Articles by M

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If You Don’t Own any Bitcoin, Read This
Adam Taggart | Peak Prosperity – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

8 Dec 2017 – Wow. Just….wow. Bitcoin’s price has gone ‘beyond exponential’ this week. Just yesterday, as I started working on this article, it shot up 22% — from $14,000 to $17,000 (hitting an intraday high of over $19,000).

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We Saved Net Neutrality Once. We Can Do It Again
Frances Moore Lappé and Adam Eichen - YES! Magazine, 18 Dec 2017

12 Dec 2017 – Democracy lives or dies on the quality of public conversation. Just a few years ago, powerful grassroots pressure rose up to protect a free and open internet.

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Beastly – The Root of All Cruelty?
Paul Bloom – The New Yorker, 18 Dec 2017

Perpetrators of violence, we’re told, dehumanize their victims. The truth is worse.

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Palestine: Towards a Freedom from Funding
Walid Salem – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

October 2017 – Thirty years ago I wrote a study about funding, suggesting that Palestine should not accept any funding that is not directed to the development of our economic productivity. The study called for the development of self reliance and for the rejection of any international funding that will be conducted in coordination with the Israeli Civil Administration. I feel that my 1987 message is still generally valid.

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International Migrants Day: 18 December
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

Today, there are some 232 million persons who reside and work outside their country of birth. The reasons for migration are diverse − most often economic, but also refugees from armed conflicts and oppression, and increasingly what are called “ecological refugees” − persons who leave their home area due to changing environmental conditions: drought, floods, rising sea levels etc. Global warming is very likely to increase the number of these ecological refugees.

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The Farewell Sermon of Prophet Muhammad
Moin Qazi – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

15 Dec 2017 – The farewell sermon of Prophet Muhammad is one of the most important charters of human rights and symbolizes the inclusive character of Islam. It has great relevance in present times for both Muslims and the humanity at large.

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The State of the Empire in the Age of Trumpism
Diane Perlman, Ph.D. – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

“I hate the US Empire, but I love the US Republic.” For years I have been hearing this mantra from Johan Galtung my dear friend, mentor and colleague. As events unfold, it takes on new meaning.

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Children of Stones
Uri Avnery – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

16 Dec 2017 – For god’s sake, are they crazy? They congregate in the marketplace, boys of 15, 16 years, take stones and throw them at our soldiers, who are armed to the teeth. The soldiers shoot, sometimes over their heads, sometimes straight at them. Every day there are wounded, every few days there are dead. What for? They do not have the slightest chance of changing the policy of the Israeli occupation. Only very rarely do the boys hit a soldier and cause him a slight injury. Yet they go on. Why?

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It Wasn’t the Threat That Worked, It Was Reduction of Fear
Kristin Y. Christman – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

U.S. policymakers don’t trust North Korea. But on what basis can North Korea trust the U.S.? What agreement with North Korea has the U.S. ever not violated? … Whichever agreement is under discussion, the same behavior is seen: the U.S. never sees its own violations as wrong.

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An Advent Calendar to Beat the Devil
Edward Curtin – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

The deeper problems connected with advertising come less from the unscrupulousness of our ‘deceivers’ than from our pleasure in being deceived, less from the desire to seduce than from the desire to be seduced. The Graphic revolution has produced new categories of experience. They are no longer simply classifiable by the old common sense tests of true or false. At no time is this more evident than in the months leading up to Christmas and the holidays.

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Titles
Dietrich Fischer – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

Someone who farms is a farmer.

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Red Cross Says Life Has Stopped in Myanmar’s Rakhine
Stephanie Nebehay | Reuters – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

13 Dec 2017 – Life has stopped in its tracks in Myanmar’s northern Rakhine state where an estimated 180,000 Rohingya remain, the International Committee of the Red Cross said today. “You get a sense of the two main communities being deeply scared of each other. What surprised me is the fact that not only the Muslim communities are scared, but that the others are actually scared as well.”

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UN High Commissioner for Human Rights on the situation of the Rohingya Muslim population in Myanmar
Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein | OHCHR – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

5 Dec 2017 – By continuing to dehumanise the Rohingya, the state authorities could fuel even wider levels of violence in the future – drawing in communities from across the region, eventually forcing a confessional confrontation, and destroying whatever it is they may once have hoped for their country. We cannot afford to hear that historical and tragic refrain, one more time, that no one knew it would turn out to be like this — what a lie that would be. I urge the Council to take the appropriate action to stop this madness now.

