South Mississippi Correctional Institution.
Reeves, who retired in 2016 and continues to communicate with MDOC employees, said staff members are not able to keep up with repairs in the facilities. Outside contractors hired by the agency have not made up the gap.
“They’re in such bad shape,” Reeves said of Mississippi’s corrections facilities.
Welch, the lawyer who monitored Parchman for 36 years, said the latest report and photographs show conditions much worse than before the federal court stopped monitoring.
If just a fraction of Parchman’s problems took place in a public building other than a prison, it would be shut down, he said. He called the prison’s conditions an “unbelievable nightmare.”
His assessment was echoed by J. Cliff Johnson, the director of the University of Mississippi’s MacArthur Justice Center, who regularly visits the prison.
“Parchman is held together with baling wire and bubble gum,” Johnson said. “We put facilities like Parchman in the middle of nowhere so that people don’t have to think about the humans inside those facilities or their inhumane treatment. We don’t want to hear about it. We don’t want to see it. We don’t want to think about it.”
“I’ve got him in a chokehold”
In 2014, MDOC employed 1,591 correctional officers. Although the inmate population in state prisons has fallen slightly, the number of correctional officers has plummeted to 731 — a loss of more than half the workforce. Parchman is unable to fill its open positions. This year, the prison had the authority to employ 512 officers but hired only 261.
That figure is far below ACA accreditation standards, which require no more than a 10% vacancy rate in any 18-month period for correctional employees who work directly with inmates.
Hall, who plans to resign as corrections commissioner in mid-January, blamed the soaring number of job openings on low salaries. MDOC has asked the Legislature to increase starting pay rates from $25,650 annually to $30,640, at a cost of $2.79 million. But the Joint Legislative Budget Committee has recommended rejecting this proposal.
The shortage of staff has been accompanied by an increase in inmate deaths from unnatural causes.
On average, Parchman records about two inmate suicides per year. In 2019, five Parchman prisoners killed themselves, all in single-person cells, according to the coroner’s office.
Solitary confinement and a failure to check regularly on inmates in one-man cells increases the likelihood of suicide, experts say.
“In many prison systems, a majority of all suicides occur in solitary confinement, even though prisoners in solitary account for only a small proportion of the prison population,” Fathi said.
Seven inmates were killed by fellow detainees in the 13 months from January last year through the present month, according to the coroner. From 2011 to 2018, one prisoner was killed every 19 months on average.
On July 10, Jeffery Allen, 40, was beaten to death in the shower, according to the coroner. Less than a month later, Samuel Wade, 27, was strangled to death. Just before midnight on Nov. 12, Jeremy Irons, 31, was fatally stabbed by other inmates. The death took place after an argument over a $40 debt, according to inmates.
On Nov. 19, Michael Anderson, 26, who was serving a 10-year sentence for armed robbery, was fatally stabbed by other inmates, according to the coroner.
Anderson’s father, Robert Coleman, said his son, before his death, shared that a prison gang “wanted him to do something that he didn’t do” and that he wasn’t under the protection of his “brothers” anymore.
Another three homicides have taken place since the new year began.
One factor in the soaring number of deaths is that prison gangs have become a de facto replacement for the old armed trusties, according to some prison experts.
“We are talking to correctional officers who say that gang leaders are making decisions about who gets housed where,” said Johnson, of the University of Mississippi’s MacArthur Justice Center, whose office represents many prisoners in Parchman. “When people get ‘out of line,’ the severe gang disciplinary system rules the day.”
Travis Arnold, sentenced to five years in prison in 2018 for statutory rape and failing to register as a sex offender, said he and other inmates have long felt unsafe because “there are not enough guards to protect us, and they never come around and check on us.”
Those fears became a reality when a gang war between the Vice Lords and the Gangsters erupted at Parchman and other Mississippi prisons, starting Dec. 29.
In an attempt to stem the violence, Parchman officials last week reopened notorious Unit 32, which had been closed in 2010 under the federal consent decree. Inmates subsequently shot a video there that shows standing water, mold, peeling paint and cells where there is no running water for sinks or toilets.
“This illustrates one of the shortcomings of litigation — sooner or later the lawsuit goes away, and defendants are then free to return to their old ways, unless and until a new lawsuit is filed,” Fathi said.
Video circulating on social media purports to show the Jan. 3 killing of an inmate. ProPublica could not verify the authenticity of the video with prison officials. Though officially banned, cellphones are widely available to inmates. Several inmates contacted said it appeared to show Parchman’s interior, and details in the video match the coroner’s description of the circumstances of the death of one inmate.
In the video, an inmate can be seen standing inside a cell, dressed in the distinctive red-and-white pants worn by the most dangerous prisoners. The inmate repeatedly strikes another man in the cell with his fists. Loud shouting can be heard while an unnamed prisoner narrates the video: “They’re straight up hitting the motherfuckers with knives and shit, beating them motherfuckers up. They’re behind the cell while we’re on lockdown.”
A woman’s voice can then be heard, perhaps from a cellphone: “He has his own family.”
An inmate can be heard boasting: “I’ve got him in a chokehold.”
Another inmate cheers him on: “Oh, yeah, oh, yeah. Dead. Oh, yeah. Dead. Deaaaaad.”
Despite the loud shouting throughout the incident, no officer can be seen responding.
Though the identity of the man attacked in the video could not be confirmed, a prison doctor pronounced an inmate named Denorris Howell dead at 3:20 a.m. on Jan 3. Authorities initially thought Howell was stabbed to death by his roommate.
But Sunflower County Coroner Heather Burton later determined that Howell had sustained a fatal neck injury and that the blood stains on his clothing belonged to his roommate, who was also injured in the attack.
No charges have been filed, and MDOC officials have declined to comment.
Howell’s mother, Janice Wilkins of Memphis, Tennessee, said her son had called her on his cellphone and told her that the lights had been turned out. Before hanging up the phone, he said that a guard was letting inmates out of their cells.
“My son won’t be back,” she said. “But I’m crying for other inmates who are incarcerated.”
Johnson called the video “the stuff of dystopian nightmares.”
“We take thousands of people and lock them up in hellholes where they are forced to fight for survival on a daily basis while they unravel due to the effects of mental illness, addiction, disease and constant fear,” Johnson said. “Events like this one are horrific not only because of the depraved behavior of the killers, but also because we as Mississippians have allowed this to happen, even encouraged it.”
“We all have blood on our hands,” he said.
Prisoners in the Dark
Mississippi Department of Health inspections from the past decade provided plenty of warning about the increasingly poor state of Parchman.
In 2012, one year after federal oversight ended, six inmates lacked mattresses or bedding in Parchman. Last year, more than 250 did — nearly 8% of the prison’s inmates.
In 2012, a dozen toilets for inmates in the prison didn’t work. Last year, there were 64.
The reports document holes in cell walls and prison doors; collapsing ceilings; broken commodes, sinks, drains and tiles; exposed wiring; and roaches and rats throughout the prison. One photograph in the reports shows birds eating off inmates’ food trays.
Unit 29, the maximum-security building, was the focus of special scrutiny. The roof of the building, which houses the state’s death row inmates, has holes that let rain pour into the facility. Door and locks are broken. Inmates have bored holes in the building’s unreinforced concrete large enough to hide contraband weapons, drugs and phones, corrections officials have acknowledged.
The official reports are backed up by interviews, documents and photographs from prisoners inside Parchman and their family members. Some prisoners said they washed their uniforms in toilets after laundry service stopped. One prisoner said he fashioned homemade extension cords from stripped wires, using them to start fires and boil water in an effort to make it safe to drink.
At Parchman today, many inmates are living in darkness. The latest inspection shows at least 300 cells without lights or power — a stark contrast to 2012 when there were no cells without lights or power.
James Louis Manning, who was released from Parchman in June after serving time for grand larceny, said he had no light in his cell during his final year as a prisoner. “It wasn’t fixed before I left,” he said.
Lack of light in a prison can have serious consequences, said Eldon Vail, former corrections secretary in Washington state. Officers can’t check on prisoners to make sure they’re safe. Lengthy periods of darkness can cause stress and exacerbate mental illness.
Beyond the cells, many of Parchman’s dayrooms, where inmates gather, lack lighting.
“What officer would want to go into a dayroom with the prisoners out of their cells and no lights?” Vail asked.
The latest inspection showed at least 43 places where electrical wires were exposed, making it possible for inmates to set fires or cause other damage. The inspection also shows some live wires near showers and water fountains.
Inmate Percy Dean III, who received an 11-year sentence for forgery in 2012, said dangers abound with “live wiring hanging over, under and on the sides of the steel beds in which inmates have to sleep.”
Parchman’s water and sewer system are creating hazardous health conditions, according to experts. The number of nonfunctioning sinks has ballooned from five in 2012 to 59 in the latest reports. One building had a single working shower for more than 50 inmates.
Although MDOC policy calls for each inmate to get three showers a week, inmates describe going weeks without the opportunity to clean themselves. In one month, Manning said he received a total of five showers, three of them in one week.
Since federal court monitoring ended in 2011, the Health Department has issued nearly 100 major violations of the Safe Drinking Water Act to Parchman, finding multiple toxic contaminants in the drinking water. Safety scores for water treatment have plummeted from 3.5 out of 5 in 2015 to 0.5 out of 5 in 2019.
Inmates have posted online images of brown or opaque water streaming from taps in their cells.
Retherford, the former inmate who was released in May, said he and other inmates who drank the water “were constantly getting stomach ailments. I got into the habit of boiling my water in the microwave.”
Fisher declined comment on the deficiencies found in health and environmental inspections. She downplayed the issues of discolored drinking water and said MDOC had fixed problems as they were reported. Brown water “comes out of my faucets at my homes in Jackson and in the Delta,” she said.
Revelations of Parchman’s conditions horrified former State Health Officer Dr. Alton Cobb. “If this state can’t afford to provide reasonable hygiene to inmates, that is ridiculous,” he said.
Prison advocates say what is happening at Parchman is too serious to be ignored any longer.
“They have to shutter that place,” said Kevin Ring, president of FAMM, a national criminal justice reform organization that has asked for a civil rights investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice. “People can’t live like that, let alone be rehabilitated.”


