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The individual vs. globalism

by Jon Rappoport

“Global solution” means the individual is cut out of the equation, he doesn’t count, he doesn’t mean anything in the larger scheme of things, he’s just another pawn and cipher to move around on the board.

This is purposeful.

This is the script for the future: create problems whose only solution appears to be collective.

Psychologically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually divert the individual’s attention from his own vision, his own profound desires, his own imagination—and place it within The Group (“all of humanity”).

Propagandize the idea that, if the individual concerns himself with anything other than The Group, he is selfish, greedy, inhumane. He is a criminal.

More and more, this is how the young are being trained these days.

The grand “we” is being sold to them like a cheap street drug. They buy in. They believe this “we” is real, instead of a hollow con designed to drag them into a Globalist framework owned and operated by mega-corporations, banks, foundations, governments, and ubiquitous Rockefeller interests.

And what of the individual, his mind, his unique perception, his independent ideas, his originality, his life-force?
Swept away in the rush toward “a better world.”

I have breaking news. Earth is not a spaceship and we are not crewmembers. If Earth is a spaceship, it has serious design flaws, because it keeps making the same trip around the same sun every year.

Each one of us does not have a specified function, as a crewmember would.

Going back as far as you want to in history, shortage and scarcity in the world that engendered a crisis was either created by some elite or maintained by them, for the purpose of eradicating dissent and fomenting a collectivist solution. Meaning a solution that came from the top. Meaning a solution that reduced individual freedom.

In recent human history, a different idea emerged: severely hamstring government, in order to protect the individual against it.
This idea has had a very tough time. Collectivists have fought it every step of the way.

But regardless of circumstances, the individual can author his own freedom and what it implies. He can discover, within himself, extraordinary possibilities. He can contemplate what it means to create reality that expresses his most profound desires.
And then he can begin a voyage that no one and no group can stop.

Civilizations come and go, rise and fall; the individual remains.

The word “imagination,” when properly understood, indicates that the individual can envision and then create futures that never were, and never would be, unless he invented them.

Imagination is the opposite of “provincial,” “restricted,” “well-known,” “familiar,” “accepted.”

That is its challenge to the status quo.

That is the true threat the individual poses to all predictive systems.

“It’s all just information” is a psyop code-phrase. Ideas, thoughts—nothing is original, nothing is new; we all “share” information floating in the collective consciousness; the individual invents nothing.

Which is the opposite of the truth.

The individual invents everything.

He can’t be predicted when he is himself. He is not a pattern. He is not a system.

He is not anyone else.

He thrives on his own inspiration.

He is not a piece of universe.

He is not a humble servant of Order.

He invents the space and time of his own time to come.

As early as 1961, a brilliant healer, Richard Jenkins, whom I write about in my book, The Secret Behind Secret Societies, explained what was to come. He wrote me a note, which I’m paraphrasing from memory: “People are confusing their own empathy for others with some inflated idea about group-identity. They aren’t the same. People are becoming afraid of their own unique and distinct existence. This is a social fear. A new social contract is being foisted on the population. Either you belong, or you have no rights. This is a totalitarian concept. It’s coming in through the back door.”

Well, now, it’s right there at the front door.

The individual still has a choice. But he has to make it.

Explore his own power, or give it away for nothing more than an illusion of belonging.

Stoke the fires within, or form a diluted image of self, and bow down to The Group.

The “I” is not isolated. He can reach out to others whenever and however he wants to. The question is, is he moving on the ground of his own independence, or is he searching for a group life raft, to which he will attach himself without thought or hesitation?

Beyond economics or politics, Globalism is a system that offers a life raft which is heading toward a machine-future. Disembark and find the great We, a construct of integrated parts, each of which is an individual, in a state of spiritual amnesia.

Happiness there is function and sedation, shadowless, wiped clean of distinctions.

This is the elitist end-game of social justice and equality.

It’s a fake culture.

It’s a grid of artifice, laid over the individual.

(Jon Rappoport is tthe author of three explosive collections, The Matrix Revealed, Exit From The Matrix, And Power Outside The Matrix).

What many do not know about the importanceof the pancreas

by Ben Fuchs

One of the best movies I’ve ever seen was the Rob Marshall adaptation of the Broadway musical Chicago. Not only was the historical depiction of the Windy City in 1920’s fascinatingly presented but watching funnyman John C. Reilly put out an Oscar worthy, if not Oscar winning performance, and listening to him belt out a tune was a pleasant surprise as well.

My favorite song in the film was Reilly’s character Amos Hart’s rendition of “Mr. Cellophane” a plaintive plea for recognition from an oblivious love interest that many of us can find familiar. “Mr. Cellophane” tells the story of the trials of an under-appreciated and misunderstood man in love. And, who among us can say that they never felt unrequited love from a guy or girl we simply wanted to acknowledge our affections.