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Is This Genocide?
Nicholas Kristof - The New York Times, 18 Dec 2017

15 Dec 1017 — “Ethnic cleansing” and even “genocide” are antiseptic and abstract terms. What they mean in the flesh is a soldier grabbing a crying baby girl named Suhaifa by the leg and flinging her into a bonfire. Or troops locking a 15-year-old girl in a hut and setting it on fire. Survivors describe Myanmar soldiers killing men, raping women and burning babies in a Rohingya village.

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ICAN Statement on Nobel Peace Prize 2017
International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, Nobel Peace Laureate – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

6 Oct 2017 – The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons is a coalition of non-governmental organizations in one hundred countries. By harnessing the power of the people, we have worked to bring an end to the most destructive weapon ever created – the only weapon that poses an existential threat to all humanity.

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Rohingyas Are Survivors, Not Security Threat
Maung Zarni | Prothom Alo – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

13 Dec 2017 – Can you imagine BBC, Chatham House, Rand Corporation portraying as potential “Jewish terrorists” the survivors of Auschwitz-Birkenau, Ravensbruick, Dachau and other world infamous death and labour camps? Of course not! But that is precisely what is now happening to the survivors of my Buddhist country’s genocide, whose name even the entire Catholic Church in Myanmar, and by extension, Pope Francis, have dared not pronounce.

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God’s Oppressed Children
Pankaj Mishra | New York Review of Books – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

Many Indian houses still have a simple pit toilet, which consists of a large hole in the floor. The feces are collected at night by manual scavengers who carry away human shit and whose tools are nothing but a small broom and a tin plate. Most are women. One out of six Indians is a Dalit, untouchable, but for years I neither witnessed nor imagined the life of one, although almost every week small columns in the newspapers reported the murder, rape, and torture of them.

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Income of World’s Top .001% Skyrockets by 636%: Report
teleSUR – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

The report, which highlights the growing gulf between haves and have-nots, was compiled by five economists, including scholars Emmanuel Saez and Thomas Piketty.

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Put Out the Fire Before It Is Too Late
Dietrich Fischer – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

There was a man called Nicolas who was happy in life except for one thing: he and a neighbor distrusted each other. One day, his chicken strayed into the neighbor’s garden.

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Banality of Riches
Pawel Kuczynski – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

World of Illusion

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How Portuguese Migrants in Angola Navigate Corruption
Lisa Åkesson and Camilla Orjuela – The Conversation, 18 Dec 2017

13 Dec 2017 – There are always envelopes. And you have to know the people who are responsible for the procurement. Then when you win the contract you share the profit with them. The Angolans only accept companies that give bribes. Other companies will not enter. The Portuguese we spoke to felt that it was morally acceptable to engage in corrupt practices to protect their business interests.

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(Français) Amérique latine : des pouvoirs et des luttes
Bernard Duterme | CETRI Centre Tricontinental – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

Décembre 2017 – Entre paix et violence, tournant à gauche puis à droite, les reconfigurations à l’œuvre en Amérique latine détonnent. Contention, répression, dilution… les luttes « progressistes » n’en ont pas fini pour autant de hanter le continent des inégalités extrêmes. Face à la poussée « extractiviste », la protestation ne s’est pas unifiée : appels à la redistribution des bénéfices d’un côté, au respect de l’environnement et des territoires de l’autre.

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Palestine: It Is Time for a New Beginning
Ramzy Baroud | Politics for the People – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

13 Dec 2017 – Now that the American mask has completely fallen, Palestinians require an urgent rethink in their own political priorities, alliances and national liberation strategy. Business should not go on as usual after Trump accepted Israel’s definition of Jerusalem as its capital.

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Recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s Capital
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

15 Dec 2017 – Critics, including myself, regard the initiative as a slap at the Palestinians and a confirmation of Trump’s disregard of international law and morality, and the authority of the UN. The status of Jerusalem is a focal point for the tension between the old geopolitics of hard power realism and the normative geopolitics of soft power new realism.

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U.S.A: FCC Repeals ‘Net Neutrality’ Rules for Internet Providers
Alina Selyukh | NPR – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

14 Dec 2017 – U.S. telecom regulators have voted to repeal net neutrality rules, which restrict the power of Internet service providers to influence loading speeds for specific websites or apps. Net neutrality: It’s a principle that Internet providers should be neutral gateways that provide equal access to all legal web content.

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Bitcoin, Blockchain, and Local Currencies
Tad Montgomery | Resilience – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

14 Dec 2017 -The world is on fire lately with the exponential growth of Bitcoin and other electronic cryptocurrencies. While some see these as speculative bubbles that are tied to nothing, used on the dark web to ransom hacked computers, and profligate users of electricity, others see Bitcoin and its ilk as our liberation from nation states and their central banks. Both could be true.