rawstory--2020-01-08--Airlines avoiding flying through Iran and Iraq airspace

A growing number of airlines said Wednesday they were avoiding Iranian and Iraqi airspace for flights to the region after Tehran fired ballistic missiles against bases housing US troops in Iraq .
“ As a precautionary measure and following news of air strikes underway , Air France has decided to suspend until further notice all flights through Iranian and Iraqi airspace , ” an Air France spokesman told AFP .
Iran launched a series of missiles at bases housing US troops in the early hours , officials in Washington and Tehran said .
Iran ’ s supreme leader called the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” after a US drone strike killed Iranian military commander Qasem Soleimani near Baghdad international airport last week .
Shortly after the missile attacks , the US Federal Aviation Administration said it was banning US-registered carriers from flying over Iraq , Iran and the Gulf .
Its Russian counterpart , the Federal Air Transport Agency , said it was recommending airlines avoid the air space over Iran , Iraq and the Persian and Oman Gulfs “ due to information about current risks for safety of international passenger flights ” .
The region is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Europe and Asia , although planes can be rerouted .
A KLM spokesman told AFP : “ Until further notice , KLM has no flights over Iranian or Iraqi airspace .
All flights to different Southeast Asian destinations and other destinations in the Middle East will be flown through alternative routes.
” In Germany , Lufthansa said it had cancelled its daily flight to Tehran in addition to halting overflights of Iran and Iraq until further notice .
It added that Saturday ’ s twice-weekly service to northern Iraqi city of Erbil would @ @ @ @ @ @ @ national airline LOT had already announced at the weekend that its regular flights in the region were being diverted to keep them out of Iranian airspace .
UAE carriers Emirates Airline and low-cost Flydubai said they had cancelled flights to Baghdad for “ operational reasons ” .
Australia ’ s Qantas said one of its London-Perth flights would be rerouted , with the other already flying an alternative route .
“ We ’ re adjusting our flight paths over the Middle East to avoid the airspace over Iraq and Iran until further notice @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Singapore Airlines and Malaysia Airlines said they would divert flights from Iranian airspace .
Vietnam Airlines said it will make “ appropriate adjustments ” of routes to avoid areas of potential instability although its regular flight paths to Europe do not pass over Iran and Iraq .
Japanese airlines ANA and JAL , and Hong Kong-based Cathay Pacific said their planes do not fly through airspace affected by latest flare-up .
Air India spokesman Dhananjay Kumar said the airline ’ s carriers Air India and Air India Express would “ temporarily ” be @ @ @ @ @