When I think of unrequited love, sometimes I think of our human body and its parts. Like Chicago’s Amos Hart, our heart, and spleen and thymus and thyroid among other structures faithfully love us but remain unrecognized and unappreciated. And no organ in the body is more unrecognized and unappreciated than the pancreas. While everyone knows about the heart and the brain and the stomach and the skin hardly anyone ever give this little 2 or 3 ounce organ its due.

Not only does the pancreas manufacture and secrete insulin for blood sugar control, it also makes digestive enzymes for breaking down protein, carbs, fats and cholesterol. Bicarbonate for blood health and for controlling the acid levels of digested and processed foods is also made by the pancreas. Even the DNA of living and formerly alive foods is processed by pancreatic secretions.

There’s a reason why carcinogenesis of the pancreas is the most deadly form of cancer. The pancreas is super important and once this structure breaks down so does the entire body. In addition to being a digestive structure the pancreas plays a major role in sugar processing via its manufacturing of the hormone insulin. Autoimmune disease of the pancreas technically known as type 1 diabetes affects nearly 3 million Americans according to the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation and includes unpleasant symptoms like chronic thirst, weight loss, visual problems and mental confusion. Ultimately unconsciousness and even death can result from autoimmune pancreatic disease further highlighting the importance of this unappreciated digestive and endocrine organ.

Keeping the pancreas in tip-top shape is one of the most effective paths to digestive health. Making sure your sugar and refined carb intake are low can support pancreatic wellness. Even unprocessed carbs like potatoes and grains can put a burden on the pancreas. Caloric restriction in general is another way to be kind to the pancreas. With every mouthful of food, the pancreas is required to work hard at making enzymes and digestive juices.

How to have a healthy pancreas? In addition to caloric restriction and laying off the refined carbs, and sweets, using 3 or 4 digestive enzymes capsules with every meal can be helpful. Pancreatic enzyme supplements (i.e. pancreatin) can be especially helpful; take a couple with meals and snacks. And using uncooked, whole, unprocessed, enzyme-rich fresh vegetables can support pancreatic enzyme activity. And, chromium (200mcg with meals) and the B-complex (especially Niacin) can support sugar metabolism and help insulin activity, reducing the load on an overworked pancreas.

Human rights in Mexico, from crisis to catastrophe

Two recent reports reveal that Mexico’s institutions are simply unable or unwilling to actually protect human rights and rampant incompetence denies justice to victims

by José Luis Granados Ceja

MEXICO CITY — Thirty-one-year-old photojournalist Ruben Espinosa was murdered the first time in July of 2015, when he and four women were fatally shot, execution style, with a 9-millimeter handgun, inside an apartment in a middle-class neighborhood of Mexico City. Three of the women were likely in the wrong place at the wrong time; the real targets were almost certainly the human-rights activist Nadia Vera, 31, and Espinosa, both of who were implacable foes of the corrupt governor of the state of Veracruz, Javier Duarte.

In fact, Duarte — who would go on the lam after prosecutors accused him of embezzling $35 million in taxpayer money – was so enraged by the publication of one unflattering Espinosa photograph of the portly governor wearing a police cap, accompanying an article titled “Veracruz: A Lawless State,” that he tried to buy every copy of the magazine’s print run.

Espinosa was one of 42 Mexican journalists murdered during the presidency of Enrique Peña Nieto, more than in any other country in Latin America and rivaling war zones such as Syria. According to the annual report released last week by Article 19, a nonprofit dedicated to promoting freedom of expression, there were 507 documented acts of aggression against journalists in Mexico; and yet in a staggering 99.6 percent of those cases no one is punished.

The reason, to most Mexicans, is clear: five years into the government of President Enrique Peña Nieto, Mexico is, for all intents and purposes, governed by narco-politics, in which a corrupt and complicit ruling party, the PRI, has no interest in protecting the citizenry because that would be tantamount to biting the hand that feeds it.
This deliberate neglect represents the second murder of Espinosa. From the beginning, police showed little interest in solving the homicide, and an independent review found that they erred at virtually every step in the investigation, from failing to preserve the crime scene to irregularities in the autopsy. Moreover, according to Espinosa’s sister, Patricia Espinosa, law-enforcement authorities have insinuated that her brother’s recklessness was to blame for his own death and have attempted to stigmatize the women who were killed alongside him, suggesting that they were sex workers and their deaths were a result of their lifestyle.

“Prosecutors do not see us as people with dignity and rights,” Patricia Espinosa told MintPress News, adding:

“They see us as yet another page in the five, 10, or 20 volumes of the dossier … They believe that the (number) of pages (in) a volume reflects the quality.”