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Dirty Vaccines: New Study Reveals Prevalence of Contaminants
Celeste McGovern | Children’s Medical Safety Research Institute – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

Every Human Vaccine Tested Was Contaminated by Unsafe Levels of Metals and Debris Linked to Cancer and Autoimmune Disease, New Study Reports

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Temples for Spirituality, Harmony and Joy
Dr Ravi P Bhatia – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

18 Dec 2017 – As is well known India has diversities of virtually all types. As for religions, we have followers of all major world religions — Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism and smaller faiths such as Sikhism, Jainism, Judaism, Arya Samaj, Baha’i. Other faiths such as Brahmo Samaj, Dev Samaj, along with their specific deities, rituals and holy books are also present in different regions of the country.

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(Português) Investigação revela a crueldade extrema da indústria da carne de cordeiro
ANDA Agência de Notícias de Direitos Animais – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

12 Dez 2017 – Os ativistas da Animal Equality investigaram um dos cerca de 200 matadouros no país que têm autorização para matar animais sem realizar o atordoamento, uma prática cruel infligida todos os anos contra centenas de milhares de seres inocentes.

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The Rohingya Crisis Shames the Global Community
Tej Parik – Asia Times, 18 Dec 2017

11 Dec 2017 – The international response to the Rohingya crisis has been high on emotion but depressingly low on action regarding the Myanmar military latest “clearance operations” against the Muslim minority – pillaging villages, burning crops, and shooting civilians on sight. Without reform and rethinking how we react, we’re only doomed to keep repeating the same cycle: condemnation, anger, calls for action, insufficient action, and, then, shame.

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An Incomplete Timeline of What We Tried: Working Back from Human Extinction
Debbie Urbanski | Vice – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

Human extinction.
The coordinated release of various strains of a human sterilization virus.
The no-child laws.
The launching of the Colony into space, no final destination in mind, for those able to afford the journey…

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Rwanda’s Agricultural Revolution Is Not the Success It Claims to Be
Margot Leegwater, et al. – The Conversation, 18 Dec 2017

13 Dec 2017 – This article combines the findings of nine academic researchers who conducted in-depth research on the impact of Rwanda’s policies. The research found that Rwanda’s land and agricultural policies diminished land-tenure security, excluded vulnerable groups from taking part in the agricultural programs and caused food insecurity for many small-scale farmers. This challenges the Rwandan government’s position, which portrays the agricultural sector reforms as hugely successful, and claims that these have resulted in poverty reduction and increased agricultural productivity.

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US House Passes Resolution ‘Condemning Ethnic Cleansing of Rohingya’
Katherine Gypson – Voice of America, 18 Dec 2017

6 Dec 2017 – The U.S. House of Representatives condemned the “ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya” today, passing a resolution (423-3) “calling for an end to the attacks” against the Muslim minority in Myanmar, also known as Burma.

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Ave Maria (Music Video of the Week)
Daniel Taylor & Les Petits Chanteurs Du Mont-Royal – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

A Virtuoso Performs a Classic

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The Case against Iraqing Iran
David Swanson | World Beyond War – MintPress News, 18 Dec 2017

Planning war and funding war creates its own momentum. Sanctions become, as with Iraq, a stepping stone to war. Cutting off diplomacy leaves few options open. Electoral pissing contests take us all where most of us did not want to be.

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Rohingya Crisis Is ‘Very Deliberate Genocide’, Former UN General Romeo Dallaire Says
Dominic Waghorn – Sky News, 18 Dec 2017

The former commander of UN peacekeeping forces in Rwanda says the “will to intervene” on the Rohingya crisis is missing. A world authority on genocide, he said what is happening to Myanmar’s Rohingya Muslims is undoubtedly genocide and the international community must intervene to prevent it.

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Corporate Media Allowed Net Neutrality to Die in Silence
Pam Vogel | Media Matters for America – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

15 Dec 2017 – The flagship morning news shows on broadcast and cable news covered net neutrality for less than four minutes combined.

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(Português) Mary Midgley: “Os animais são muito mais sutis e complicados do que pensávamos”
David Arioch | Jornalismo Cultural – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

Segundo a filósofa britânica, um problema comum por parte de muitos cientistas é que eles ignoram a complexidade psicológica e motivacional que também faz parte dos animais.

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Russia-gate’s Litany of Corrections
Robert Parry – Consortium News, 18 Dec 2017

As much as the U.S. mainstream media insists that the Russia-gate scandal is growing, what is undeniably growing is the list of major corrections that news outlets have been forced to issue.

