mikedunnauthor - Network

The number of autocracies (91) has just surpassed the number of democracies (88) for the first time, and the U.S. could soon be one of them,...

The number of autocracies (91) has just surpassed the number of democracies (88) for the first time, and the U.S. could soon be one of them, according to the Varieties of Democracy project, from the University of Gothenberg. Sweden.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/trump-democracy-report-1.7486317?utm_source=firefox-newtab-en-us

#democracy #trump #MAGA #freespeech #deportation #immigration #prison #autocracy #dictatorship

Even the ultra-mainstream press think Musk is a...

Even the ultra-mainstream press think Musk is a disaster

https://www.newsweek.com/poor-performing-probationary-employee-elon-musk-must-go-opinion-2046116

#musk #doge #fascism

If you "saw" something-NO, you...

If you "saw" something-NO, you didn't.

https://www.reviewjournal.com/crime/several-vehicle-set-on-fire-at-tesla-in-las-vegas-police-say-3322726/

#musk #tesla #arson #vandalism #sabotage #MAGA

Today in Labor History March 19, 1933: Nazis arrested Jewish antifascist photographer Gerda Taro and interrogated her about a supposed...

Today in Labor History March 19, 1933: Nazis arrested Jewish antifascist photographer Gerda Taro and interrogated her about a supposed communist plot to overthrow Hitler. She had previously been arrested for distributing anti-fascist literature. The Nazis eventually let her go and she fled to France, and then Yugoslavia. She died at the age of 26, photo-documenting the Spanish Republican war against Franco and the fascists. Some said that she was responsible, along with Robert Capa, of inventing the genre of war photography. Capa was actually the nom de guerre of Taro’s lover, Endre Friedmann, a Hungarian Jew who taught her the art of photography and who later went on to found Magnum Photos, along with French photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson. “Capa” was Friedmann’s street name, back in Hungary. It meant “shark.”

#workingclass #LaborHistory #worldwartwo #hitler #nazi #holocaust #antisemitism #antifascism #antifa #fascism #photography #photojournalism #journalism #gerdataro #robertcapa

Today in Labor History March 19, 1742: Tupac Amaru was born. Tupac Amaru II had led a large Andean uprising against the Spanish. As a...

Today in Labor History March 19, 1742: Tupac Amaru was born. Tupac Amaru II had led a large Andean uprising against the Spanish. As a result, he became a mythical figure in the Peruvian struggle for independence and in the indigenous rights movement. The Tupamaros revolutionary movement in Uruguay (1960s-1970s) took their name from him. As did the Túpac Amaru Revolutionary guerrilla group, in Peru, and the Venezuelan Marxist political party Tupamaro. American rapper, Tupac Amaru Shakur, was also named after him. Chilean poet, Pablo Neruda, wrote a poem called “Tupac Amaru (1781).” And Clive Cussler’s book, “Inca Gold,” has a villain who claims to be descended from the revolutionary leader.

#workingclass #LaborHistory #indigenous #inca #tupac #conquest #colonialism #uprising #Revolutionary #PabloNeruda #poetry #novel #tupacamaru #peru #fiction #books #author #writer #poetry @bookstadon

Today in Labor History March 19, 1935: Harlem Uprising occurred, during the Great Depression, after rumors circulated that a black Puerto...

Today in Labor History March 19, 1935: Harlem Uprising occurred, during the Great Depression, after rumors circulated that a black Puerto Rican teenage shoplifter was beaten by employees at an S. H. Kress "five and dime" store, and then killed by the police. Protests were quickly organized by the Young Liberators and the Young Communist League, which were promptly declared illegal by the police. Participants smashed windows of the store and began looting. The protest and looting spread, causing $200 million in damages. Police arrested 125 people and killed 3. Mayor LaGuardia set up a multi-racial Commission to investigate the causes of the riot, headed by African-American sociologist E. Franklin Frazier and with members including labor leader A. Philip Randolph. The identified "injustices of discrimination in employment, the aggressions of the police, and the racial segregation" as conditions which led to the outbreak of rioting, and congratulated the Communist organizations as deserving "more credit than any other element in Harlem for preventing a physical conflict between whites and blacks".

#workingclass #LaborHistory #harlem #Riot #greatdepression #racism #police #policebrutality #poverty #segregation #BlackMastadon

Only 56% of Americans understand that raw milk is risky, or why. And this isn't just about bird flu. They don't realize there's...

Only 56% of Americans understand that raw milk is risky, or why. And this isn't just about bird flu. They don't realize there's an increased risk of salmonella, E. Coli, listeria and other kinds of potentially deadly food borne illness. And 32% believe that pasteurization is an unnecessary intrusion of government into our lives.

And a new preprint paper coming out of Cornel university suggests that aging raw milk Cheeses may not inactivate H5N1.

https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/avian-influenza-bird-flu/u-penn-survey-shows-only-56-americans-understand-drinking-raw-milk-risky

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.03.13.643009v1.full.pdf

#publichealth #birdflu #H5N1 #foodsafety #rawmilk #cheese

A Short History of Measles and Vaccine HesitancyThe graphs accompanying this article show that vaccination rates have risen over the last...

A Short History of Measles and Vaccine Hesitancy

The graphs accompanying this article show that vaccination rates have risen over the last ten years in California, while declining in most of the rest of the country. The California increase in vax rates correlates with the aftermath of the 2014 Disneyland Measles Outbreak, which caused over 300 measles infections, mostly in Southern California and Canada, and overwhelmingly among unvaccinated individuals. It also sparked debate on vaccine hesitancy and led to California Senate Bill 277, which revoked the “personal belief” exemption, thus tightening the rules around vaccination requirements for K12 public school children by eliminating nonmedical exemptions.

SB 277 was co-authored by Senators Richard Pan (who was a physician) and Ben Allen. At the time, some California public schools had vaccination rates below 60%, even though a 95% rate is required for Community Immunity (herd immunity) for many diseases, including measles. Though the bill was supported by the California Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the PTA and California Children’s Hospital Association, there was loud and aggressive opposition by a tiny number of anti-vax activists, who tried (but failed) to get Pan recalled. They also called him a Nazi and made death threats against both him and Allen.

It takes a serious level of fear and anger to want to kill someone. So, what was driving this fear and anger?

A major factor is the false belief that vaccines cause autism. For new parents, autism can be a terrifying diagnosis. So, if there is any evidence that something specifically is causing autism, it makes perfect sense to try and avoid it. And if parents believed that the state was imposing an autism-causing drug on their children, it is not hard to see why they’d associate the law-makers with Nazis, and the drug with Zyklon B. To a rational, educated person who understands that the risks associated with vaccines are actually miniscule compared with the risks associated with the diseases they protect against, this kind of thinking by anti-vaxxers probably seems absurd, or ignorant. However, it’s not just an issue of education versus ignorance. Consider that Marin County, California, one of the nation’s most affluent and highly educated communities, once had one of the lowest vaccination rates in the state.

One reason people have associated vaccines with autism stems from the common mistake of conflating causation with correlation. Autism is often diagnosed in children around the age of two, which is around the same age that many childhood vaccinations are given. Many parents of autistic children got their diagnoses within a year or so of their children’s vaccinations and they made the assumption that the two were connected when, in actuality, it was a coincidence. Dozens of peer-reviewed studies have confirmed that there is no increased risk of autism due to vaccinations.

The belief that vaccines caused autism really took off in the late 1990s. After British physician Andrew Wakefield published his fraudulent 1998 Lancet article, falsely showing a link between the MMR (Measle, Mumps, Rubella) vaccine and autism, there was a sharp decline in vaccination uptake. However, other researchers were unable to replicate Wakefield’s results (something that should be easy to do if the study was valid). Additionally, journalist Brian Deer discovered that Wakefield had a significant conflict of interest because he stood to earn up to $43 million per year selling test kits. And the British General Medical Council (GMC) later found that Wakefield was guilty of mistreating developmentally delayed children.

When Wakefield’s study was discovered to be fraudulent, Lancet retracted his paper and the GMC revoked his medical license. In 2004, he moved to the U.S., where he continued to push his bogus anti-vaccination claims, directing the pseudoscience propaganda film “Vaxed.” Robert De Niro, whose son is on the autism spectrum, removed the film from the Tribeca Film Festival. However, proponents of the vaccines-cause-autism hypothesis, including U.S. Health & Human Services boss Robert F. Kennedy Jr., continue to push this lie. For a while, they tried to blame thimerosal, a mercury-containing preservative that was used in vaccines since the 1930s. However, in 1999, thimerosal was pulled from vaccines as a precautionary measure. And, guess what: autism rates continued to climb anyway.

Today’s measles outbreak is currently close to 300 cases, primarily in Texas and New Mexico, but with cases spreading to Oklahoma and other states. And nearly every one of those cases is in an unvaccinated patient. There have also been two deaths, one in Texas and one in New Mexico. However, in the U.S., measles mortality is general around 1-2 deaths per 1,000 cases. Because measles, unlike Covid and Influenza, does not mutate rapidly, this is unlikely due to the evolution of a more virulent strain. Rather, the nearly 300 documented cases today are likely a gross undercount. The actual number may be closer to 500 or even 1,000. And we may not even be at the peak yet, particularly considering how low the vaccination rates currently are.

Back in 2015, when the California’s vaccination rates were lower, and its legislature was considering SB 277, one of the public faces of the debate was a 6-year-old Marin County boy with leukemia, named Rhett Krawitt. His parents argued that it was not safe for him to attend school with unvaccinated children, since he was immune-compromised and at increased risk of contracting a deadly disease from them. At the time, 20% of Marin’s students had opted out of the required vaccinations. Rhett, himself, spoke to the school board, as well as the state legislature, contributing to Marin County’s shift from being one of the lowest vaccinated counties in California, to one of the highest.

#vaccination #measles #mmr #publichealth #antivax #texas #california #marin #rfkjr #ableism #disability

Today in Labor History March 18, 1968: The staff of San Francisco's "progressive" rock station KMPX-FM walked out on strike...

Today in Labor History March 18, 1968: The staff of San Francisco's "progressive" rock station KMPX-FM walked out on strike citing a lack of control over programming & "hassles over the whole long-hair riff." Performers like the Rolling Stones, Joan Baez, the Jefferson Airplane and the Grateful Dead requested the station not play their music as long as the station was run by strikebreakers.

#workingclass #LaborHistory #strike #rollingstones #JoanBaez #gratefuldead #JeffersonAirplane #sanfrancisco #kmpx #radio

Today in Labor History March 18, 1970: The first mass work stoppage in the 195-year history of the U.S. Postal Service began on this date in...

Today in Labor History March 18, 1970: The first mass work stoppage in the 195-year history of the U.S. Postal Service began on this date in New York City. The walkout was illegal, giving President Richard Nixon the excuse to send in federal troops to sort the mail. But the strike succeeded in forcing Congress to raise wages and reorganize the postal system and marked a new militancy among postal employees.

#LaborHistory #workingclass #postal #union #strike #nixon #congress #wages #newyork #wages

Today in Labor History March 18, 1918: U.S. authorities arrested Mexican anarchist Ricardo Flores Magón under the Espionage Act. They...

Today in Labor History March 18, 1918: U.S. authorities arrested Mexican anarchist Ricardo Flores Magón under the Espionage Act. They charged him with hindering the American war effort and imprisoned him at Leavenworth, where he died under highly suspicious circumstances. The authorities claimed he died of a "heart attack," but Chicano inmates rioted after his death and killed the prison guard who they believed executed him. Magon published the periodical “Regeneracion” with his brother Jesus, and with Licenciado Antonio Horcasitas. The Magonostas later led a revolution in Baja California during the Mexican Revolution. Many American members of the IWW participated. During the uprising, they conquered and held Tijuana for several days. Lowell Blaisdell writes about it in his now hard to find book, “The Desert Revolution,” (1962). Dos Passos references in his “USA Trilogy.”

#literary #historicalfiction #workingclass #LaborHistory #RicardoFloresMagon #magon #magonistas #mexico #mexican #Revolution #chicano #prison #Riot #books #author #writer @bookstadon

Today in Labor History March 18, 1871: The Paris Commune began on this date. It started with resistance to occupying German troops and the...

Today in Labor History March 18, 1871: The Paris Commune began on this date. It started with resistance to occupying German troops and the power of the bourgeoisie. They governed from a feminist and anarcho-communist perspective, abolishing rent and child labor, and giving workers the right to take over workplaces abandoned by the owners. The revolutionaries took control of Paris and held on to it for two months, until it was brutally suppressed. During Semaine Sanglante, the nationalist forces slaughtered 15,000-20,000 Communards. Hundreds more were tried and executed or deported. Many of the more radical communards were followers of Aguste Blanqui. Élisée Reclus was another leader in the commune. Many women participated, like Louise Michel and Joséphine Marchais, including in the armed insurrection. Nathalie Lemel, a socialist bookbinder, and Élisabeth Dmitrieff, a young Russian exile, created the Women's Union for the Defence of Paris and Care of the Wounded, demanding gender and wage equality.

Read my complete biograph of Louise Michel here: https://michaeldunnauthor.com/2024/04/20/louise-michel/

#workingclass #LaborHistory #paris #commune #anarchism #communism #execution #massacre #feminism #ChildLabor #Revolution #wageequality #socialism #agusteblanqui #ÉliséeReclus #womenshistorymonth #louisemichel

Trump just deported >200 to El Salvador, even after a judge ordered him to stop.This, after disappearing Mahmoud Khalil, a legal...

Trump just deported >200 to El Salvador, even after a judge ordered him to stop.

This, after disappearing Mahmoud Khalil, a legal resident, for exercising his right to free speech.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vixkLiOKEgE

#dictator #fascism #marmoudkhalil #freespeech #trump #deportation #immigration #authoritarian

Today in Labor History March 17, 1942: The Nazis gassed the first Jews from the Lvov Ghetto at the Belzec death camp. The city was 50%...

Today in Labor History March 17, 1942: The Nazis gassed the first Jews from the Lvov Ghetto at the Belzec death camp. The city was 50% Polish, 32% Jewish and 16% Ukrainian and then part of Nazi-occupied Poland. In July, 1941, the ultranationalist Ukrainian People's Militia launched a pogrom on the city’s Jews. In 1943, the Nazis decided to murder all the remaining Jews of the Ghetto, many of whom fought back with Molotov cocktails. The city is now part of Ukraine.

#workingdlass #LaborHistory #holocaust #genocide #antisemitism #nazis #ukraine #molotov #poland