Opinion

Right now, Congress is working on a giant, fast-track bill that would make historic cuts to basic needs programs to finance another round of tax breaks for the wealthy and big corporations.

As the Communications and Policy Director for the Rural Democracy Initiative, I’ve been hearing from rural leaders across the country about the devastating impacts this bill would have.

The good news is it’s not too late. But there’s little time to spare.

This dangerous, unpopular bill would increase costs for rural working families by thousands of dollars per year, leaving millions hungry and without health care — all to provide tax breaks and handouts to the wealthy and special interests.

Here are just six of the worst provisions.

1. It guts rural healthcare.

As the first African American woman and first public defender to sit on the United States Supreme Court, Ketanji Brown Jackson’s place in history is assured. Educated at public schools and the daughter of teachers, Jackson’s high school ambition was to graduate from law school and obtain a judicial appointment.

Like many African Americans, Jackson can document a history of slavery in her family. She also knows firsthand the sting of racism; after all, she was reared in the South and has been a Black woman in America for 54 years. Yet her immediate and extended family told her all her life that she was destined for greatness and above engaging with the prejudice that lingered even after the African American freedom movement of the 1960s. One incident during her childhood was especially distressing.    

Our esteemed Poet Laureate MIMI GERMAN opens the Green Grassroots Emergency Election Zoom with one of her great poems: “A Thousand Grains of Sand”.

We pay homage to BROOOCE SPRINGSTEEN and his stellar defense of democracy as well.

We follow with MAYOR HEIDE LAMBERT of Waldport, Oregon and her astonishing parallel fight for democracy.

In the wake of a meeting with Christie Brinkley and Alec Baldwin, the legendary KARL GROSSMAN tells us the Democrat Governor Kathy Hochul is now pushing nuke power in NY.

The great MYLA RESON fills us in on the latest lunacy from Arizona's Palo Verde nukes, which are owned in part by the city of Los Angeles.

Our co-convenor MIKE HERSH thanks Karl for helping to shut the Shoreham nuke on Long Island.

Legendary computer pioneer LEE FELSENSTEIN adds his contribution to encouraging organizers of upcoming mass rallies to distribute business cards with QR codes to special websites for further organizing.

Santa Monica solar pioneer PAUL NEWMAN updates us on Newsom’s attack on renewables, forcing AB942 through the legislature to impose new taxes and charges on rooftop PV panels.

BANGKOK, Thailand -- The loudest cheers of victory in the brief India-Pakistan war are congratulating the Pakistani pilots who flew Chinese-built jets firing impressive PL-15 missiles, purportedly enabling them to shoot down six of India's French and Russian warplanes.

China is sharing Pakistan's military success.

Since the mid-20th century China has been arming, investing in, and helping to construct Pakistan which is a crucial nation in Beijing's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and a non-NATO ally of the U.S.

Pakistan is China's only overland access to the Arabian Sea which opens onto the Indian Ocean and the Middle East's vital petroleum shipping lanes.

"The confirmed kill of a sixth Indian Air Force jet, a Mirage 2000 near Pampore on the night of May 6-7, once again demonstrates the superior combat performance of the Pakistan Air Force and the unwavering resolve of our armed forces to defend the motherland at any cost,” Pakistani Prime Minister Sharif said on May 16 while visiting a PAF base.

It has been an interesting few days with the United States renaming the Gulf of Mexico and Persian Gulf while also doubling down on spying directed against Greenland in expectations that it will be acquired as a US territory sometime soon. Meanwhile, some of us who have been watching developments in what has been described as Donald Trump’s “peace initiative” trip to the Middle East, which might also have included a stop in Istanbul to sit in with Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelensky, are now examining the pluses and minuses as the travel has ended. In my mind, high grades should be awarded for two aspects of the trip. The first one is what he did do, and that was speak sensibly and decently in his address to the Saudi, Emirates and Qatari leadership when he specifically rejected a hegemonistic “neocon” inspired approach to US foreign policy, saying that independent countries in the Middle East and elsewhere are perfectly capable of acting to develop their economies and societies in such a fashion as to prosper and provide fundamental liberties for their citizens.

Below we suggest three options for getting out of the Russia-Ukraine stalemate and in the process review briefly the relevant history. It’s time to up the ante. We write this exploration in the form of a hypothetical letter President Donald Trump might send to President Vladimir Putin.

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Dear Vladimir,
            Russia continues to resist entering into peace talks with Ukraine or even to consider a ceasefire and, instead, insists on continuing hostilities, aimed primarily at civilians. This was yet again evident from your absence at direct talks with President Zelensky (and me) in Istambul, Turkey, last Thursday (5/15/25), even though you yourself called for these face-to-face negotiations. This was also evident from your massive drone attack ahead of our today's (5/19/25) telephone call on ending the war.

Two years ago this month, the US State Department did the unthinkable. It has fired Devin Brooks, a security specialist who worked as an armed protection officer at the State Department. The reason? He grew a beard in compliance with his Islamic faith. His supervisors disregarded his Islamic beliefs and ordered him to shave. After he was left with no choice, he was forced to shave his beard. Subsequently, Brooks was fired. That is preposterous! Brooks then contacted the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) for help. CAIR sued the State Department on his behalf.