2021-01-13: News Headlines

Karen Conner (2021-01-13). A Big Jump In Gas Prices Pushes Overall CPI Up 0.4 Percent In December. cepr.net (This is a compilation of Dean Baker's quick-take analysis over Twitter. Follow @DeanBaker13 on Twitter to get his quick-take analysis of government data immediately upon release.) The pandemic has led to a real flip in price trends. Rent, medical care, and education had been sectors with higher inflation. This is no longer the case; now food and cars …

Devin Cole (2021-01-13). Building an Inside-led prison abolition movement. workers.org On Jan. 5, Devin Cole spoke with Free Alabama Movement co-founder and freedom fighter Bennu Hannibal Ra Sun about the economic side of the ongoing 30-day Economic Blackout and Alabama prison strike in January, the growth of social media and prison abolition, and what it will take to build a . . . |

David Rovics (2021-01-13). Questions In the Wake of the Beer Belly Putsch. dissidentvoice.org After seeing some very strange, amnesiac discussion threads on social media, I have a few words to consign to the screen. Naturally, social media and the media media are all going nuts since the more or less successful far right siege of the Capitol. There are a variety of talking points that I've been hearing …

Rayhan Uddin (2021-01-12). Palestinian activist wins legal battle to have name removed from World-Check 'terror list'. middleeasteye.net Palestinian activist wins legal battle to have name removed from World-Check 'terror list' | Zaher Birawi receives damages from financial database after it 'wrongly and unjustly' linked him to terrorism | Tue, 01/12/2021 – 16: 30 | Zaher Birawi, the chairman of London-based Palestine advocacy group Europal Forum, won a legal battle against World-Check financial database (Twitter/screenshot) | A Palest…

Dr. Binoy Kampmark (2021-01-12). Twitter "Nukes Trump". Accuses POTUS of "Incitement of Violence" globalresearch.ca This was Twitter Safety's January 8

RT (2021-01-12). Facebook reinstates Press TV page with 4 million subscribers, hours after mysterious 'FINAL' deletion. rt.com Iranian news outlet PressTV has had its Facebook page restored after appealing the platform's decision to remove it. Boasting over four million followers, the page had been deleted without warning earlier on Tuesday. | The English-language outlet revealed its appeal to Facebook had been successful on Tuesday, just hours after the page had vanished without warning or explanation. | The platform had initially claimed the deletion was not only "final" but that it could not provide any more information than that the page had been removed for "safety and security reasons," Press TV reported earlier in the day. | Al…

RT (2021-01-12). Hook-up culture evolves but murder never changes? Revivals of Sex And The City, Sopranos spark debate about morphing social mores. rt.com News that fresh life will be given to The Sopranos and Sex and the City has been mostly met with cheers, but has also sparked a deep philosophical Twitter debate about which serial is a better fit for the current zeitgeist.

Juan Cole (2021-01-12). The armed Accelerationists are Coming: Neo-Nazis and Boogaloo Bois plan another Insurrection Jan. 20. juancole.com Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) — The far right militias, some of whom invaded the Capitol on 1/6, are now planning armed invasions of all 50 state capitols in advance of Jan. 20, according to the FBI, and are coming back for a second try at taking over the national Capitol. One reason Twitter kicked Trump, …

_____ (2021-01-12). Tehran Hits Back After Pompeo Makes Claims About Al Qaeda. popularresistance.org America's "declassifications" of information about Iran are "fictitious," Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has tweeted. It followed US State Secretary Mike Pompeo accusing Iran, without proof, of harboring Al-Qaeda's base. | "Mr. 'we lie, cheat, steal' is pathetically ending his disastrous career with more warmongering lies," Zarif wrote in a fiery message in the wake of Pompeo's statement, referring to the US State Secretary by his infamous 2019 quote. Zarif denounced the Iran "declassifications" and the claims Pompeo made about its links to Al-Qaeda, calling them "fictitious." He also condemned the US' dec…