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This Week in History
Satoshi Ashikaga – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

Dec 18-24, 2017 ~ QUOTE OF THE WEEK: “ No matter how devastating our struggles, disappointments, and troubles are, they are only temporary. No matter what happens to you, no matter the depth of tragedy or pain you face, no matter how death stalks you and your loved ones, the Resurrection promises you a future of immeasurable good.” – Josh McDowell

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Libya: European Governments Complicit in Horrific Abuse of Refugees and Migrants
Amnesty International – TRANSCEND Media Service, 18 Dec 2017

12 Dec 2017 – European governments are knowingly complicit in the torture and abuse of tens of thousands of refugees and migrants detained by Libyan immigration authorities in appalling conditions in Libya, said Amnesty International in a report published today, in the wake of global outrage over the sale of migrants in Libya.

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(Português) Seminário – Rumo a um Mundo Livre de Armas Nucleares: Desafios e Perspectivas
Embaixador Sergio Duarte – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

Intervenção de Abertura, Ministério das Relações Exteriores, Brasília 7-8 Dez 2017 – Uma visão ampla sobre três principais temas:
• a contribuição do Tratado de Tlatelolco e da ABACC para a segurança da América Latina e do mundo em geral;
• as perspectivas para a Conferência de Exame do Tratado de Não Proliferação de Armas Nucleares, em 2020;
• e o impacto da recente adoção do Tratado de Proibição de Armas Nucleares.

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Ludwig van Beethoven (17 Dec 1770 – 26 Mar1827)
Biography – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

Ludwig van Beethoven was a deaf German composer and the predominant musical figure in the transitional period between the Classical and Romantic eras. He was baptized on Dec 17, 1770 in Bonn, Holy Roman Empire. He was an innovator, widening the scope of sonata, symphony, concerto and quartet, and combining vocals and instruments in a new way. His personal life was marked by a struggle against deafness, and some of his most important works were composed during the last 10 years of his life, when he was quite unable to hear.

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Towards a World without Nuclear Weapons: Challenges and Perspectives
Ambassador Sergio Duarte – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

8 Dec 2017 – I was asked to provide a bird’s eye view of the three main topics of this Seminar, namely the contribution of the Treaty of Tlatelolco and ABACC to the security of Latin America and the world, the prospects for the 2020 Review Conference of the Treaty on the Non-proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, and the impact of the recent adoption of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.

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(Français) La résolution 2250 du Conseil de Sécurité sur «La jeunesse et la paix»
Christophe Barbey - TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

La résolution 2250 du Conseil de Sécurité sur « La jeunesse et la paix » Présentation générale et vision future – Genève et Flendruz, novembre 2017

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Amy Biehl
Prof. Dietrich Fischer – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

Amy Biehl was a young Princeton graduate who went to Capetown, South Africa, in 1992 as a volunteer to work with an NGO to help overcome apartheid.

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A Religion Called Economy
Michele Migliorino | Countercurrents – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

4 Dec 2017 – You can see how the Economy Religion destroys everything: forest, seas, living species, ourselves and our infinite cultures existing over the whole planet. By now, realism would tell us that it is time to throw the Economy GOd into the wastebasket history and try to create a society which won’t imply such a despicable waste of energy and resources.

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Violence against Women: Why the UN Secretary-General Got It Wrong
Robert J. Burrowes, Ph.D. – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

6 Dec 2017 – In his remarks on the recent International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women UN Secretary-General António Guterres inadvertently demonstrated why well-meaning efforts being undertaken globally to reduce violence against women fail to make any progress in addressing this pervasive crisis.

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Europe Responds: ‘If the law allows this, we need to change the law.’
Cecile S. Gallego – International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, 11 Dec 2017

28 Nov 2017 – A European Parliament committee has grilled Paradise Papers reporters as members grapple with how to claw back millions being lost to new, elaborate tax-reducing maneuvers.

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Progress toward Nuclear Weapons Abolition
David Krieger – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation was founded in early 1980s on the belief that peace is an imperative of the Nuclear Age, that nuclear weapons must be abolished, and that the people of the world must lead their leaders to achieve these goals. As a founder of the organization, and as its president since its founding, it now seems an appropriate time to look back and reflect on the changes that have occurred over the past 35 years.

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Conservation Goal for the Amazon Exceeded: More than 60 Million Hectares Protected
World Wildlife Fund | EcoWatch – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

1 Dec 2017 – The World Wildlife Fund announced today that the Program for Protected Areas of the Amazon, a joint venture with the Brazilian Ministry of the Environment, has reached the goal of protecting at least 60 million hectares. This effort represents the conservation of 15 percent of the biome’s territory in Brazil.

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10 December: Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights – Eleanor Roosevelt, World Citizen
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

8 Dec 2017 – It was Eleanor Roosevelt who helped to craft and then championed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights whose anniversary we celebrate on 10 December.

