November 19, 2024 ❧ Trump appoints Dr. Oz to run Medicare, Ukraine strikes Russia with U.S. missiles, and huge NYPD salaries

Plus: Texas censors abortion websites, Bernie agrees with Trump on something, “woke sandwiches,” and World Anteater Day

For our younger readers: “Skibidi news outlet”

AROUND THE WORLD

❧ President Biden has authorized the Ukrainian military to strike even further within Russia using U.S.-supplied long-range missiles. As of Tuesday morning, officials in Moscow report their territory has been hit with at least six Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS) projectiles, which have a range of approximately 300 kilometers (or 190 miles). This is incredibly worrying, as Vladimir Putin said in September that the U.S. would officially be “at war” with Russia if these missiles were used, which could bring the whole world closer to nuclear annihilation. 

Also, notice how the U.S. can easily control what Ukraine does with the weapons we supply them? But when it comes to Israel, allegedly all Biden can do is say he’s “concerned” and watch the killing continue? Interesting, isn’t it? (BBC)

A screaming comes across the sky. It has happened before, but there is

nothing to compare it to now. (Image: Wikimedia Commons)

• Speaking of Israel, an editorial in the Jerusalem Post—written by a former Deputy Communications Director for Benjamin Netanyahu, no less—asserts that “Southern Lebanon is Actually Northern Israel” and uses Biblical references to argue that Israelis should settle it. This is an open endorsement of illegal conquest and colonization from one of Israel’s largest papers, and it really makes the recent article in the Atlantic calling settler colonialism a “false narrative” look silly.

• Saying they’ve been “oppressed and repressed by our own government,” which has failed to provide them basic necessities like clean drinking water, some of Canada’s Indigenous and First Nations communities are turning to China in the hopes of making energy trade deals to boost their economies. As you might expect, the Trudeau government isn’t very happy about that. (Financial Times)
  
  
• The newly-elected President of Botswana, Duma Boko of the left-leaning Umbrella for Democratic Change party, is on a roll. Earlier this month, he indicated that he wants to shut down U.S. military bases in Botswana, similar to what Niger did back in April. Now, he’s also announced plans to legalize undocumented immigrants from Zimbabwe, saying that “we need to have them come in properly, come in legally and be rewarded appropriately for the skills that they bring.” There’s also speculation in the Botswanan press that Boko, a former human rights lawyer, may soon abolish the country’s death penalty. (BBC)

MEANWHILE, THE BRITISH PRESS FOCUSES ON WHAT MATTERS: “WOKE SANDWICHES”

Along with avocados, which of course caused the 2008 financial crash, the Mail informs us that “olives and continental cheese” are woke now. Huh. (Headline: Daily Mail)

• China has unveiled a new $1.3 million “megaport” in Peru, which is expected to speed up shipping times between the two countries dramatically. The U.S. views it as a frightening expansion of China’s soft power into what Newsweek called “America's Backyard,” as if we should be in charge of how a country almost 4,000 miles away gets to run its economy.  
  
  
• A year after the military seized power, Gabon has a new constitution, which was overwhelmingly approved in a referendum held Saturday. Following the 41-year rule of President Ali Bongo Ondimba, the new constitution introduces term limits, prevents family members from succeeding one another, and abolishes the position of prime minister. (Associated Press)
  
  
• You’ve probably wondered, when all the humans die out, which creature will rise to take over the world? One Oxford scientist has the answer: Octopi. (The European)

AROUND THE STATES

• The New York Department of Labor is investigating the Chinese dance troupe Shen Yun for its alleged abuse and exploitation of minors. Run by the shady anticommunist religious organization Falun Gong, the shows primarily involve the performances of children and teenagers, who have allegedly been required to work from dawn to midnight for little or no pay, although the company reported $265 million in assets on its latest tax return. (New York Times)

It really can’t be overstated how weird this whole thing is.

(Image: Shen Yun Performing Arts)

• [CONTENT WARNING: SEXUAL HARASSMENT] Two cops in Missouri—David McKnight and Julian Alcala—have been indicted for allegedly pulling women over, searching their phones for nude pictures, and taking pictures of anything they found using their own phones. The Florissant Police Department says it’s “disgusted at this behavior,” but talk is cheap; there need to be real consequences here, not just a slap on the wrist. (Associated Press) 
  
  
• In other ludicrous cop news, the highest-paid officer in the NYPD raked in a staggering $403,515 this fiscal year. More than half of that total—$204,453.48, to be exact—came from overtime hours, which Lt. Quathisha Epps reportedly spent doing “administrative tasks.” She’s not the only cop pulling down six figures, either. Payroll records show that 392 different NYPD employees made more than $100K in overtime for the 2024 fiscal year, partly because they were so busy cracking down on pro-Palestine protests. That kind of money could really be better spent on things like healthcare and education, and it’s more clear than ever that the “defund the police” people back in 2020 had a point. (New York Post)

Lt. Epps, grinning lucratively in January. (Image: NYPD Guardians via Instagram)

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

“The worker who becomes a policeman in the service of the capitalist state is a bourgeois cop, not a worker.”  — Leon Trotsky

• Meanwhile, a Trump-appointed judge in Texas has blocked a change to the country’s overtime rules, which would have made millions of real workers eligible for overtime pay for the first time. (Houston Chronicle)
  
  
• Republicans in Texas have also introduced a sweeping “Women and Child Safety Act” that would create new felony offenses for “paying for or reimbursing abortion costs” and “destroying evidence of an abortion,” along with punishing any internet provider or social media network that doesn’t censor information about how to obtain abortions. The last provision is clearly a violation of the right to free speech, and this horrible law needs to meet forceful resistance from the people of Texas. (Reason)
  
  
• Commercial landlords are in trouble, as 10.35 percent of them are now delinquent on the loans for their office buildings—the highest rate since August 2012. Economists at Moody’s Ratings say “remote work and hybrid work” are causing demand for office space to sink, taking the landlords’ fortunes with it. (So in other words, aggressive “return to office” policies—which are terrible for immunocompromised people, among others—are partly a way to artificially prop up the real-estate industry and its profits.) (Fortune)
  
  
• Animal rights protesters crashed the GQ Men of the Year awards party to confront Pharrell Williams, who serves as the creative director for Louis Vuitton, over the brand’s use of fur and leather. It’s the second time they’ve done this recently, after previously bringing a “Pharrell: Stop Supporting Killing Animals for Fashion” banner to his biopic premiere in London. (The Root)

They're not happy, and they're not clapping along. (Image: Vegan FTA)

CROOKS vs. SICKOS (or, “what’s going on with our politicians and oligarchs?”)

❧ The Trump clown car rumbles ever forward. There are more cabinet picks. All of them are bad.

• For Secretary of Energy, Trump has appointed Chris Wright—the CEO of a fracking company called “Liberty Energy,” who declared in 2023 that “There is no climate crisis, and we’re not in the midst of an energy transition either.” Since the news broke, his company’s stock price has risen almost 5 percent, which kind of seems like a conflict of interest. 
  
  
• For the Federal Communications Commission, Trump plans to nominate Brendan Carr, the man who wrote the section on the FCC in Project 2025. He has called for social media companies to be blocked from banning content from their platforms unless it is illegal—in other words, turning every social media platform into sewers of unrestricted hate speech and false information like Elon Musk’s X. Carr has also threatened to revoke the broadcast licenses of Trump’s critics, including NBC, which he says violated the FCC’s “equal time” requirement by allowing Kamala Harris to appear on Saturday Night Live (In fact, they offered Trump a spot too, which he declined.) Trump has made no secret of his desire to prosecute journalists and shut down critical outlets in a second term, and Carr does not seem like he’d be opposed.
  
  
• For the Secretary of Veterans Affairs, Trump plans to nominate former Georgia congressman Doug Collins, who is not known for his extensive experience with veterans’ issues. During Trump’s first term, he signed the MISSION Act, which put more veterans’ healthcare into the hands of private companies, which charged more and delivered worse care. Biden reeled back the act somewhat, but Collins seems poised to put more veterans’ care in the hands of for-profit companies, close more facilities, fire more VA employees.
  
  
• Lastly, Trump has placed Dr. Mehmet Oz—an outright quack who has previously hawked “miracle” diets, Hydroxychloroquine, and all kinds of other medical misinformation to his TV audience—in charge of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. As Andrew Perez points out for The Lever, “Oz and his wife own up to $550,000 worth of stock in UnitedHealth Group and up to $50,000 in CVS Health, which owns Aetna,” so he has a vested interest in healthcare company profits, in direct conflict with the whole purpose of Medicare itself. 

Art by J. Longo from Current Affairs Magazine, Issue 41, March/April 2023

• Trump also clarified the frightening promise he will declare a national emergency and use the U.S. military on domestic soil to carry out his mass deportations of undocumented immigrants. He has also said that in cases where state governments refuse to cooperate, he will deploy the national guards of neighboring Republican states to round up immigrants. (The Guardian)
  
  
• Senator Bernie Sanders is bringing a package of Joint Resolutions of Disapproval to the floor of the Senate tomorrow, aiming to block another $20 billion in arms sales to Israel. There are separate resolutions for each kind of weapon, including tank rounds, fighter jets, mortar rounds, and precision aiming systems for bombs, all of which would be used to kill civilians in Gaza and Lebanon. It’ll be an uphill fight to restrict any of them—but Bernie has a track record here, having successfully passed a Joint Resolution against U.S. involvement in Saudi Arabia’s war on Yemen in 2018. Let’s hope he can pull it off again. (Middle East Eye) 
  
  
• Bernie also says he’d be willing to work with Trump if he actually keeps his campaign promise to cap credit card interest at 10 percent, which he calls a “very good idea.” (Newsweek)

Could these guys actually agree on something? 

• After years of calling him a “threat to democracy,” the hosts of MSNBC’s Morning Joe took a trip to Mar-a-Lago to congratulate Donald Trump on his re-election and have a “very positive” conversation about a “new approach” to political commentary, in which they’ll “not only talking about Donald Trump, but also talking with him.” (The Guardian)
  
  
• Possibly because of programs like Morning Joe—or, you know, just being wrong about everything in general—MSNBC’s ratings have dropped 51 percent post-election, with their shows now getting an average viewership of just 808,000 people. That’s less than a reasonably talented Minecraft YouTuber! (The Wrap)

• When the corrupt West Virginia coal baron Jim Justice was elected to the Senate, we thought there was at least one silver lining: that his English bulldog, Babydog, would get to hang out in the Senate and maybe even do something funny like poop on Ted Cruz’s shoes. Unfortunately, we cannot have even one nice thing. Justice was recently informed that only service dogs will be allowed in the chamber, meaning that poor Babydog is banned. (Axios)

For more on politicians who cynically use their pets to appear more likable than they

really are, check out this Current Affairs article on “puppaganda.”

HAPPY WORLD ANTEATER DAY!

In the calendar of animal celebrations, November 19 is our friend the anteater’s time to shine. Or rather, the anteaters, since there are several distinct kinds. The “Big Four” of the anteater world are the giant anteater, the northern and southern tamandua, and the silky anteater—but thanks to a 2017 analysis, some scientists now believe there are actually seven slightly different species of silky anteater.

(Image: Chattanooga Zoo.)

From the whole extended family, the giant anteater is the only one who lives mostly on the ground, as opposed to the various tamanduas and silkies who are tree-dwelling to some extent. From the name alone, you probably already know that they slurp up ants and termites at an incredible rate, eating as many as 30,000 in a single day. But did you also know that they use their own bushy tails as blankets when they get cold? 

(Image: ICAS Animal Conservation Institute via Twitter)

Don’t be fooled by their cute, fluffy appearance, though. Giant anteaters also have big, sharp claws they use to rip apart logs and find ants, and they will mess you up if they feel threatened. In Brazil, at least two human hunters have reportedly been killed by anteaters. Even jaguars know enough to keep their distance!

Image: Royal Zoological Society of Scotland

Writing and research by Stephen Prager and Alex Skopic. Editing and additional material by Nathan J. Robinson and Lily Sánchez. Header graphic by Cali Traina Blume. This news briefing is a product of Current Affairs Magazine. Subscribe to our gorgeous and informative print edition here, and our delightful podcast here.

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