‘We Will Defend Democracy In Ecuador’ By Progressive International. November 30, 2020 ‘We Will Defend Democracy In Ecuador’2020-11-302020-11-30https://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2017/12/popres-shorter.pngPopularResistance.Orghttps://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2020/11/ecuador.png200px200px Above photo: Pedro Szekely. The Progressive International expresses grave concern for free and fair elections in Ecuador. We, members of the Progressive International, witness with great concern the deterioration of democracy in Latin America. In countries like Ecuador, Bolivia, Colombia, and Chile, popular movements have risen to express […]
Democracy
31 posts
‘The Envy of the World’: Still No Functioning Democracy Here By Paul Street, Counterpunch. November 12, 2020 ‘The Envy of the World’: Still No Functioning Democracy Here2020-11-122020-11-12https://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2017/12/popres-shorter.pngPopularResistance.Orghttps://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2020/11/street-e1605218867866.jpg200px200px Above photo: Derek Simeone – CC BY 2.0. Those who own the country ought to govern it. – John Jay You have owners. – George Carlin Nobody Said Biden’s Name I walked up to Chicago’s Trump Tower down the middle […]
The Supreme Court retains a strong but largely undeserved reputation as a protector of the liberties guaranteed by the Constitution. In fact, there is a long history of right-wing Supreme Court majorities serving as dead hands to enforce reactionary policies favored by political minorities who have lost electoral power, or even wars. Most notoriously, a right-wing court favored the South’s radical, pro-slavery positions before the Civil […]
How Ecuador’s Democracy Is Being Suffocated By Vijay Prashad and Pilar Troya, Counterpunch. October 1, 2020 How Ecuador’s Democracy Is Being Suffocated2020-10-012020-10-01https://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2017/12/popres-shorter.pngPopularResistance.Orghttps://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2020/10/ecuador1.png200px200px Above image: Coat of arms of Ecuador. A recent poll showed that if Andrés Arauz Galarza were allowed to run in Ecuador’s presidential election of 2021, he would win in the first round with 45.9 percent of the vote. The pollsters found that Arauz—who was the minister […]
The Battle For Democracy In Ecuador By Guillaume Long, Open Democracy. September 30, 2020 The Battle For Democracy In Ecuador2020-09-302020-09-30https://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2017/12/popres-shorter.pngPopularResistance.Orghttps://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2020/09/ecuador-1-e1601491477671.jpg200px200px Above photo: The outgoing President, Rafael Correa, right, received in the the Palace of Carondelet the president-elect Lenin Moreno for the official act of transition between the two governments in April 2017. Quito, Ecuador. Gabriela Mena / ACG/SIPA USA/PA Images. Political trials and electoral bans. Amidst political […]
Venezuela: Democracy Versus Blockade By Ángel Guerra Cabrera, Resumen English. September 29, 2020 Venezuela: Democracy Versus Blockade2020-09-292020-09-29https://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2017/12/popres-shorter.pngPopularResistance.Orghttps://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2020/09/vzelection-e1601392593267.jpg200px200px Above photo: Bill Hackwell. On December 6 there will be elections in Venezuela to elect all the deputies to the National Assembly (NA), an event of extraordinary political transcendence. But before going into that subject I will mention the elections that will be held in several Latin American countries in the […]
President Donald Trump isn’t a threat to American democracy on a metaphorical level. He’s a threat to the country’s entire political structure, literally, according to two academics who have studied American democracy throughout history and wrote a whole book on the topic. Dr. Robert C. Lieberman, Professor of Political Science at Johns Hopkins University and co-author of Four Threats: The Recurring Crises of American Democracy, joined […]
Illustration by Elizabeth Brockway/The Daily Beast On the one hand, Donald Trump isn’t saying anything he didn’t say in 2016—I’ll respect the results if I win, and so on. On the other, though, there is one thing that’s very different: He’s president now. He wasn’t then. And when a sitting president refuses to commit to the peaceful transfer of power, that’s a flag that’s as red […]
The poisoning incidents in Salisbury, England in 2018 with an unusual organophosphate compound designated A-234 gave rise to wide coverage of the story that a novel class of nerve agents named “Novichoks” had been discovered in the Soviet Union in the 1980s and that development of these agents as weapons had continued in Russia in violation of bilateral agreements with the US signed in 1989 and […]