_____ (2021-01-12). US Designates Cuba As A 'Sponsor Of Terrorism'. popularresistance.org The United States announced on Monday January 11 that it will designate Cuba as a state sponsor of terrorism. The move came hours after Secretary of State of the Trump administration, Mike Pompeo, announced that the Yemeni militant group Ansar Allah, commonly known as the Houthis, would be designated as a "foreign terrorist organization." The announcement has been met by widespread condemnation by authorities within Cuba and political leaders and movements worldwide. | Foreign minister Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla wrote on Twitter, "We condemn the hypocritical and cynical announcement by the US to designate Cuba as a…

The Global Research Team (2021-01-12). Global Research: The Silencing of Independent Media. We Need Your Help. globalresearch.ca We are currently facing an unprecedented threat to the independent media and freedom on the Internet. An increasing number of search engines & social media implement algorithms which are negatively biased against independent news and analysis websites such as Global …

Robert Inlakesh (2021-01-11). Millions Of Palestinian Refugees Suffer As UN Aid Is Collapsing. thelastamericanvagabond.com This Saturday, rumours began to spread amongst Palestinians on social media of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) cutting aid to 400,000 refugees living in the Gaza Strip. This coupled with the lack of funds available to the UN Agency have sparked anxiety that the situation in the illegally besieged Gaza Strip will

Nadda Osman (2021-01-11). Overwhelmed hospitals in Lebanon forced to treat Covid patients in cars. middleeasteye.net Overwhelmed hospitals in Lebanon forced to treat Covid patients in cars | The country has seen a surge in coronavirus in recent weeks, with many angry at the lax rules over Christmas | Mon, 01/11/2021 – 13: 41 | Patients in Beirut are treated in their cars, after a hospital ran out of beds (Screengrab/Facebook) | A video from Lebanon showing queues of patients waiting outside a hospital and being treated…

Editor (2021-01-11). Chris Hedges & Ramesh Srinivasan Debate Twitter & Facebook Banning Trump. scheerpost.com Twitter, Facebook and other social media companies have removed President Trump from their platforms, after years of debate about the disinformation he shared to millions of followers from his accounts. While many are applauding the bans, author Chris Hedges warns they could backfire on a new episode of DemocracyNow! "To allow these companies to essentially function as de facto platforms for… |

RT (2021-01-11). Ukrainian neo-Nazi 'thought leader' fired from prestigious Vienna fellowship as outcry over far-right links goes viral. rt.com A prominent ultranationalist activist has lost her role at a prestigious Austrian research institute after evidence arose linking her with a far-right Ukrainian group, known for extremism and antisemitism. | Olena Semenyaka, who has been called "The First Lady of Ukrainian Nationalism," was due to take up a Junior Visiting Fellowship at the Vienna-based Institute for Human Sciences (IWM) in January. | However, on Monday, the college told RT that the arrangement was now under review in response to allegations raised online. "The jury of the Ukraine in European Dialogue fellowship program has been requested by t…

Jonathan Cook (2021-01-11). Twitter's ban on Trump will only deepen the US tribal divide. dissidentvoice.org Anyone who believes locking President Donald Trump out of his social media accounts will serve as the first step on the path to healing the political divide in the United States is likely to be in for a bitter disappointment. The flaws in this reasoning need to be peeled away, like the layers of an …

Matthew Rozsa (2021-01-11). MAGA-approved social media platform Parler is taken down — but its demise may be short-lived. salon.com Hacked data from the (temporarily?) defunct site may help law enforcement identify perpetrators of the Capitol Riot…

commondreams (2021-01-11). Muslim Advocates Calls on Facebook's New Civil Rights VP to Ban Trump, Prioritize Anti-Muslim Hate. commondreams.org ______________________________…

David Rovics (2021-01-11). Questions n the Wake of the Beer Belly Putsch. counterpunch.org After seeing some very strange, amnesiac discussion threads on social media, I have a few words to consign to the screen. Naturally, social media and the media media are all going nuts since the more or less successful far right siege of the Capitol. There are a variety of talking points that I've been hearing