Trained in political science and the law, he has no formal education in disaster preparedness or response. And prior to his current role, he never held a full-time job dedicated to emergency management.
Instead, his main qualification was being chief of staff to then-mayor Alan Arakawa. But in that role, he told Civil Beat Tuesday, he assisted during emergency operations. And he said he participated in online FEMA trainings and workshops throughout the years.
In 2017, Andaya beat out 40 other applicants for the job, Maui Now reported at the time.
As the mayor’s administration was coming to a close, a panel of government officials – which said it was independent of the mayor – chose Andaya for the civil service role.
Civil Beat reviewed Andaya’s experience after historic Lahaina was swallowed by an inferno last week, killing scores of residents and visitors who never saw it coming.
The Maui Emergency Management Agency had the authority to issue siren warnings that might have alerted people. After Andaya’s agency decided not to sound them, many survivors reported they only became aware of the fire when they saw and smelled smoke.
Andaya said sounding the sirens wasn’t an option officials considered because they’re “mainly used for tsunamis.” That’s why they’re mostly located on the coast, he said.
But the state’s own website says the sirens are useful for many kinds of emergencies.
“The all-hazard siren system can be used for a variety of both natural and human-caused events; including tsunamis, hurricanes, dam breaches, flooding, wildfires, volcanic eruptions, terrorist threats, hazardous material incidents, and more,” the site states.
Andaya wasn’t on the island when the fires started, and he hasn’t made any appearances at press conferences since the disaster occurred.
Asked about Andaya’s resume, David Hafner, a retired telecommunications planner for the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency, questioned whether his relative inexperience affected his agency’s performance in a crisis.
“It’s a good ol’ boy network,” Hafner said. “This time it cost lives.”
Hafner said it’s “absolutely essential” for emergency management leaders to have experience in the field so they make the right decisions both before and after disasters strike.
Not having it, he said, “can lead to grave mistakes in judgment.”
Andaya’s hiring came at a time when Hawaii’s counties had just taken on increased responsibility for disaster response, according to Hafner. State emergency management officials used to be the designated authority to respond to emergencies, he said, but an update to the law in 2014 put the counties in the driver’s seat.
Asked about Andaya’s LinkedIn resume, Colin Moore, a political scientist at the University of Hawaii, said he was shocked by the emergency administrator’s lack of relevant experience. He said the public is owed an explanation.
“It’s a legitimate question to ask why the person leading the county emergency services agency has no clear background in fire, police, public health, the usual emergency services backgrounds,” he said.
“Having that on-the-ground experience, you develop the instincts and the connections to be able to perform a job like this. And if you just have general government experience, there is just no opportunity to have that kind of on-the-ground knowledge that often is really useful in a crisis.”
Andaya said as a former member of the mayor’s cabinet, he was qualified for the job.
“Whenever there was an activation in the emergency operations center, we were involved,” he said. “To say that I have no experience or no background in emergency management is not correct.”
‘Political Influence’ A Concern
Andaya, 52, is from Maui and graduated from HP Baldwin High School.
He has bachelor’s and master’s degrees in political science from the University of Hawaii Manoa. He also has a law degree from the UH Richardson School of Law, although he never became a licensed attorney, according to the Hawaii State Bar Association’s online database.
He began his career clerking for Maui Judge Artemio Baxa. He then worked for the law office of Lynn Araki-Regan, an attorney who is the wife of Arakawa’s managing director, Keith Regan.
When Andaya vacated his position as chief of staff, it was filled by Araki-Regan, who was by then the county budget director. Regan said he had no involvement in Andaya’s hiring.
From the early 2000s onward, Andaya has held leadership positions in Maui’s Department of Housing and Human Concerns and worked as the assistant to the chancellor of UH’s Maui College, according to his LinkedIn resume. He is married to Rowena Dagdag-Andaya, a former elementary school teacher who served as Maui’s public works director and now works in Maui’s Office on Aging.
Andaya was Arakawa’s chief of staff from 2011 through 2017. That year, the mayor appointed him acting administrator of MEMA, and he became permanent by the end of that year.
In contrast, Honolulu’s emergency management director, Hiro Toiya, has technical training in emergency response, worked for years as a preparedness planner for the Hawaii health department and rose up the ranks of Honolulu’s Department of Emergency Management. He worked there for more than seven years before becoming the director.
Asked how he stood out among a pool of 40 job candidates, Andaya said Maui doesn’t have a lot of emergency management professionals to begin with. He noted that he had to take an exam and based on his score was determined to be a finalist.
“You would have to question the civil service process if you can believe that politics was involved,” he said. “This is something that my predecessors have to go through as well.”
Before Andaya was hired, there were concerns in Maui’s political scene that the county was considering someone who wasn’t qualified.
“In the past, this position has sometimes been filled by individuals without the proper emergency response background.”
Former Maui County Council Chairman Mike White
In July 2017, the chair of the Maui County Council at the time, Mike White, took the unusual step of writing a Maui News column warning that the job of emergency management was too important to be “subject to political influence.”
“In the past, this position has sometimes been filled by individuals without the proper emergency response background,” White wrote.
“The administration must search for well-qualified candidates who can make a seamless transition in leading our Emergency Management Agency. The stakes are too high and our community has grown to a point where emergency coordination has become quite sophisticated in its implementation.”
In his column, White praised the outgoing emergency management chief, Anna Foust, who had previously worked for years leading the Maui branch of the Red Cross. White emphasized her expertise.
“During her tenure, she used her emergency response experience and training to help guide the county to keep citizens safe during hurricane warnings and watches, flooding events and tsunami warnings,” White wrote.
Civil Beat wasn’t able to reach White for comment.
Panel Of Specialists Chose Andaya
On Tuesday, Arakawa’s former managing director, Keith Regan, said that politics was not a factor in Andaya’s hiring. Asked why Andaya was the best candidate, Regan said he didn’t know because he wasn’t on the hiring committee. But he was adamant there was “zero” political influence in the process.
“This was a straightforward civil service process,” said Regan, who is now the state comptroller.
When Regan ran for Maui County Council in 2015, Andaya was his campaign manager. This year, Andaya wrote a letter of support of Regan’s nomination to state comptroller.
Regan noted that the hiring panel included numerous experts in the field. Maui Now identified them at the time as then-Maui Police Chief Tivoli Faaumu; then-Maui Fire Chief Jeff Murray; Elton Ushio, administrator of the Kauai Emergency Management Agency; and Vern Miyagi, then-administrator of the Hawaii State Emergency Management Agency.
At the time, Ushio was quoted by Maui Now as saying Andaya’s “proven leadership abilities, executive level experience, and impressive knowledge of emergency management” made him a great fit for the job. Murray cited Andaya’s familiarity with government processes, his “institutional knowledge of the various emergency incidents” in recent years, and his then-recent work as acting leader of the department.
“These are not people that, you know, are just political people,” Regan said. “They’re people who understand emergency management and are going to make the right choice for the community.”
In a statement, former HI-EMA director Miyagi said the public’s focus should be on working together on response and recovery.
“Herman Andaya and his staff at MEMA are really good people,” he said. “They carried Maui successfully through numerous hurricanes, floods, and other disasters.”
He said the public should wait for the attorney general’s investigation before drawing conclusions.
Civil Beat left messages with the other hiring committee members on Tuesday, but they were not returned. Former mayor Arakawa also did not respond to a request for comment.
“Herman is a very skilled, experienced, knowledgeable, professional individual,” Regan said. “I trust that is making the right decisions … There is no question in my mind that he cares about that community, and he’s going to do everything he can to keep that community safe.”


rawstory--2020-01-08--Cory Booker hitting the 2020 wall: Why a once-promising candidate never clicked

With the DNC ’ s reliance on polling and campaign cash metrics for qualifying , Booker faces the prospect that for the second month running in a row he won ’ t make the televised debate stage , less than three weeks before the first Democratic votes are counted in the Feb. 3 Iowa caucus .
Not since Booker ’ s days of running as an insurgent , confronting the powerful incumbent Mayor Sharpe James in Newark , has he faced such long odds .
Initially , the Democratic Party ’ s 2020 presidential race featured the most diverse field @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , with the departures of Sen. Kamala Harris and former HUD Secretary Julián Castro and the entrance of former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg , the field is skewing to being whiter and wealthier — a lot wealthier .
The party whose major unifying theme is its supposed advocacy for the 99 percent now appears more like a pyramid scheme , where the number of donors and the amount of cash you raise is what determines your relevance to the DNC process .
Booker told NBC ’ s Andrea Mitchell on Jan. 2 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was generating “ a sense of frustration ” among voters he had spoken with in Iowa , who saw the party as “ excluding people from a debate stage because they don ’ t have the money that billionaires have to get on these stages.
” New Jersey ’ s native son then went on to list his successes in the Hawkeye State that he felt the DNC was ignoring .
“ As Iowa Starting Line just pointed out , I am the No .
3 candidate in just general popularity and net @ @ @ @ @ @ @ he told Mitchell .
“ We have the most endorsements , and in the kind of surge we are seeing I am the No .
1 campaign for the percentage of Iowa women contributing too.
” “ Instead of letting Iowans choose , ” Booker continued , the primary campaign “ is being dictated ” by party leaders in Washington .
“ It makes no sense.
” Democratic candidates have only until Jan. 10 to qualify for the next debate , which according to Ballotpedia will require “ 225,000 unique contributors and at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ polls or 7 percent support in two eligible state-level polls.
” It ’ s almost impossible that Booker will meet those criteria — and Andrew Yang probably won ’ t either , which would leave five white candidates on the debate stage in Des Moines .
There ’ s pretty convincing evidence that Booker ’ s campaign is already being marginalized by major media like the New York Times , which was once critical to establishing his national brand .
The only Booker stories getting play are the ones fixated on how much @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Jan. 4 Times roundup , written in the aftermath of President Trump ’ s decision to order the killing of Iranian Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani and entitled “ Airstrike Pushes Foreign Policy to Front of Presidential Race , ” Booker was not mentioned , although he is a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee .
The views of former Vice President Joe Biden , Sen. Bernie Sanders , Sen. Elizabeth Warren , Sen. Amy Klobuchar and Mayor Pete Buttigieg were all incorporated .
Bloomberg , was also cited , with the Times @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for describing Trump ’ s action as an assassination .
Similarly , in an NBC report surveying the 2020 Democratic presidential field ’ s response to the latest developments in Iraq , Booker ’ s take was also MIA .
It ’ s not that Booker didn ’ t have a relevant take on our delicate geopolitical moment , one he ’ s honed after years of serious contemplation and study of these issues .
“ Make no mistake — Qasem Soleimani was a ruthless , evil leader who had orchestrated countless attacks @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Booker said in a statement posted on his Senate website .
“ Today , many questions remain and must be answered on the intelligence reports that led to this action , what steps were undertaken to prepare our personnel and partners in the region , and the consequences of an escalatory attack with no clear endgame.
” He continued , “ This President has no long-term strategy for dealing with Iran , bringing stability to the Middle East , or avoiding military conflict with Iran .
The reality is that Americans are evacuating @ @ @ @ @ @ @ morning Americans at home and abroad are at risk from Iran ’ s potential retaliatory actions.
” From the trajectory of the Democratic nomination process to this point , it appears that the party has prematurely nationalized the contest with its arbitrary debate standards .
This has resulted in marginalized the opinions of voters in places like Iowa and New Hampshire .
It has been fairly argued that the lack of voters of color in those two early voting states gets the entire intra-party debate off to a non-representative start .
in which @ @ @ @ @ @ @ white voters frame the debate for a party that ’ s totally reliant in a general election on voters of color in metropolitan areas .
Overlay that with the DNC ’ s debate-culling process , and the whole contraption starts to resemble the deeply flawed Electoral College more than a free and open democratic contest .


rawstory--2020-01-08--Netanyahu warns of ‘resounding blow’ if Iran attacks Israel

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned Wednesday that Israel would strike a “ resounding blow ” if attacked by arch foe Iran , as regional tensions soar after the US killing of a top Iranian general .
“ Anyone who attacks us will receive a resounding blow , ” the premier told a Jerusalem conference after Iran launched a salvo of retaliatory missile strikes on bases used by US troops in Iraq .
Netanyahu has described the target of last week ’ s US drone strike — Major General Qasem Soleimani , commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards foreign operations arm @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ Qasem Soleimani was responsible for the deaths of countless innocent people , he destabilised many countries for decades , he sowed fear and misery and anguish and he was planning much worse , ” Netanyahu said .
“ He was the architect and driver of Iran ’ s campaign of terror throughout the Middle East and the world.
” The Israeli premier praised US President Donald Trump for “ acting swiftly , boldly , and resolutely ” in killing Soleimani in the Iraqi capital Baghdad .
The drone strike has put the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for Tehran ’ s response to the killing .
A senior Iranian official on Monday warned the Israeli cities of Haifa and Tel Aviv would be turned “ to dust ” , if Washington carried out further military action in response to its retaliatory moves .


rawstory--2020-01-08--Economist Robert Reich explains why millennials don’t have any money

The same forces that are driving massive inequality between the top 1 percent and the rest of us are creating a vast generational wealth gap between baby boomers — my generation — and millennials .
Millennials aren ’ t teenagers anymore .
They ’ re working hard , starting families and trying to build wealth .
But as a generation , they ’ re way behind .
They ’ re deeper in debt , only half as likely to own a home , and more likely to live in poverty than their parents .
If we want to address their @ @ @ @ @ @ @ problems .
Number one : Stagnant wages .
Median wages grew by an average of 0.3 % per year between 2007 and 2017 , including the Great Recession – just as millennials were beginning their careers .
Before that , between the mid-1980s and mid-1990s , wages grew at three times that rate .
Second : As wages have stagnated , the costs of essentials like housing and education have been going through the roof .
Millennials own fewer homes , the most common way Americans have built wealth in the past .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ inflation , the average college education in 2018 cost nearly three times what it did in 1978 .
Third : As a result of all of this , Debt .
That expensive college education means that the average graduate carries a whopping $ 28,000 in student loan debt .
As a generation , millennials are more than one trillion dollars in the red .
In addition , the average young adult carries nearly $ 5,000 in credit card debt , and this number is growing .
Fourth : Millennials are finding it harder @ @ @ @ @ @ @ future .
Among Fortune 500 companies , only 81 sponsored a pension plan in 2017 , that ’ s down from 288 twenty years ago .
Employers are replacing pensions with essentially “ do-it-yourself ” savings plans .
All of this means that fewer millennials are entering the middle class than previous generations .
Most have less than $ 1,000 in savings .
Many young people today won ’ t be able to retire until 75 , if at all .
If we don ’ t start trying to reduce this generational wealth @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , accessible health insurance , paid family leave , affordable housing , and a more equitable tax code for renters — millions of young Americans will struggle to find financial security for the rest of their lives .


rawstory--2020-01-08--Are white evangelicals as concerned about Middle Eastern Christians as they say they are?