Joe Biden didn’t mince words as Mitch McConnell and Donald Trump abuse and corrupt the Constitution in their rush to fill Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s seat on the Supreme Court. “The infection this president has unleashed on our democracy can be fatal. Enough. Enough. Enough.” He has since added that expanding the Court is a legitimate question. Biden sees McConnell’s desire for total unitary executive, judiciary […]
Remembering Kevin Zeese, Tireless Fighter For Our Democracy By Chip Gibbons, Rightsanddissent.org. September 9, 2020 Remembering Kevin Zeese, Tireless Fighter For Our Democracy2020-09-092020-09-09https://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2017/12/popres-shorter.pngPopularResistance.Orghttps://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2020/09/kzbbp-e1599685148211.jpg200px200px Above photo: Kevin Zeese speaks at an event at Busboys and Poets in Washington, DC. By Ellen Davidson. Defending Rights & Dissent was deeply saddened to learn of the passing of Kevin Zeese over the weekend. Over his life, he was on the frontlines of […]
The Wall Street Journal had reported in August that a senior executive of Facebook in India had intervened in the platform’s internal content review process to stop a ban on a legislator from the national ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), who had made religiously intolerant posts. Facebook, however, has denied the allegation. Reiterating that the international media had uncovered a brazen attack on India’s democracy and […]
Top German politicians have been venting their fury after Saturday’s massive anti-lockdown rally in Berlin ended with the surreal scenes of protesters trying to storm the Reichstag building – the seat of the national parliament. Many were baffled after footage showed one of the groups of protesters rallying against anti-coronavirus restrictions in the German capital breaking through police cordons with flags and banners and literally trying to take […]
Donald Trump’s acceptance speech Thursday night, a deranged Fidel Castro parody of maniacal gaslighting proportions, could not be mistaken for an American president’s. In his bizarro unreality, 180,000 dead and rising is public health. Divisive hate mongering is law and order. Historic unemployment and inequity is strength. Police brutality is a race war. Protests for civil rights are anarchy. Still he attempted to inject himself into […]
For Democracy And Transparency In The Plurinational State Of Bolivia By Progressive International. August 27, 2020 For Democracy And Transparency In The Plurinational State Of Bolivia2020-08-272020-08-27https://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2017/12/popres-shorter.pngPopularResistance.Orghttps://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2020/08/bolivia-protest.png200px200px Above photo: Protest in Bolivia. Corrado Scropetta. Members of the Progressive International call on the UN and the Supreme Electoral Tribunal to guarantee fair elections in Bolivia. We are witnessing the systematic destruction of democracy at the hands of the de […]
Barack Obama likes to talk about the bending arc of history. His own story is a testament to it. Not just the well-known biographical portions, but the political parts as well. In 2004, as an unknown state Senator from Illinois, he delivered the keynote address at the Democratic convention that is remembered for its lofty oratory and themes of unappreciated national unity. As president for eight […]
Former US president Barack Obama said the Trump administration had turned the presidency into a “reality show” in his speech to the Democratic convention, holding up Joe Biden as a panacea for all of the country’s troubles. Addressing the third night of his party’s national convention on Wednesday, the ex-POTUS took an uncharacteristically harsh tone on President Donald Trump, saying he hadn’t “grown into the job […]
…from Glenn Kirschner VT: Kirschner is a 30 year prosecutor and JAG who cuts through the political crap of the Senate’s highly redacted findings and applies real criminal law. [ Editor’s Note: This is a huge blow to Trump, as the report is from the Republican controlled Senate Intel Committee. Trump cannot puff this away with a Tweet. He can try to distract attention from it […]
…from southfront.org The protests in Belarus are continuing, now for over a week, following the elections won (the opposition says ‘no’) by President Alexander Lukashenko. The protesters are exploiting the general dissatisfaction with the government, and the direction the country has been going for a while, and then Lukashenko government has its obvious faults that have led to discontent brewing. At the same time, the Lukashenko […]
HONG KONG—July has been a month of constant struggle for this city in recent years, but especially since the protests last summer, which raised the stakes in the quest for universal suffrage. This year is even more chaotic: A third wave of COVID-19 infections has revived worries that Hong Kong, one of the densest cities in the world, may soon see an overwhelmed hospital system. Meanwhile, […]