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Modern Life Styles – Symbols of Consumerism, Self-centeredness and Isolation
Dr Ravi P Bhatia – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

The world today is a complex amalgam of violence, conflicts on one side and consumerism and rich lifestyles of a section of people on the other. It is also a modern world of social media, internet, mobile phones and consumerist ideologies promoted in newspapers and television.

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Johan Galtung’s Acceptance Speech of the People’s Nobel in Sweden
Johan Galtung – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

2 Dec 2017 – The People’s Peace Prize According to Nobel’s Will
Celebration-Seminar-Banquet, Orust Peace Movement at Svanvik, Sweden

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Palestinians Recognize Texas as Part of Mexico
Alex Huntley | The Beaverton – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

6 Dec 2017 – In response to Donald Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as the Israeli capital, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has announced that he will recognize Texas as a state of Mexico, since it was violently annexed by the United States in the 1840s. He says that this is a new approach to Mexican-US relations, and hopes it will help ease the tension between the two countries over security and immigration.

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The Doomsday Machine in Donald Trump’s Hands
Amy Goodman and Denis Moynihan – Democracy NOW!, 11 Dec 2017

Now at 86 years old, Ellsberg is revealing for the first time that the Pentagon Papers were not the first classified documents that he removed from his secure workplace. In his new book, The Doomsday Machine: Confessions of a Nuclear War Planner, he details his early years at the Pentagon, and why he took thousands of pages of U.S. nuclear war plans describing the lunacy of the U.S. nuclear war policy over 55 years ago. What he discovered is frighteningly relevant today.

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Symbolic Relocation of United Nations HQ to Jerusalem Vicinity
Anthony Judge | Laetus in Praesens – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

11 Dec 2017 – The recently elected President of the United States of America, Donald Trump, has made the historic decision to move the US Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem. This highly controversial initiative offers an unprecedented opportunity to reframe the Middle East peace process and the highly problematic relations between Israel and Palestine, originally engendered by the United Nations in envisaging its own administration of Jerusalem as a corpus separatum.

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After Trump’s Jerusalem Move, Media Worry about ‘Violence’–Not Violation of International Law
Adam Johnson and Nima Shirazi | FAIR-Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting - TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

8 Dec 2017 – The frame that dominated headlines as news of Trump’s announcement broke was not on the meaning of the move but on potential vague “fears of violence” from Palestinians and Muslims throughout the Middle East. This is often the case when it comes to Israel/Palestine: Media focus is on the reaction to injustice, not on the injustice itself. The illegality of Israel’s occupation of East Jerusalem is rarely mentioned.

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Plunder Capitalism
Paul Craig Roberts – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

4 Dec 2917 – What we are witnessing is the complete looting of America and the entirety of the West. While the Western World collapses, the insouciant, submissive people sit there sucking their thumbs while they are being ruined. Nothing is left of the West except looters at work. This tax bill is an abomination, an act of brutal plunder. Its sponsors should be tarred and feathered and ridden out of town on a rail, if not hung from a lamp post.

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A Message from Johan Galtung to the TRANSCEND Network
Sebastian Eck | Galtung Institut – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

A New Year’s Message

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From Barak to Trump
Uri Avnery | Gush Shalom – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

9 Dec 2017 – The latest decisions of Trump concerning Jerusalem are – to put it mildly – idiotic. Arabs are furious, Israelis don’t really care, America’s Arab stooges, princes and all, are deeply worried. If disturbances erupt, they may well be swept away. Jerusalem is holy to three world religions, and one cannot argue with holiness.

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Trump White House Weighing Plans for Private Spies to Counter “Deep State” Enemies
Matthew Cole and Jeremy Scahill – The Intercept, 11 Dec 2017

5 Dec 2017 – The Trump administration is considering a set of proposals developed by Blackwater founder Erik Prince and a retired CIA officer — with assistance from Oliver North, a key figure in the Iran-Contra scandal — to provide CIA Director Mike Pompeo and the White House with a global, private spy network that would circumvent official U.S. intelligence agencies.

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(Português) Explorados até a morte: galgos são escaldados vivos na China
ANDA Agência de Notícias de Direitos Animais – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

Cães britânicos anteriormente explorados em corridas têm sido vendidos para a China para serem escaldados vivos e consumidos em nome do lucro.

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The Need for a Cultural Shift on Gender-based Violence
Laura Finley, Ph.D. | PeaceVoice – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

November 25th kicked off the annual 16 Days of Activism against Gender-based Violence. At no time has this work been more necessary than now. From rampant sexual harassment to sexual assault, domestic violence and sexual trafficking, women across the globe and in the U.S face gender-based violence at horrifying rates.

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Brazil, U.S. and 20 Other Countries Carry Out Military Exercise in the Amazon
Gabriel Lemos | WSWS – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

6 Dec 2017 – Military units from 20 countries, including Peru and Colombia, as well as the US, Germany and Japan, participated in military exercises dubbed Amazonlog 2017. Coordinated by the Brazilian military command, they marked the first such international war games in Brazil’s strategically sensitive Amazon region.

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N. Korea Open to Talks if Recognized as Nuclear Power – Russian Delegation to Pyongyang
RT – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

1 Dec 2017 – North Korea is ready to sit at the negotiating table for peace talks if it is recognized as a nuclear power, the Russian delegation to Pyongyang said, adding that the North claims that it was forced to be aggressive and will not stop its nuclear program.

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Both Parties Pushed Trump toward Reckless Action on Jerusalem
Stephen Zunes | The Progressive – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

6 Dec 2017 – President Trump announced today that the United States will formally recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and that the U.S. embassy would be moved to that multi-ethnic and multi-faith city… In the Senate, the bill was cosponsored by such prominent Senate Democrats as Joe Biden and John Kerry and only one Democrat (the late Robert Byrd) voted no. On the House side, just thirty out of 204 Democrats voted no, along with the independent then-Congressman Bernie Sanders.

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Careless Disposal of Antibiotics Could Produce ‘Ferocious Superbugs,’ UN Environment Experts Warn
UN News Centre – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

5 Dec 2017 – Growing antimicrobial resistance linked to the discharge of drugs and some chemicals into the environment is one of the most worrying health threats today. “The warning here is truly frightening: we could be spurring the development of ferocious superbugs through ignorance and carelessness.”

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Trump-Mideast: Much More than a ‘Kiss of Death’ to Palestinians
Baher Kamal – Inter Press Service-IPS, 11 Dec 2017

7 Dec 2017 – US President Donald Trump’s decision to recognise Jerusalem as Israel’s capital does not represent only a ‘kiss of death’ to the two-State solution, but also a strong blow in the face of 57 Muslim countries, let alone igniting fire in this easily inflammable region, providing more false arguments to criminal terrorist groups to escalate their brutal attacks, in addition to taking a step further in Washington’s new conflict with Iran and the ‘restructuring’ of the Middle East.

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Talcott Parsons (13 Dec 1902 – 8 May 1979): The Promise of Transdisciplinarity
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

There are two aspects of Parsons’ work that merit attention. The first is his role in introducing and championing the work of the German sociologist Max Weber in the USA. The second is helping create transdisciplinarity in area studies.

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Trump’s Jerusalem
Carlos Latuff – MintPress News, 11 Dec 2017

Idiocy + Power = Disaster

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What Libya’s “Slave Auctions” Tell Us about the Humanitarian System
Nanjala Nyabola | IRIN – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

The CNN film was a shock. But it’s nothing new: racism is at the heart of the refugee and migrant crisis. It’s Time to Talk about Race and Racism

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(Português) Brian May: “Porcos, bois e cordeiros são criados puramente como mercadorias, prontos para o brutal matadouro”
David Arioch | Jornalismo Cultural – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

O jornal britânico Sunday Express publicou um artigo intitulado Why I have to speak for the Animals (Por que eu tenho que falar pelos animais), assinado por Brian May, guitarrista e compositor da lendária banda de rock Queen, além de astrofísico. May fez duras e contundentes críticas à exploração animal, versando sobre a redução de animais a alimentos, caça e experiências laboratoriais. Abaixo segue o artigo traduzido na íntegra.

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Last Straw
Mazin Qumsiyeh | Popular Resistance – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

7 Dec 2017 – Trump’s decision dropped the last fig leaf and added the final straw that will indeed reshape Western Asia and probably the world but not in ways that the Zionists who run the Trump administration planned or wished for. IT IS NOW TIME FOR ACTIONS.

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Fake News; Fake History; JFK; and the Paul Kurtz-Vince Salandria Interview
Gary Corseri – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

7 Dec 2017 – In the intro to this dialogue between Paul Kurtz and Vince Salandria–poignantly intercut with JFK’s own words on his goals and hopes for salvaging the human race from the prospects of nuclear suicide-homicide–, Kurtz refers to Salandria as “razor-sharp.”

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Slave Auctions in Libya Are the Latest Evidence of a Reality for Migrants the EU Prefers to Ignore
Simon McMahon – The Conversation, 11 Dec 2017

5 Dec 2017 – There’s been global outrage at the revelation that migrants from African countries are being auctioned as slaves in Libya. The EU governments’ promises to crack down on the trade will reek of hypocrisy if they don’t also recognise the relationship between migration control policies and the vulnerability of migrants in and through Libya.

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International Olympic Committee Bans Russia from 2018 Olympics in Political Provocation
Josh Varlin | WSWS – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

The IOC announced on 5 Dec it decided to ban the Russian Olympic team from participating in the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea. The sham decision is a political provocation. It has much less to do with steroid use by Russian athletes than with US imperialism’s aim to humiliate and isolate Russia before the court of world public opinion.

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South-South Cooperation Key to a New Multilateralism
Baher Kamal – Inter Press Service-IPS, 11 Dec 2017

4 Dec 2017 – South-South and triangular cooperation can contribute to a new multilateralism and drive the revitalisation of the global partnership for sustainable development… Solutions and strategies created in the South are delivering lasting results around the world.

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Special Session on the Human Rights of the Rohingya Muslims and Other Minorities in Myanmar
UH Human Rights Council – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

5 Dec 2017 – The Council condemned the alleged systematic and gross violations of human rights and abuses committed against persons belonging to the Rohingya Muslim community and other minorities in Myanmar.

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What Kind of Nuclear Attack Would Be Legal?
John LaForge | PeaceVoice – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

Any use of nuclear weapons would be indiscriminate and illegal by definition. Only the uninitiated, uninformed or willfully blind can still imagine that today’s nuclear weapons could be used “proportionately” to produce more military good than evil. The uncontrollable, unlimited, and unfathomable magnitude of nuclear weapons effects have been established as unlawful in countless text books, law journals, government studies and independent analyses.

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This Week in History
Satoshi Ashikaga – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

Dec 11-17, 2017 ~ QUOTE OF THE WEEK: “When he died, all things soft and beautiful and bright would be buried with him.” ― Madeline Miller, The Song of Achilles

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The EU Support to Jerusalem and Alternatives
Walid Salem – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

8 Nov 2017 – Yesterday, the Jerusalem NGO’s leaders, and all those concerned of the EU Support to Jerusalem gathered in the “African Club” in the Old City. There is a way out for real support to the Palestinian presence, steadfastness, and resilience in East Jerusalem. The question is about the political will to do so.

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The Game of War and a Path to Peace
TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

Portugheis explores how and why language has been used to separate societies, to control and antagonize people, demonstrating, how today, well educated and talented writers with extensive knowledge of the lexicon and assistance of psychologists together with scientists who have great expertise on mind control’, help politicians organise chaos, violence and wars as they use techniques to create fear in the population, so that they can offer us protection.

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Philippines Suspends Dengue Vaccination after Drug Firm’s Warning
Felipe Villamor – The New York Times, 11 Dec 2017

2 Dec 2017 — French pharmaceutical giant Sanofi said in the advisory that further clinical studies had revealed that for those who had not had dengue, and were vaccinated and later became infected, “more cases of severe disease could occur.” The Philippines became the first country in Asia to approve the commercial sale of Dengvaxia, in December 2015.

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Issue of Jerusalem Must Be Resolved through Direct Negotiations between Parties, UN Chief Stresses
UN News Centre – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

6 Dec 2017 – “In this moment of great anxiety, I want to make it clear: there is no alternative to the two-state solution. There is no Plan B,” said Mr. Guterres. In his remarks, the UN chief noted that it is only by realizing the vision of two states “living side-by-side in peace, security and mutual recognition, with Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and Palestine, and all final status issues resolved permanently through negotiations,” that the legitimate aspirations of both peoples will be achieved.

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How Will We Rejoice the Future?
Adolf P. Shvedchikov – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

How will we rejoice the future?
What will remain in the memory of descendants,

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Inside a Judge’s Rehab: Unpaid Work at a Local Coca-Cola Plant
Amy Julia Harris and Shoshana Walter | Reveal – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

4 Dec 2017 – Retired Oklahoma Judge Thomas Landrith started nearly a decade ago his own rehab work camp where defendants must work full time for free at a local Coca-Cola bottling plant and other companies, under threat of prison. They are required to say they’re unemployed and turn over their food stamps to the program, which is fraud.

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Lisboa Antiga – Old Lisbon (Music Video of the Week)
Amália Rodrigues – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

FADO: Alma Portuguesa–Portuguese Soul ~ Amália is the greatest Portuguese Interpreter of Fados [Fadista] of all time.

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How the Radical Right Takeover in Brazil Has Parallels with Trumpism
Anne Vigna | Le Monde diplomatique - AlterNet, 11 Dec 2017

The hard right is running the country without being elected after Dilma Rousseff’s impeachment last year. It has surprising support among the new lower-middle class. There has never been a time when those defending the interests of the big landowners, evangelical Christians and the army have been so strongly represented in the National Congress.