I am going to say something that I have never before said in public .
I have professed my faith in Jesus Christ as my personal Lord and Savior .
More than once , actually .
I don ’ t remember how many times .
Maybe half a dozen ?
I do remember each time had the same empirical result , which is to say no empirical result .
I was the same after as I was before .
I knew nothing had changed because my Christian upbringing taught the importance of the truth .
What I didn ’ t @ @ @ @ @ @ @ now , is that the truth isn ’ t The Truth .
Years later my dad asked if I was saved .
It was important to him .
I said yes , and I felt like a liar .
Then I realized there ’ s no way he could prove I wasn ’ t .
Faith , after all , isn ’ t falsifiable .
Telling him I was “ saved ” had the same small-T truth to it as saying I accepted Jesus , which is to say , no truth at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ profession of faith in Christ did not actuate my inner moral conscience anymore than saying abracadabra .
To born-again Christians , the event I describe here , in which you profess your faith in God who gave His only Begotten Son to be sacrificed on the Cross of Calvary so that Man might be forgiven his Sins , is seminal .
The revelation of God ’ s Power and Glory is supposed to be a turning point one reflects on in old age in search of wisdom to pass on to youngsters embarking @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
It is the implicit or explicit lesson to every Sunday school class , every Bible story , and every sermon .
Everything about born-again Christianity is bent toward the goal of your being born again .
The only thing missing is how to be a good person .
For me to say that the words of profession of my faith in Jesus did not actuate my moral conscience any more than saying abracadabra did isn ’ t merely offensive to born-again Christians .
It ’ s also confounding .
I mean , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to avoid burning for an eternity in a Lake of Fire .
What ’ s morality got to do with that ?
( The people I ’ m describing , by the way , are all white .
I have no unique insight into African-American evangelical religion or culture . )
My argument here is kind of the inverse of Martin Luther ’ s .
The German theologian who launched the Reformation came to believe that “ good works ” did not bring salvation .
Doing the right thing was not the way @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , could be justified by faith alone .
Moral action wasn ’ t enough .
You really had to believe .
This makes sense when you think about it from Martin Luther ’ s point of view .
He was fighting the idea of—actually the widespread practice of—salvation through the cash purchase of little pieces of paper that said you are now absolved of such-and-such sin .
If I were Luther , I might want to reform such blatant corruption , too .
I ’ d want people to be truthful in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ empty vessels , and that ’ s no way to build a religious community .
Instead , corruption is a way to tear it down .
I ’ m no historian but it seems to me , as someone who has strayed ( badly but gladly ) from my born-again Christian beginnings , that many of today ’ s believers have turned the Reformation on its head in a way .
Whole lifetimes can pass by without having to think seriously about what a good person is or how to put virtue into @ @ @ @ @ @ @ And such apathy is made possible by the deep-seated belief that morality is the same as obedience to authority , especially obedience to God the Father .
In other words , I am good because people in authority tell me I am good for obeying their authority .
Take the believer out of the shadow of authority , however , and what do you have ?
A person who ’ s never developed a moral core .
An empty vessel , sadly .
Donald Trump and his white evangelical supporters have more in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Caveat : I developed a moral core , but it wasn ’ t easy on my own .
Others often do the same . )
You ’ ve probably read recently about evangelical Christian leaders taking umbrage with Trump ’ s order to pull out of Syria , abandoning our allies , the Kurds , who have protected the small Christian communities in the region—communities now in peril .
This , we are told , has forced leading evangelicals to “ break ranks ” with Trump .
Broadcaster Pat Robertson even worried that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ heaven ’ s mandate.
” But seriously .
If Robertson and others wanted to take action , they would .
If the lives of these Middle Eastern Christians mattered so much to them , they ’ d do everything in their power , which is a lot , to pressure Trump to reverse his terrible choice .
They will not , however , for three reasons .
One , these Middle Eastern Christians are the wrong kind .
They may as well be Mormons .
Two , Trump is the best chance @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of their making .
And three , but most importantly , moral action—that is , doing good in the world—isn ’ t all that important in a fallen world that is coming to an end soon enough anyway .
What matters is faith alone .
( To be sure , there are many thoughtful evangelical Christians eager to engage morally in the world , however fallen .
They are , alas , a tiny minority . )
But don ’ t take my word for it .
According to the New York Times @ @ @ @ @ @ @ very same point : In Martin Luther ’ s time , good works had become hopelessly corrupt .
In ours , faith alone can be .
Indeed , today ’ s true believers are turning the Reformation on its head .
What ’ s moral about obedience to an authority with no moral core ?