– It was pure Barr: a proud, combative, unflappable and unapologetic partisan warrior in the loyal service of the White House. During the five-hour session on Capitol Hill in Washington this week, Barr made clear why he has been dubbed Donald Trump’s faithful protector and personal henchman. He defended using federal forces in US cities, denied giving Trump’s allies favorable treatment and demurred on issues such as foreign […]
Bolivia’s Struggle To Restore Democracy After OAS Instigated Coup By Frederick B. Mills, Rita Jill Clark-Gollub and Alina Duarte, COHA. July 12, 2020 Bolivia’s Struggle To Restore Democracy After OAS Instigated Coup2020-07-122020-07-12https://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2017/12/popres-shorter.pngPopularResistance.Orghttps://popularresistance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2020/07/bolivia-presidential-candidate-luis-arce-with-vice-presidential-candidate.jpg200px200px Above photo: Luis Arce, presidential candidate, and David Choquehuanca, running for the vice presidency. They lead all surveys so far MAS-IPSP, http://www.masipsp.bo/. On October 21, 2019, the Organization of American States (OAS) issued a fateful communique […]
‘In a speech last October, Mr Zuckerberg had controversially signalled that Facebook’s interests aligned with Donald Trump’s.’ Photograph: Erin Scott/Reuters Guardian: In every political debate since Facebook began to dominate democracy, the company has placed itself on the wrong side of history. The social media firm cannot be reformed from within because its business model profits from hosting bomb-throwing circuses of hate, humbug and hogwash. The platform harvests users’ […]
Miriam Amancay Colque, spokeswoman for the Bartolina Sisa Resistance movement, discussed the role of women and indigenous people in fighting the ongoing coup government as well as further updates on the crisis in Bolivia. Sputnik: How are grassroots movements like the Bartolina Sisa Resistance responding to the Campaign for Seven? Which actions will they take and how do they plan to confront the coup Bolivian government […]
It could lead to a severe prison overcrowding crisis the likes of which has never been experienced in UK history but the time for the introduction of a specific criminal offence of lying to the public is now long overdue. It would clip the wings of politicians who use telling lies as a campaign tool to win votes or defend the indefensible and who now think […]
A shorter work week would not only make for a better work/life balance it would also increase overall productivity and the ability of citizens to more meaningfully participate in democracy, says economics professor Richard D. Wolff. World leaders, labour representatives and even some high profile business figures, such as Google co-founder Larry Page and Virgin’s Richard Branson, have been calling for the adoption of a shorter […]
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is using self-described human rights legislation to put pressure on the Hong Kong government and threaten China’s sovereignty, Beijing has claimed. Pompeo is “blackmailing” the semi-autonomous city with the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act, a spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry’s Office of the Commissioner to Hong Kong said on Thursday. He added that China was not intimidated […]
Anti-Trump Republican Senator Mitt Romney of Utah ripped into President Trump Saturday for his firing of several inspectors general over the past few months, calling the moves “a threat to accountable democracy and a fissure in the constitutional balance of power.” File screen image. Romney’s attack comes a day after Trump fired Obama holdover State Department Inspector General Steve Linick. Since his acquittal in early February […]
A Democratic group has accused the Department of Homeland Security of violating federal regulations by revealing private information about immigrants to reporters at conservative news outlets. On Monday, Democracy Forward, a left-leaning anti-corruption advocacy group, sent a letter to the DHS Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties requesting that the agency open an investigation into the department’s press office. The organization said that according to […]
With US President Donald Trump preparing to square off with presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden in the 2020 race, Americans might as well be choosing between Orwell and Huxley, Pink Floyd co-founder Roger Waters told RT. Though the current US president is a “failed landlord” who somehow managed to become “the most powerful man in the western world,” Biden, his likely rival, does not present a […]
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán speaking last month in Parliament, when lawmakers granted him the power to rule indefinitely by decree. One aspect of the law ostensibly passed to cope with the coronavirus calls for prison terms of up to five years for those convicted of spreading falsehoods or distorted facts during the emergency. Tamas Kovacs/AP hide caption toggle caption Tamas Kovacs/AP Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor […]