The Weekly Town Crier (09/25/20)
All the week’s news that’s fit to cry about (09/25/20).
We’ll Miss You:
Read “Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg dead at 87” at CNN.
Read “Robert Graetz, minister who helped organize Montgomery Bus Boycott, dies at 92” at Montgomery Advertiser.
Read “Juliette Gréco, French chanteuse, dies at 93” at Boing Boing.
Religion and Stuff:
Read “Prominent Southern Baptists are dropping ‘Southern’ name amid racial unrest” at Washington Post.
Read “Liberal congregations more politically active than conservative ones” at Religion News Service. “new study of 1,262 congregations across the United States shows it is liberal congregations, and particularly Black churches, that have become substantially more engaged in political activity compared to their conservative counterparts.”
Read “Critiquing the Church’s Beliefs about Sex and Gender (Aimee Byrd)” at Hebraic Thought.
Read “Pope Francis will take his Message on Climate Change to the UN General Assembly” at Open PR.
Read “Political Divides, Conspiracy Theories and Divergent News Sources Heading Into 2020 Election” at Journalism. “43% of Republicans identify fraud as a major problem with voting by mail versus 11% of Democrats. 41% of Republicans who have heard about QAnon say it's a good thing for the country, per new Pew poll.”
Read “Who is behind QAnon? The Reply All podcast investigates” at Boing Boing.
Read “ICE apprehension on church grounds violated federal policy, say faith leaders” at Religion News Service.
Read “Cult leader who claims to be reincarnation of Jesus arrested in Russia” at The Guardian. “Former traffic officer Sergei Torop, AKA Vissarion, arrested in special operation in Siberia.”
Read “The Black Church Is Atlanta’s Original Community Organizer” at Christianity Today.
Read “U.S. bishops urge immediate halt to federal executions” at American Magazine.
Read “AG Barr To Receive “Catholic” Award Hours After Authorizing Execution” at Catholic Mobilizing Newtork.
Read “‘That’s No Accident’: Robert Henderson Credits His Prayer for Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s Death” at Right Wing Watch.
Read “People who are highly spiritual tend to be more civic-minded” at Religion News Service.
Read “Pandemic Denial Sows Division and Endangers Others” at Christianity Today.
Read “Prominent evangelical church is the first to sue D.C. over covid-19 worship limits” at Washington Post. “The complaint filed by the 850-member Capitol Hill Baptist Church is the first legal challenge by a religious organization to the capital’s coronavirus restrictions. There have been two others in the region — one in Virginia and one in Maryland — since quarantine measures began, and final decisions are pending in both.”
Read “The Market Made Me Do It: The Scandal of the Evangelical College” at Mere Orthodoxy.
Read “How a Sean Feucht worship service convinced me I am no longer an evangelical” at Religion News Service. “I can no longer call myself an evangelical, because what defines a white evangelical in the United States has become a longing for an authoritarian state where Christianity is prioritized and privileged.”
Legal/Justice and Social Justice and Race or Gender or Sexism-Related Stuff:
Read “NBC News contributor Hugh Hewitt: “The lockdown ... is other than slavery the most numerous imposition on people's individual liberty” at Media Matters.
Read “McConnell Warns D.C. and Puerto Rico Statehood Part of Democrats' 'Radical' Agenda” at Newsweek.
Read “White Supremacists Are a Threat to Elections, Says the DHS” at The Nation. According to this report, right wing extremists have been encouraging followers to intentionally spread covid in minority neighborhoods and at political rallies.
Read “Nike jerseys commemorating four years since Kaepernick took a knee sold out in under a minute” at The Hill.
Read “What Is Critical Race Theory and Why Is Trump Afraid of It?” at The Nation. “His attacks are an attempt to reach those who repudiate the symbols and premises of white supremacy but worry that anti-racist advocacy can go “too far.”
Read “Whiteness as Property” at Harvard Law Review (originally from 1993).
Read “Satchuel Cole, leader in the fight for racial equality in Indianapolis, lied about own race” at Indy Star.
Read “Female graduates earn less than their male counterparts just one year after university - here's why” at The Telegraph.
Read “A racial slur remains in hundreds of place names throughout North America” at Public Radio International. “Clashes throughout North America about the racial slur "squaw" is starting to lead to place name changes.”
Read “The Top Contender for RBG’s Seat Has a Fundamentally Cruel Vision of the Law” at Slate. “Here’s what we can expect if Trump fills the late justice’s seat.”
Read ‘A Neighborhood’s Race Affects Home Values More Now Than in 1980” at Bloomberg.
Read “He fought wildfires while imprisoned. California reported him to Ice for deportation” at The Guardian. “Kao Saelee worked as an incarcerated firefighter in California. But when his release date came, the state partnered with ICE and transferred him to detention. He now faces deportation to Laos, a country his family fled when he was two years old.”
Read “Wells Fargo CEO ruffles feathers with comments about diverse talent” at Reuters. "[T]he unfortunate reality is that there is a very limited pool of black talent to recruit from." - Wells Fargo CEO Charles Scharf.
Read “Fight to protect Joshua trees faces stiff local opposition in California” at The Guardian.
Read “GOP will ask Supreme Court to limit mail voting in Pennsylvania in first post-RBG test” at The Hill.
Read “Almost half of NFL fans have changed their mind about Colin Kaepernick” at The Hill.
Read “Program to house homeless people in hotels is ending after falling short of goal” at Los Angeles Times.
Read “In North Carolina, Black Voters’ Mail-In Ballots Much More Likely to Be Rejected Than Those From Any Other Race” at Pro Publica.
Read “Biracial Couple Gets Lower House Appraisal With Black Family Member Present” at WBUR.
Read “The Secret History Of The Word 'Cracker' at NPR. “A 1783 pejorative - "crackers" specifies people who descended from convicts that were transported from Great Britain to Virginia at different times, and inherit so much profligacy from their ancestors, that they are ostracized.”
Read “Until Black Women Are Free, None of Us Will Be Free” at New Yorker.
Read “The Truth About ‘The Truth About’ Memes” at New York Times.
Read “Extremists Pose a Violent Threat, FBI and DHS Officials Say” at Wall Street Journal. “Christopher Wray, Ken Cuccinelli warned a Senate committee of white supremacists, anarchists and militia-style groups.”
This Week In Protest-Related News:
Read “Portland protests resume, demonstrators remain resolute in push for racial justice” at Oregon Public Media.
Read “DOJ Designates New York City as an “Anarchist Jurisdiction” at NBC New York.
Read “Trump's DOJ Threatens To Strip Funds From NYC And Other "Anarchist Cities," Prompting Cheers From NYPD Unions” at Gothamist.
Read “Tohono O'odham protest at border wall site ends in standoff, scuffle” at AZ Central.
Read “Luxury cars, MAGA flags and Facebook invites: How an unknown Idaho family organized the Portland rally that turned deadly’ at Washington Post.
Read “Video refutes trooper who denied unmasking protester” at Associated Press.
Read “The Problem With Militias and the Constitution” at U.S. News and World Report. “The presence of illegal militia groups at recent racial justice protests increases the chance of violence and has already proved deadly.”
Read “pro-Trump activists plotted violence ahead of Portland rallies” at The Guardian. “Patriots Coalition members suggested political assassinations and said ‘laws will be broken, people will get hurt’, leaked chats show.”
Read “Jailed Denver anti-racist leaders subjected to dangerous and degrading conditions in custody” at Liberation News.
Read “A fake protest led to armed resistance in Prescott” at AZ Central. “Posts spread on social media in the Prescott area, claiming buses of protesters were coming on Sept. 11. They claimed local police needed help. There was no protest planned, and the police didn't request help, but armed counterprotesters still turned out.”
Read “Suspect charged in connection to shooting of 2 Louisville officers” at 12 News.
This Week With The Police:
Read “Salt Lake City police officer charged after body cam video shows K9 ordered to bite suspect” at NBC News.
Read “Man in MCSO custody dies after being found unresponsive in Cave Creek substation” at AZ Central.
Read “Trooper who shot Dion Johnson will not face criminal charges, county attorney says” at AZ Central.
Read “NYPD Officer Spied on Tibetan New Yorkers for Chinese Government: Feds” at Daily Beast.
Read “Bodycam shows Salt Lake City police shooting 13-year-old boy with autism” at Salt Lake Tribune.
Read “Six Louisville cops under internal investigation for roles in fatal Breonna Taylor search” at Louisville Courier-Journal.
Read “Kentucky Grand Jury Indicts 1 Of 3 Officers Over Breonna Taylor Killing” at NPR.
Read “Q&A: Why was no one charged in Breonna Taylor's shooting?” at Los Angeles Times.