rawstory--2020-01-08--Trump threatens Afghan armageddon

Trump threatens Afghan armageddon

On February 4 , 2002 , a Predator drone circled over Afghanistan ’ s Paktia province , near the city of Khost .
Below was al-Qaeda ’ s founder Osama bin Laden — or at least someone in the CIA thought so — and he was marked for death .
As Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld put it later , both awkwardly and passively : “ A decision was made to fire the Hellfire missile .
It was fired.
” That air-to-ground , laser-guided missile — designed to obliterate tanks , bunkers , helicopters , and people — did exactly @ @ @ @ @ @ @ As it happened , though ( and not for the first time in its history either ) , the CIA got it wrong .
It wasn ’ t Osama bin Laden on the receiving end of that strike , or a member of al-Qaeda , or even of the Taliban .
The dead , local witnesses reported , were civilians out collecting scrap metal , ordinary people going about their daily work just as thousands of Americans had been doing at the World Trade Center only months earlier when terror struck from the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ those Afghan scrap collectors have been joined by more than 157,000 war dead in that embattled land .
That ’ s a heavy toll , but represents just a fraction of the body count from America ’ s post-9/11 wars .
According to a study by the Costs of War Project of Brown University ’ s Watson Institute , as many as 801,000 people , combatants and noncombatants alike , have been killed in those conflicts .
That ’ s a staggering number , the equivalent of the Rwandan genocide of 1994 .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ be believed , the United States has “ plans ” that could bury that grim count in staggering numbers of dead .
The “ method of war ” he suggested employing could produce more than 20 times that number in a single country — an estimated 20 million or more Afghans , almost all of them civilians .
It ’ s a strange fact of our moment that President Trump has claimed to have “ plans ” ( or “ a method ” ) for annihilating millions of innocent people , possibly most @ @ @ @ @ @ @ those comments of his barely made the news , disappearing within days .
Even for a president who threatened to unleash “ fire and fury ” on North Korea and usher in “ the end ” of Iran , hinting at the possibility of wiping out most of the civilian population of an ally represented something new .
After all , America ’ s commander-in-chief does have the authority , at his sole discretion , to order the launch of weapons from the vast U.S. nuclear arsenal .
So it was no small @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that he might unleash a “ method of war ” that would kill at least 54 % of the roughly 37 million inhabitants of Afghanistan .
And yet almost no one — in Washington or Kabul — wanted to touch such presidential comments .
The White House , the Pentagon , and the State Department all demurred .
So did the chief spokesman for Afghan President Ashraf Ghani .
One high-ranking Afghan official apologized to me for being unable to respond honestly to President Trump ’ s comments .
A current American official @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s Afghan threats might provoke a presidential tweet storm against him and refused to comment on the record .
Experts , however , weren ’ t shy about weighing in on what such “ plans , ” if real and utilized , would actually mean .
Employing such a method ( to use the president ’ s term ) , they say , would constitute a war crime , a crime against humanity , and possibly a genocide .
“ Massive Soviet military forces have invaded the small , nonaligned sovereign nation @ @ @ @ @ @ @ announced on January 4 , 1980 .
“ Fifty thousand heavily armed Soviet troops have crossed the border and are now dispersed throughout Afghanistan , attempting to conquer the fiercely independent Muslim people of that country.
” Nine years later , the Red Army would finally limp out of that land in the wake of a war that killed an estimated 90,000 Mujahideen fighters , 18,000 Afghan troops , and 14,500 Soviet soldiers .
As has been the norm in conflicts since World War I , however , civilians suffered the heaviest toll @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have been killed .
In the 18-plus years since U.S. forces invaded that same country in October 2001 , the death toll has been far lower .
Around 7,300 U.S. military personnel , contractors , and allied foreign forces have died there , as have 64,000American-allied Afghans , 42,000 opposition fighters , and 43,000 civilians , according to the Costs of War Project .
If President Trump is to be believed , however , this body count is low only due to American restraint .
“ I have plans on Afghanistan that , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , Afghanistan would be wiped off the face of the Earth .
It would be gone , ” the president remarked prior to a July 2019 meeting with Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan .
“ If we wanted to fight a war in Afghanistan and win it , I could win that war in a week .
I just don ’ t want to kill 10 million people.
” In September , he ramped up the rhetoric — and the death toll — further .
“ We ’ ve been very effective in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ And if we wanted to do a certain method of war , we would win that very quickly , but many , many , really , tens of millions of people would be killed.
” If America ’ s commander-in-chief is to be believed , plans and methods are already in place for a mass killing whose death toll could , at a minimum , exceed those of the Holocaust , the Cambodian genocide , the Rwandan genocide , the Vietnam War , the Korean War , the Hundred Years ’ War , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ all in a country where the Pentagon believes there are only 40,000 to 80,000 Taliban fighters and fewer than 2,000 Islamic State militants .
President Trump claims he ’ d prefer not to use such methods , but if he did , say experts , his Senate impeachment trial could theoretically be followed by a more consequential one in front of an international tribunal .
“ Of course , any ‘ method of war ’ that would kill ‘ 10 million people ’ or ‘ tens of millions ’ of people in a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 40,000 to 80,000 would be a blatant violation of the laws of war and would render President Trump a war criminal , ” Daphne Eviatar , director of the Security with Human Rights program at Amnesty International USA , told TomDispatch .
Max Pensky , the co-director of the Institute for Genocide and Mass Atrocity Prevention at the State University of New York at Binghamton , agreed .
“ Carrying out such a plan would certainly be a war crime because of the context of the armed conflict in Afghanistan , ” he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ be a crime against humanity.
” He noted that it might also constitute a genocide depending on the intent behind it .
The United States has , of course , been a pioneer when it comes to both the conduct and the constraint of warfare .
For example , “ General Orders No .
100 : Instructions for the Government of the Armies of the United States in the Field , ” issued by President Abraham Lincoln on April 24 , 1863 , represents the first modern codification of the laws of war @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and more acknowledged that the unarmed citizen is to be spared in person , property , and honor as much as the exigencies of war will admit , ” reads the 157-year-old code .
“ All wanton violence committed against persons in the invaded country , all destruction of property not commanded by the authorized officer , all robbery , all pillage or sacking , even after taking a place by main force , all rape , wounding , maiming , or killing of such inhabitants , are prohibited under the penalty of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as may seem adequate for the gravity of the offense.
” More recently , however , the United States has set the rules of the road when it comes to borderless assassination .
In asserting the right of the military and the CIA to use armed drones to kill people from Pakistan to Yemen , Somalia to Libya , through quasi-secret and opaque processes , while ignoring previous American norms against “ targeted killing , ” questions about national sovereignty , and existing international law , the U.S. has created a ready framework @ @ @ @ @ @ @ October 2019 , for example , Turkey ’ s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan hinted that he would assassinate Mazloum Kobani , the head of the Syrian Democratic Forces and a key U.S. ally in the fight against the Islamic State in Syria .
“ Some countries eliminate terrorists whom they consider as a threat to their national security , wherever they are , ” Erdogan said .
“ Therefore , this means those countries accept that Turkey has the same right.
” Historically , the United States has also pioneered the use of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ White House spokesperson would not address the question of whether President Trump was alluding to the use of nuclear weapons when he claimed that “ Afghanistan would be wiped off the face of the Earth , ” it ’ s notable that the United States is the only country to have used such weaponry in an actual war .
The first nuclear attack , the U.S. strike on Hiroshima , Japan , on August 6 , 1945 , left that city “ uniformly and extensively devastated , ” according to a study carried @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey .
“ The surprise , the collapse of many buildings , and the conflagration contributed to an unprecedented casualty rate.
” Between 60,000 and 80,000people were killed instantly .
The final death toll , including those who later perished from the long-term effects of radiation sickness , was estimated at 135,000 to 150,000 .
An atomic attack on Nagasaki , carried out three days later , was calculated to have killed another 50,000 to 75,000 people .
Just days before mentioning the possibility of annihilating tens of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Taliban to task for killing 12 people , including 10 Afghan civilians and one American soldier , in a car bombing while peace talks with the militant group were underway .
At the time , he tweeted : “ What kind of people would kill so many in order to seemingly strengthen their bargaining position ?
” Weeks later , he would clear three military service members of war crimes , one of them convicted of murdering two Afghan civilians , another charged with the murder of an Afghan man .
Amnesty @ @ @ @ @ @ @ president ’ s “ disregard toward the lives of civilians ” may have led to less precise American attacks in recent years .
“ We ’ ve seen a dramatic rise in civilian casualties from U.S. military operations since Trump took office , including in Afghanistan , ” she told TomDispatch .
An October report by the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan ( UNAMA ) , analyzing the war from July to the end of September 2019 , documented the highest number of civilian casualties it had recorded in a single quarter @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 2009 .
During the first nine months of last year , in fact , UNAMA tallied the deaths of 2,563 civilians and the wounding of 5,676 more — the majority by “ anti-government ” forces , including the Taliban and ISIS .
UNAMA found , however , that “ pro-government forces , ” including the U.S. military , killed 1,149 people and injured 1,199 others in that period , a 26 % increase from the corresponding timeframe in 2018 .
Of course , such numbers would be dwarfed were Donald Trump to decide @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the fashion he hinted at twice last year , even as peace talks with the Taliban were underway .
Johnny Walsh , a senior expert on Afghanistan at the United States Institute of Peace and a former lead adviser for the State Department on the Afghan peace process , chalked Trump ’ s purported plans up to a “ rhetorical flourish ” and doubts they actually exist .
“ I am not at all aware of any plan to escalate the conflict or use nuclear weapons , ” he told TomDispatch .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ , civilian casualties in Afghanistan continue to rise , prompting experts to call for additional scrutiny of U.S. military operations .
“ It ’ s tempting to dismiss some of the President ’ s more provocative statements , ” said Amnesty ’ s Daphne Eviatar , “ but we do need to take very seriously the exponential increase in civilian casualties from U.S. military operations since 2017 and ensure every one is thoroughly and independently investigated , and the results made public , so we can know if they ’ re the result @ @ @ @ @ @ @ practice.
” As 2020 begins , with America ’ s Afghan war in its 19th year and “ progress ” as nonexistent as ever , a beleaguered president continues to mull over just how to end America ’ s “ endless wars ” ( while seemingly expanding themfurther ) .
Under the circumstances , who knows what might happen in Afghanistan ?
Will 2020 be the year of peace or of Armageddon there — or will it simply bring more of the same ?
With a president for whom “ plans ” may @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of this and the fate of perhaps 20 million or more Afghans remain among the great “ unknown unknowns ” of our time .
To stay on top of important articles like these , sign up to receive the latest updates from TomDispatch.com here .