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The Necessity of Imagining an Unimaginable War
Lisa Fuller | Waging Nonviolence – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

5 Dec 2017 – The prospect of nuclear war with North Korea has repeatedly been described as “unimaginable” – and in fact, most of us have literally failed to imagine it. Admittedly, with biological, conventional and nuclear weapons expected to kill millions, the scenario is genuinely difficult to comprehend. We struggle to translate such high numbers into pictures of individual men, women and children suffering.

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US Intelligence Community Claims North Korea Transferred Three Nuclear War Heads to Iran Last Spring–But Where’s the Beef?
Franklin Lamb – TRANSCEND Media Service, 11 Dec 2017

Both Iran and NK feverishly test ICBM’s to neutralize US and Israeli threats. Granted, an interesting assertion.

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Johan Galtung Is Awarded Peace Prize in Nobel’s Spirit
Jan Oberg | Transnational Foundation for Peace & Future Research – TRANSCEND Media Service, 4 Dec 2017

On 2 December 2017 Johan Galtung is awarded the alternative peace prize, The People’s Peace Prize In Accordance With Nobel’s Will.

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The FCC’s Order Is Out, We’ve Read It, and Here’s What You Need to Know: It Will End Net Neutrality and Break the Internet
Matt Wood and Gaurav Laroia | Free Press – TRANSCEND Media Service, 4 Dec 2017

22 Nov 2017 – Today, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai released his draft order to completely eradicate Net Neutrality. You can read the full text here. The short version is that Pai’s order takes the Net Neutrality rules off the books and abandons the successful 2015 Open Internet Order. Breaking the Rules – Breaking the Law – Breaking from Reality.

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(Français) La R2P comme instrument d’agression
Edward S. Herman | Investig’Action – TRANSCEND Media Service, 4 Dec 2017

27 Nov 2017 – Avec cet article fondamental sur les interventions dites humanitaires, Investig’Action souhaite rendre hommage à Edward S. Herman, décédé le 11 novembre. Avec Chomsky, il avait signé un ouvrage majeur de l’analyse critique des médias, Fabriquer un consentement. Investig’Action va d’ailleurs rééditer ce livre en juin 2018*. Dans cet article, Herman expose avec brio comment les grandes puissances instrumentalisent les concepts de « Responsabilité de protéger » et d’« Intervention humanitaire » pour justifier des guerres totalement illégales au regard du droit international.

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When I Am Mute
Emanuel E. Garcia – TRANSCEND Media Service, 4 Dec 2017

When I am mute,
When even my ordinary words
Have deserted me,
When beauty is beyond my ken

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Killing the Biosphere to Fast-track Human Extinction
Robert J. Burrowes, Ph.D. – TRANSCEND Media Service, 4 Dec 2017

Unless and until you make a conscious personal decision to participate strategically in the struggle to save life on Earth, you will be one of those individuals who kills the biosphere as a byproduct of living without awareness and commitment. So next time you ponder the fate of humanity, which is inextricably tied to the fate of the Earth, it might be worth considering the unparalleled beauty of what Earth has generated.

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What is Peace Journalism?
Peace News Network – TRANSCEND Media Service, 4 Dec 2017

Have you noticed that news media always cover war and violence, but rarely peace and reconciliations? Check out a new style of reporting that is emerging, and being used worldwide.

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Moralizing International Politics
Dr. Debidatta Aurobinda Mahapatra – TRANSCEND Media Service, 4 Dec 2017

This article makes an appeal to bridge the chasm between the practice of international politics and the universal moral principles. Violation of moral principles has emerged a norm than exception in international politics. States and global institutions have proved ineffective to checkmate violent conflicts and wanton killings as in Syria. It is not they are incapable or lack resources. The problem lies elsewhere. Ego is a major cause behind much of the hazards in international politics. The article problematizes ego and calls for a broader thinking in international politics.

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Fact Sheet: Understanding Chairman Pai’s Proposal to Dismantle Net Neutrality
FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn – TRANSCEND Media Service, 4 Dec 2017

22 Nov 2017 – To combat the “mountain of lies” from FCC chair Ajit Pai to justify his newly released plan to kill net neutrality, Democratic FCC commissioner Mignon Clyburn prepared a Fact Sheet to help the public realize that Pai’s proposals are “worse than one could imagine.”

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Decoding Donald
David Krieger – TRANSCEND Media Service, 4 Dec 2017

The world’s best hope is that the military men surrounding Trump, particularly Secretary of Defense Mattis, would recognize any order from Trump to launch nuclear weapons as an illegal order and refuse to carry it out. In addition, it should be recognized by Congress that Trump is mentally unstable and unfit for office, and that they must take the necessary steps to remove him from the presidency before it is too late. Impeachment would be the best way to decode Donald.

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