Read “Is Black Lives Matter Causing a Police Shortage?” at Slate. “Probably not.”
Read “Maricopa County Attorney Calls For Body Cameras For All Arizona Officers” at KJZZ.
Education and The Learnings // School Re-Openings
Read ‘This company says it's 'not a school' and has no teachers. But it gets millions meant for charter, private schools” at AZ Central.
Read "New Zealand Schools Have Been Advised to Use Students’ Preferred Names, Genders, and Pronouns” at Global Citizen.
Read “Trump lawyer Jay Sekulow and family hope 'Bald Beagle' will teach kids 'God and country' American history” at Religion News Service. “President Donald Trump believes American history is under attack. His lawyer — and his lawyer’s kids — want to do something about it. Enter Bald Beagle.”
Read “Telling the Truth About Slavery Is Not ‘Indoctrination’” at The Atlantic. “Our country is made better, not worse, by young people reckoning with the full legacy of the institution.”
Read “University of California wrongly admitted well-connected students, state auditor finds” at ABC 7.
Read “'Where Are the Kids?' School Is Back in Session, but Many Kindergarteners Are Missing” at Time.
Read “Jeff Bezos Announces The First Bezos Academy, A Free Preschool For Students From Low-Income Families” at Forbes.
Your Weekly Coronavirus Roundup:
Read “Fresh curbs in Europe as global coronavirus cases top 30m” at Al Jazeera.
Read “Police Haul Man Out of Library for Not Wearing Mask During Meeting About Wearing Masks” at Herman Cain’s website, saying: “It's time for the obsessive mask-wearing to wear off.” . (EDITOR’S NOTE: Herman Cain died of Coronavirus).
Read “Boris Johnson warns second coronavirus wave has arrived in the UK” at Daily Record.
Read “2-month-old dies from COVID-19 in Michigan: 'Children are not spared' at The Hill.
Read “Anti-maskers in Indonesia are being forced to dig graves for COVID-19 victims” at KXAN.
Read “Boris Johnson says self isolate or face £10,000 fine as tough new virus law imposed” at Daily Record.
Read “CNN's medical expert says 'source' told him '80-90%' of COVID deaths could have been saved by scrapped WH mask plan” at Fox News.
Read “Top US health official says coronavirus vaccine not likely until mid-2021: 'That's just a fact'“ at The Hill.
Read “Scotland Restricts People From Visiting Other People’s Homes” at Bloomberg.
Read “Jorma Kaukonen Honored By The State of New Jersey for Providing “Respite and Entertainment” Through COVID-19 Pandemic” at Jambands.
Read “Officiant At Superspreader Maine Wedding Is An Anti-Mask Evangelical” at Huff Post.
Read “Dr. William Schaffner: CDC's removal of virus transmission guidance 'very distressing'“ at MSNBC.
Read “Despite early, strict quarantine measures, Peru has worst COVID-19 death rate in the world” at Miami Herald.
Read “The media needs to do more to show real Americans' pain during the pandemic” at CNN. “29 million Americans are on unemployment aid, 5% of renters (8 million people) are behind on rent, and 1 in 10 families with kids didn't have enough to eat in August.”
Read “Why SF has the lowest COVID-19 death rate of any other major city” at SF Gate.
Read “Fauci testifies on coronavirus response” at CNN. “You’ve misconstrued that, senator, and you’ve done that repeatedly in the past.” Dr. Fauci pushes back against Sen. Rand Paul’s claims on the coronavirus.
Miscellany Cultural Items:
Read “Trump Administration to Ban TikTok App Downloads Starting Sunday” at Pitchfork.
Read “I Have Blood on My Hands”: A Whistleblower Says Facebook Ignored Global Political Manipulation” at Buzzfeed News. “I’ve found multiple blatant attempts by foreign national governments to abuse our platform on vast scales to mislead their own citizenry, and caused international news on multiple occasions. I have personally made decisions that affected national presidents without oversight, and taken action to enforce against so many prominent politicians globally that I’ve lost count.”
Read “Kanye West Calls Puma ‘Trash’ and Says He Is the ‘Head of Adidas’ on Twitter” at Footwear News.
Read “The West’s Wildfires Collide With its Housing” at Bloomberg. “Oregon was already short 155,000 homes before fires destroyed thousands more, including a huge share of one county’s most affordable options. Where do people go now?”
Read ‘Wired Magazine: Amazon Takes Down Controversial Job Postings” at KJZZ. “Amazon recently removed job postings for Phoenix that went viral with descriptions that included "collecting information about labor organizing threats against the company."
Read “Facebook says it may quit Europe over ban on sharing data with US” at The Guardian.
Read “California to Ban Sales of New Gas-Powered Cars Starting in 2035” at at Wall Street Journal.
Read “Nikola founder Trevor Milton forfeits $166 million in stock he would have lost anyway and gets to keep $3.1 billion under separation deal” at CNBC. “Electric truck company Nikola is under investigation by the Justice Dept and SEC for fraud. Two-thirds of its value was wiped out in the scandal. The company has sold 0 trucks. The founder just resigned with $3.1 billion exit package.”
Read “If You Live in Illinois, Facebook Probably Owes You $400” at Vice.
Read “Harley-Davidson to exit world's biggest bike market” at BBC.
Internationalities:
Read “Erdogan willing to meet Greek PM over east Med tensions” at Al Jazeera.
Politics And Sucheries:
Read “He arrived in NC with big donations, but the money traces to a business with QAnon link” at News Observer. “Four voter support groups suspect someone tried to infiltrate their operations as part of an undercover campaign to discredit them.”
Read “Democratic senator calls for eliminating filibuster, expanding Supreme Court if GOP fills vacancy” at The Hill.
Read Court-packing, Democrats’ nuclear option for the Supreme Court, explained” at Vox.
Read “51 percent of voters want to abolish the electoral college” at The Hill.
Read “Arnold Schwarzenegger Offers Grants to Reopen Polling Places” at Variety.
Read “What The SCOTUS Vacancy Means for Abortion — And The 2020 Election” at NPR.
Read “Democrats Prepare New Coronavirus Aid Proposal” at Wall Street Journal.
Read “Mary Trump sues President Trump, family members over fraud allegations” at The Hill.
Read “Democrats prepare bill limiting U.S. Supreme Court justice terms to 18 years” at Reuters.
This Week In Political Corruption:
Read “U.S. Admits That Congressman Offered Pardon to Assange If He Covered Up Russia Links” at Daily Beast. “Republican congressman Dana Rohrabacher offered Assange the deal in 2017, a year after the emails that damaged Hillary Clinton had been published.”
Read “Federal Prosecutors Have Steve Bannon’s Murky Nonprofit in Their Sights” at Pro Publica. “Tucked at the bottom of the long indictment against Bannon, prosecutors say they want to seize the assets of his nonprofit Citizens of the American Republic, shedding more light on the secretive political group’s finances.”
Watch: “The Daily Show Hilariously Cut Together Clips of Trump Doing Exactly the Things He Accuses Biden of Doing” at Second Nexus.
Read “Virginians wait up to four hours to cast early voting ballots” at The Hill.
Read “What GOP Leaders Said About Merrick Garland Back In 2016” at Huff Post.
Read “Lindsey Graham, Chuck Grassley, and Susan Collins Have Said They Won’t Vote For SCOTUS Nominee During An Election” at Politics USA.
Read “Lindsey Graham Goes Back on His Word, Vows to Vote for Ginsburg Replacement Before Election” at Slate.
Read “Sen. Lisa Murkowski Reiterates Opposition To Confirmation Vote Before The Election” at NPR.
Read “Democrats say 2016 should be the standard for high court nominees in election year” at NBC News. ““They made a new precedent," Hillary Clinton said Sunday about Senate Republicans, "and that new precedent, which they all defended incredibly passionately, is to wait for the next president.”
Read “Most Americans think winner of election should pick next Supreme Court justice” at The Hill.
Read “McConnell locks down key GOP votes in Supreme Court fight” (EDITOR’S NOTE: Why is this a “fight” if we’re all just trying to do the right thing?).
Read “DeJoy Didn't Bother to Check Whether His Policies Would Kneecap the USPS” at Vice. “USPS collected the data they needed to know running trucks on time would destroy service, but they didn't look at it.”
Read “ICE Hysterectomy Doctor Wasn’t Even a Board-Certified OB-GYN” at Daily Beast.
Read “Trump, Orbán, and Putin Are Forming an Authoritarian Alliance” at The Intelligencer.
Read ‘The Pentagon funneled nearly $1,000,000,000 of taxpayer money meant for masks and medical equipment to defense contractors building jet engines and body armor” at Washington Post.
Read “DHS awarded $6 million in contracts to firm where Acting Secretary Wolf's wife is executive” at NBC News.