On February 4, 2002, a Predator drone circled over Afghanistan’s Paktia province, near the city of Khost. Below was al-Qaeda’s founder Osama bin Laden — or at least someone in the CIA thought so — and he was marked for death. As Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld put it later, both awkwardly and passively: “A decision was made to fire the Hellfire missile. It was fired.” That air-to-ground, laser-guided missile — designed to obliterate tanks, bunkers, helicopters, and people — did exactly what it was meant to do.
This piece originally appeared on TomDispatch.
As it happened, though (and not for the first time in its history either), the CIA got it wrong. It wasn’t Osama bin Laden on the receiving end of that strike, or a member of al-Qaeda, or even of the Taliban. The dead, local witnesses reported, were civilians out collecting scrap metal, ordinary people going about their daily work just as thousands of Americans had been doing at the World Trade Center only months earlier when terror struck from the skies.
In the years since, those Afghan scrap collectors have been joined by more than 157,000 war dead in that embattled land. That’s a heavy toll, but represents just a fraction of the body count from America’s post-9/11 wars. According to a study by the Costs of War Project of Brown University’s Watson Institute, as many as 801,000 people, combatants and noncombatants alike, have been killed in those conflicts. That’s a staggering number, the equivalent of the Rwandan genocide of 1994. But if President Donald Trump is to be believed, the United States has “plans” that could bury that grim count in staggering numbers of dead. The “method of war” he suggested employing could produce more than 20 times that number in a single country — an estimated 20 million or more Afghans, almost all of them civilians.
It’s a strange fact of our moment that President Trump has claimed to have “plans” (or “a method”) for annihilating millions of innocent people, possibly most of the population of Afghanistan. Yet those comments of his barely made the news, disappearing within days. Even for a president who threatened to unleash “fire and fury” on North Korea and usher in “the end” of Iran, hinting at the possibility of wiping out most of the civilian population of an ally represented something new.
After all, America’s commander-in-chief does have the authority, at his sole discretion, to order the launch of weapons from the vast U.S. nuclear arsenal. So it was no small thing last year when President Trump suggested that he might unleash a “method of war” that would kill at least 54% of the roughly 37 million inhabitants of Afghanistan.
And yet almost no one — in Washington or Kabul — wanted to touch such presidential comments. The White House, the Pentagon, and the State Department all demurred. So did the chief spokesman for Afghan President Ashraf Ghani. One high-ranking Afghan official apologized to me for being unable to respond honestly to President Trump’s comments. A current American official expressed worry that reacting to the president’s Afghan threats might provoke a presidential tweet storm against him and refused to comment on the record.
Experts, however, weren’t shy about weighing in on what such “plans,” if real and utilized, would actually mean. Employing such a method (to use the president’s term), they say, would constitute a war crime, a crime against humanity, and possibly a genocide.
A Trumpian crime against humanity
“Massive Soviet military forces have invaded the small, nonaligned sovereign nation of Afghanistan,” President Jimmy Carter announced on January 4, 1980. “Fifty thousand heavily armed Soviet troops have crossed the border and are now dispersed throughout Afghanistan, attempting to conquer the fiercely independent Muslim people of that country.” Nine years later, the Red Army would finally limp out of that land in the wake of a war that killed an estimated 90,000 Mujahideen fighters, 18,000 Afghan troops, and 14,500 Soviet soldiers. As has been the norm in conflicts since World War I, however, civilians suffered the heaviest toll. Around one million were estimated to have been killed.
In the 18-plus years since U.S. forces invaded that same country in October 2001, the death toll has been far lower. Around 7,300 U.S. military personnel, contractors, and allied foreign forces have died there, as have 64,000American-allied Afghans, 42,000 opposition fighters, and 43,000 civilians, according to the Costs of War Project. If President Trump is to be believed, however, this body count is low only due to American restraint.
“I have plans on Afghanistan that, if I wanted to win that war, Afghanistan would be wiped off the face of the Earth. It would be gone,” the president remarked prior to a July 2019 meeting with Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan. “If we wanted to fight a war in Afghanistan and win it, I could win that war in a week. I just don’t want to kill 10 million people.” In September, he ramped up the rhetoric — and the death toll — further. “We’ve been very effective in Afghanistan,” he said. “And if we wanted to do a certain method of war, we would win that very quickly, but many, many, really, tens of millions of people would be killed.”
If America’s commander-in-chief is to be believed, plans and methods are already in place for a mass killing whose death toll could, at a minimum, exceed those of the Holocaust, the Cambodian genocide, the Rwandan genocide, the Vietnam War, the Korean War, the Hundred Years' War, and the American Revolution combined — and all in a country where the Pentagon believes there are only 40,000 to 80,000 Taliban fighters and fewer than 2,000 Islamic State militants.
President Trump claims he’d prefer not to use such methods, but if he did, say experts, his Senate impeachment trial could theoretically be followed by a more consequential one in front of an international tribunal. “Of course, any ‘method of war’ that would kill ‘10 million people’ or ‘tens of millions’ of people in a country where the fighting force consists of 40,000 to 80,000 would be a blatant violation of the laws of war and would render President Trump a war criminal,” Daphne Eviatar, director of the Security with Human Rights program at Amnesty International USA, told TomDispatch.
Max Pensky, the co-director of the Institute for Genocide and Mass Atrocity Prevention at the State University of New York at Binghamton, agreed. “Carrying out such a plan would certainly be a war crime because of the context of the armed conflict in Afghanistan,” he said. “And it would absolutely be a crime against humanity.” He noted that it might also constitute a genocide depending on the intent behind it.
The United States has, of course, been a pioneer when it comes to both the conduct and the constraint of warfare. For example, “General Orders No. 100: Instructions for the Government of the Armies of the United States in the Field,” issued by President Abraham Lincoln on April 24, 1863, represents the first modern codification of the laws of war. “The principle has been more and more acknowledged that the unarmed citizen is to be spared in person, property, and honor as much as the exigencies of war will admit,” reads the 157-year-old code. “All wanton violence committed against persons in the invaded country, all destruction of property not commanded by the authorized officer, all robbery, all pillage or sacking, even after taking a place by main force, all rape, wounding, maiming, or killing of such inhabitants, are prohibited under the penalty of death, or such other severe punishment as may seem adequate for the gravity of the offense.”
More recently, however, the United States has set the rules of the road when it comes to borderless assassination. In asserting the right of the military and the CIA to use armed drones to kill people from Pakistan to Yemen, Somalia to Libya, through quasi-secret and opaque processes, while ignoring previous American norms against “targeted killing,” questions about national sovereignty, and existing international law, the U.S. has created a ready framework for other nations to mimic. In October 2019, for example, Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan hinted that he would assassinate Mazloum Kobani, the head of the Syrian Democratic Forces and a key U.S. ally in the fight against the Islamic State in Syria. “Some countries eliminate terrorists whom they consider as a threat to their national security, wherever they are,” Erdogan said. “Therefore, this means those countries accept that Turkey has the same right.”
Historically, the United States has also pioneered the use of weapons of mass destruction. While a White House spokesperson would not address the question of whether President Trump was alluding to the use of nuclear weapons when he claimed that “Afghanistan would be wiped off the face of the Earth,” it’s notable that the United States is the only country to have used such weaponry in an actual war.
The first nuclear attack, the U.S. strike on Hiroshima, Japan, on August 6, 1945, left that city “uniformly and extensively devastated,” according to a study carried out in the wake of the attacks by the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey. “The surprise, the collapse of many buildings, and the conflagration contributed to an unprecedented casualty rate.” Between 60,000 and 80,000people were killed instantly. The final death toll, including those who later perished from the long-term effects of radiation sickness, was estimated at 135,000 to 150,000. An atomic attack on Nagasaki, carried out three days later, was calculated to have killed another 50,000 to 75,000 people.
Theoretical war crimes and real civilian deaths
Just days before mentioning the possibility of annihilating tens of millions of Afghans, President Trump took the Taliban to task for killing 12 people, including 10 Afghan civilians and one American soldier, in a car bombing while peace talks with the militant group were underway. At the time, he tweeted: “What kind of people would kill so many in order to seemingly strengthen their bargaining position?” Weeks later, he would clear three military service members of war crimes, one of them convicted of murdering two Afghan civilians, another charged with the murder of an Afghan man.
Amnesty’s Daphne Eviatar believes that the president's “disregard toward the lives of civilians” may have led to less precise American attacks in recent years. “We've seen a dramatic rise in civilian casualties from U.S. military operations since Trump took office, including in Afghanistan,” she told TomDispatch.
An October report by the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA), analyzing the war from July to the end of September 2019, documented the highest number of civilian casualties it had recorded in a single quarter since it began systematically doing so in 2009. During the first nine months of last year, in fact, UNAMA tallied the deaths of 2,563 civilians and the wounding of 5,676 more — the majority by “anti-government” forces, including the Taliban and ISIS. UNAMA found, however, that “pro-government forces,” including the U.S. military, killed 1,149 people and injured 1,199 others in that period, a 26% increase from the corresponding timeframe in 2018.
Of course, such numbers would be dwarfed were Donald Trump to decide to “win” the Afghan War in the fashion he hinted at twice last year, even as peace talks with the Taliban were underway. Johnny Walsh, a senior expert on Afghanistan at the United States Institute of Peace and a former lead adviser for the State Department on the Afghan peace process, chalked Trump’s purported plans up to a “rhetorical flourish” and doubts they actually exist. “I am not at all aware of any plan to escalate the conflict or use nuclear weapons,” he told TomDispatch.
Whether or not such plans are real, civilian casualties in Afghanistan continue to rise, prompting experts to call for additional scrutiny of U.S. military operations. “It's tempting to dismiss some of the President's more provocative statements,” said Amnesty’s Daphne Eviatar, “but we do need to take very seriously the exponential increase in civilian casualties from U.S. military operations since 2017 and ensure every one is thoroughly and independently investigated, and the results made public, so we can know if they're the result of an unlawful Trump administration policy or practice.”
As 2020 begins, with America’s Afghan war in its 19th year and “progress” as nonexistent as ever, a beleaguered president continues to mull over just how to end America’s “endless wars” (while seemingly expanding themfurther). Under the circumstances, who knows what might happen in Afghanistan? Will 2020 be the year of peace or of Armageddon there — or will it simply bring more of the same? With a president for whom “plans” may be more figurative than literal, all of this and the fate of perhaps 20 million or more Afghans remain among the great “unknown unknowns” of our time.
To stay on top of important articles like these, sign up to receive the latest updates from TomDispatch.com here.


rawstory--2020-01-08--China urges restraint after Iran missile attacks

China on Wednesday urged restraint from all sides after Iran launched missiles at Iraqi bases housing US and British troops , saying Beijing would play a “ responsible role ” in helping to defuse tensions Iran fired more than a dozen ballistic missiles overnight at Iraqi bases housing coalition forces , the first act of the Islamic republic ’ s promised revenge for the US killing of top general Qasem Soleimani last week .
“ It is not in the interest of any party that the situation in the Middle East worsens further , ” foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ We call on the parties concerned to exercise restraint , ” he said .
Geng said China would “ play a responsible role in promoting a de-escalation of the situation as soon as possible ” .
China , a permanent member of the UN Security Council , is a key partner of Iran and a major buyer of the country ’ s oil .
“ China has always advocated that all parties concerned should properly resolve their conflicts and differences through dialogue , negotiation and other peaceful means , ” Geng said @ @ @ @ @ @ @ posted on Wednesday an announcement on China ’ s Twitter-like Weibo platform that “ the end of America ’ s evil influence in West Asia has begun ” .
The post was “ liked ” more than 380,000 times on Wednesday , with multiple commenters cheering Iran .
“ Support the people of Iran in attacking the world ’ s number-one terrorist !
” one user wrote .
Others called the people of Iran “ brothers , ” and some said they wished to donate money to Tehran .
Iran , China and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Indian Ocean and the Gulf of Oman in December and the Iranian foreign minister visited Beijing on New Year ’ s Eve .
China and Russia are also parties to the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran , from which Trump withdrew in May last year .
The deal is now unravelling , with Tehran announcing on Sunday that it would rollback the limit on the number of centrifuges used in uranium enrichment , one of its commitments under the agreement .


rawstory--2020-01-08--Iran’s supreme leader calls missile strikes on US forces a ‘slap in the face’

Iran ’ s supreme leader said a “ slap in the face ” was delivered to the United States , when the Islamic republic fired missiles at US troop bases in Iraq on Wednesday .
“ Last night , a slap in the face was delivered , ” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said in a speech broadcast live on state television .
His remarks came after he had vowed “ severe revenge ” for a US drone strike that killed Iranian military commander Qasem Soleimani near Baghdad international airport last week .
Shortly after midnight , Iran fired a series of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ troops , officials in Washington and Tehran said .
“ One important issue is what is our duty now ?
” following Soleimani ’ s assassination , said the supreme leader .
“ An important incident has happened .
The question of revenge is another issue , ” said Khamenei .
“ Military actions in this form are not sufficient for that issue , ” he said , referring to the assassination .
“ What is important is that America ’ s corrupt presence must come to an end in this region.
” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ most popular public figures .
He was laid to rest in his hometown early on Wednesday morning after massive funeral processions in several major cities of Iran .


rawstory--2020-01-08--Jared Kushner’s family saga: To understand Donald Trump’s son-in-law, you have to learn his family h

Jared Kushner’s family saga: To understand Donald Trump’s son-in-law, you have to learn his family history

In 1996 , an 83-year-old Holocaust survivor and refugee to America sat down with an interviewer from the USC Shoah Foundation to recount what she had experienced .
The woman , Rae Kushner , was part of the Holocaust remembrance movement .
“ If we ’ re not going to tell now , in 20 years I don ’ t know who ’ s going to be to tell , ” Rae Kushner said in her Yiddish-accented English .
“ And now we have still the strength and we have the power to do this and to warn the rest @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is coming up on top of your government.
” Rae ’ s grandson Jared is now one of the most powerful people in the U.S. government .
To understand him , you need to understand his family story — the subject of our new episode of “ Trump , Inc. ” Rae and her husband , Joe , had survived Nazi mass murders — including of their family members — beatings , near-starvation and hiding out in a forest through the brutal Polish winter .
After the war , they fled to Budapest @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Italy , sometimes on trains , sometimes on foot , sneaking around border guards until they made it to a refugee camp .
They were stuck there for almost four years .
No country would take in these stateless , penniless Jews .
Even after the Holocaust , U.S. immigration laws were pervasively anti-Semitic .
In 1948 , three years after World War II ended , only 847 Jews were resettled in the United States by aid groups .
In her 1996 interview , Rae Kushner was asked : “ What was your @ @ @ @ @ @ @ name and your married name are the same names ?
” Rae answered : “ Same name .
We are relatives.
” But her husband ’ s name hadn ’ t been Kushner .
He was born Yossel Berkowitz .
The two knew each other before the war and met up in Budapest while fleeing the Soviet Union .
As the Kushner family understood it , U.S. visa laws favored father-and-son relationships over connections by marriage .
So Yossel Berkowitz changed his name — to Joseph Kushner .
“ Because sons and fathers @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Yossel assumed his wife ’ s maiden name being that he travelled with his father in law , ” according to a self-published family history , “ Miracle of Life , ” written by his children .
Joe said he was the son of Naum Kushner , who was actually his wife Rae ’ s father .
The family also listed its country of origin not as Poland but as Germany , which was more favorable for immigration purposes .
These claims were recorded by aid workers in a 70-year-old case file maintained @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Society , which helped the Kushners book passage from Italy and resettle in America .
During his time in the administration , Jared Kushner has defended its restrictionist policy on refugees .
In an interview with Jonathan Swan of Axios on HBO , he said : “ You ’ ve got 65 million refugees in the world .
You can ’ t have all of them come into your country.
” When asked if he agreed with cutting levels so dramatically , Kushner said , “ It doesn ’ t make a difference @ @ @ @ @ @ @ does Kushner think about the White House ’ s refugee policy given his own family ’ s history ?
He did not answer our questions about that .