Read “Texas Republicans sue to stop Gov. Greg Abbott's extension of early voting period during the pandemic” at Texas Tribune.
Read “Trump's threat: 'Get rid of the ballots' — 'there won't be a transfer, frankly, there will be a continuation'“ at Boing Boing.
Read “Judge orders Eric Trump to sit for NY Attorney General deposition before the election” at NBC News. “Eric Trump had tried to delay answering questions in the A.G.'s Trump Organization investigation.”
Read “Mary Trump: Take It Seriously That Trump May Not Hand Over Power” at Huff Post. “How far is he willing to go to remain in office if he loses? “Farther than you can possibly imagine,” warned the president’s niece.”
Music-Related News and Such:
Read “How South Africa’s Blue Notes Helped Invent European Free Jazz” at Bandcamp.
Read “Three Years After Tom Petty’s Death, His Dream Project Finally Emerges” at Rolling Stone.
Browse “A Beginner’s Guide To The Interstellar Music of Sun Ra” at Treble.
Read “Final Recordings of the Tragically Hip’s Gord Downie Set for New Album” at Pitchfork. “Listen to a pair of songs from Away Is Mine, a double album featuring tracks recorded months before he died.”
Browse (if you must) Rolling Stone’s picks for “The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.”
Read “Sun Ra: ‘I’m Everything and Nothing’” at New York Review of Books.
Read “Punks Unite in Trailer for Rock Against Racism Doc ‘White Riot’” at Rolling Stone. “British punks unite in the trailer for Rock Against Racism documentary 'White Riot,' a new film chronicling the movement against racist rhetoric in the U.K. in the late Seventies.”
Read “Channeling alienation into a cosmic passion project” at Xtra. “John Shepherd dreamed of contacting aliens through music he beamed into space.”
Read “We’ve Got A File On You: Thurston Moore” at Stereogum. “The Sonic Youth legend on Bernie Sanders, black metal, Steve Albini, 'Gilmore Girls,' & more.”
Read “Michael Kiwanuka Wins Hyundai Mercury Prize 2020” at Clash.
Read “‘Wonderwall’ at 25: How Oasis’ Unlikely Ballad Became One of the Last Rock Standards” at Rolling Stone. “A quarter-century ago, the British band broke into America with an uncharacteristically sensitive hit. The song remains shockingly popular — even if the guy who wrote it isn’t really a fan.”
Watch “From The Edge of America :: Lonnie Holley and Richard Swift” at Aquarium Drunkard.
Read “Terms Of Service” at NCart. “Cory Rayborn had an unlikely bonus task to complete in the midst of his law school orientation, in the summer of 2000: package and ship the debut release from his fledgling record label, Three Lobed.”
Watch “Kraftwerk’s “The Robots” Performed by German First Graders in Adorable Cardboard Robot Outfits” at Open Culture.
Movies/TV/Video Games/Etc.:
Read “See All the Winners of the 2020 Emmys” at Time.
Read “Microsoft buys Bethesda, publisher of Skyrim, Doom, and Fallout, for $7.5 billion” at AV Club.
Read “‘Family Guy,’ ‘Bob’s Burgers’ Score Two-Season Renewals at Fox” at Variety.
Read “Some monster is tweeting out the entire Shrek 2 script, one line at a time” at AV Club.
Read “Dan Levy On Schitt’s Creek’s Fulsome, Splendrous Emmys Night” at Vulture.
Books/Reading/Authors
Read “We're Booked: Join NPR At This Year's Virtual National Book Festival” at NPR.
Design/Artsy Things:
See “Type lovers, over 30,000 old cigarette boxes.”
Science/Animals/Technology/Environment/Etc.:
Read “Scientists Race Against Time To Save Coral Off Florida Keys” at WBUR.
Read “The Internet Archive Will Digitize & Preserve Millions of Academic Articles with Its New Database, "Internet Archive Scholar" at Open Culture.
Food Cultures:
Read “Minnesota’s ‘Root Beer Lady’ Lived Alone in a Million-Acre Wilderness” at Gastro Obscura. “The “loneliest woman in America” brewed root beer for thousands of visitors.”
Local:
Read “Ducey signs law adding 2 justices to Arizona Supreme Court” at Tucson.com.
Read “Everything you need to know before voting on Proposition 207 in Arizona” at 12 News.
Read “Live events workers marched with empty road cases to a rally in Tempe to save jobs” at AZ Central.