The state’s impunity in the murders of Espinosa, Vera, her roommates and housecleaner is reminiscent of the 43 students from Ayotzinapa Rural Teachers College, who disappeared while traveling by bus from the province of Guerrero in southwest Mexico to attend a demonstration in Mexico City in September of 2014.

Prosecutors maintain that a notorious drug cartel kidnapped and killed the students, and then incinerated their corpses in a local dump site, but witnesses and evidence suggest a scenario in which both local and federal police are responsible for the massacre.

A report released last week by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights in Mexico found that torture was used by the state to interrogate suspects in the Ayotzinapa case, which helped to undermine the investigation’s conclusions.

For the families of the missing students, the report served to confirm what they already suspected.

“These people were forced to declare what their torturers wanted to hear and not the truth,” said Mario González, father of one of the disappeared students.
Entitled “Double Injustice,” the report identified several human rights abuses – including arbitrary detention, lack of due process, and torture – committed throughout the investigation, and even found that an investigation into human rights violations was stymied by an abrupt change in managerial personnel.

For Patricia Espinosa, the country is in the midst of a human rights crisis in which the state is “complicit” and, without the political will to enforce legally guaranteed protections, the rights of Mexicans under the current regime are “just letters on a page, without any value.”

A case in point is Congressional passage of the Law for the Protection of Defenders of Human Rights and Journalists six years ago. A fine law on paper, but attacks against journalists have continued unabated.

This year is already off to an inauspicious start. On March 21, Leobardo Vázquez Atzin, a reporter with La Opinión was shot dead, making him the third journalist slain so far in 2018. According to local reports, Vázquez had been the subject of threats from a mayor in the state of Veracruz.

Contrary to politicians’ assertions, recent trends suggest that the state, and not the drug cartels, is now the prime purveyor of violence and abuse against journalists.

According to Article 19, nearly half — about 48 percent — of the 1,986 acts of aggression against journalists since 2013 were carried out by the public officials, mostly law-enforcement and the armed forces.

Despite a number of independent investigations that debunk the government’s version of the Ayotzinapa disappearances, the government of Peña Nieto insists it played no role in the crime.

Recently, however, one of the IFAI’s six commissioners, Ximena Puente, announced her candidacy for a Congress seat as a member of the ruling PRI, raising concerns about politicization of the regulatory agency.

In its report, Article 19 also called on the state to act swiftly to bring spending on government publicity under control. The federal government, in particular, spent approximately $2 billion on publicity during a five-year period from January 2013 to December 2017.

The situation is such that the Supreme Court of Justice took the unusual step of ordering the Congress to approve a law regulating government publicity by April 30, 2018.

“The government of Enrique Peña Nieto is unwilling to shoulder the political costs of its lie,” said Mario Patron, director of the Miguel Agustín Pro Juárez Human Rights Center, at an event addressing the psychosocial impacts on the victims in the Ayotzinapa case.

As a result, families of victims of this narco-political administration are left yearning for justice.

(José Luis Granados Ceja is a writer and photojournalist based in Mexico City).

Human rights in Mexico, from crisis to catastrophe

Two recent reports reveal that Mexico’s institutions are simply unable or unwilling to actually protect human rights and rampant incompetence denies justice to victims

by José Luis Granados Ceja

MEXICO CITY — Thirty-one-year-old photojournalist Ruben Espinosa was murdered the first time in July of 2015, when he and four women were fatally shot, execution style, with a 9-millimeter handgun, inside an apartment in a middle-class neighborhood of Mexico City. Three of the women were likely in the wrong place at the wrong time; the real targets were almost certainly the human-rights activist Nadia Vera, 31, and Espinosa, both of who were implacable foes of the corrupt governor of the state of Veracruz, Javier Duarte.
In fact, Duarte — who would go on the lam after prosecutors accused him of embezzling $35 million in taxpayer money – was so enraged by the publication of one unflattering Espinosa photograph of the portly governor wearing a police cap, accompanying an article titled “Veracruz: A Lawless State,” that he tried to buy every copy of the magazine’s print run.
Espinosa was one of 42 Mexican journalists murdered during the presidency of Enrique Peña Nieto, more than in any other country in Latin America and rivaling war zones such as Syria. According to the annual report released last week by Article 19, a nonprofit dedicated to promoting freedom of expression, there were 507 documented acts of aggression against journalists in Mexico; and yet in a staggering 99.6 percent of those cases no one is punished.
The reason, to most Mexicans, is clear: five years into the government of President Enrique Peña Nieto, Mexico is, for all intents and purposes, governed by narco-politics, in which a corrupt and complicit ruling party, the PRI, has no interest in protecting the citizenry because that would be tantamount to biting the hand that feeds it.
This deliberate neglect represents the second murder of Espinosa. From the beginning, police showed little interest in solving the homicide, and an independent review found that they erred at virtually every step in the investigation, from failing to preserve the crime scene to irregularities in the autopsy. Moreover, according to Espinosa’s sister, Patricia Espinosa, law-enforcement authorities have insinuated that her brother’s recklessness was to blame for his own death and have attempted to stigmatize the women who were killed alongside him, suggesting that they were sex workers and their deaths were a result of their lifestyle.
“Prosecutors do not see us as people with dignity and rights,” Patricia Espinosa told MintPress News, adding:
“They see us as yet another page in the five, 10, or 20 volumes of the dossier … They believe that the (number) of pages (in) a volume reflects the quality.”
The state’s impunity in the murders of Espinosa, Vera, her roommates and housecleaner is reminiscent of the 43 students from Ayotzinapa Rural Teachers College, who disappeared while traveling by bus from the province of Guerrero in southwest Mexico to attend a demonstration in Mexico City in September of 2014. Prosecutors maintain that a notorious drug cartel kidnapped and killed the students, and then incinerated their corpses in a local dump site, but witnesses and evidence suggest a scenario in which both local and federal police are responsible for the massacre.
A report released last week by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights in Mexico found that torture was used by the state to interrogate suspects in the Ayotzinapa case, which helped to undermine the investigation’s conclusions.
For the families of the missing students, the report served to confirm what they already suspected.
“These people were forced to declare what their torturers wanted to hear and not the truth,” said Mario González, father of one of the disappeared students.
Entitled “Double Injustice,” the report identified several human rights abuses – including arbitrary detention, lack of due process, and torture – committed throughout the investigation, and even found that an investigation into human rights violations was stymied by an abrupt change in managerial personnel.
For Patricia Espinosa, the country is in the midst of a human rights crisis in which the state is “complicit” and, without the political will to enforce legally guaranteed protections, the rights of Mexicans under the current regime are “just letters on a page, without any value.”
A case in point is Congressional passage of the Law for the Protection of Defenders of Human Rights and Journalists six years ago. A fine law on paper, but attacks against journalists have continued unabated.
This year is already off to an inauspicious start. On March 21, Leobardo Vázquez Atzin, a reporter with La Opinión was shot dead, making him the third journalist slain so far in 2018. According to local reports, Vázquez had been the subject of threats from a mayor in the state of Veracruz.
Contrary to politicians’ assertions, recent trends suggest that the state, and not the drug cartels, is now the prime purveyor of violence and abuse against journalists.
According to Article 19, nearly half — about 48 percent — of the 1,986 acts of aggression against journalists since 2013 were carried out by the public officials, mostly law-enforcement and the armed forces.
Despite a number of independent investigations that debunk the government’s version of the Ayotzinapa disappearances, the government of Peña Nieto insists it played no role in the crime.
Recently, however, one of the IFAI’s six commissioners, Ximena Puente, announced her candidacy for a Congress seat as a member of the ruling PRI, raising concerns about politicization of the regulatory agency.
In its report, Article 19 also called on the state to act swiftly to bring spending on government publicity under control. The federal government, in particular, spent approximately $2 billion on publicity during a five-year period from January 2013 to December 2017.
The situation is such that the Supreme Court of Justice took the unusual step of ordering the Congress to approve a law regulating government publicity by April 30, 2018.
“The government of Enrique Peña Nieto is unwilling to shoulder the political costs of its lie,” said Mario Patron, director of the Miguel Agustin Pro Juarez Human Rights Center, at an event addressing the psychosocial impacts on the victims in the Ayotzinapa case.
As a result, families of victims of this narco-political administration are left yearning for justice.
(José Luis Granados Ceja is a writer and photojournalist based in Mexico City).

Google and corporate news giants forge new alliance to defeat independent journalism

The “new media” monopolists of Silicon Valley and the once-dominant traditional print media have clearly agreed that the “fake news” frenzy is a convenient pretext to step up their censorship of the internet through new algorithms, allowing them to boost their profit margins and silence opposition through a new framework of “algorithmic censorship”

by Elliott Gabriel
MPN

MOUNTAIN VIEW, CALIFORNIA – Search engine and advertising monolith Google continued to press its offensive against alternative media this week with an announcement unveiling a new $300 million project called the Google News Initiative.

The initiative encompasses a range of new projects announced by the tech giant, which has long been accused of enjoying a monopoly position and of siphoning off digital advertising revenue from traditional news publishers.

Google sees it differently, however, and asserted in a press statement announcing the initiative that it “paid $12.6 billion to partners” while driving “10 billion clicks a month to publishers’ websites for free.” The company is now promising to continue working “with publishers to elevate accurate, quality content and stem the flow of misinformation and disinformation.”

The move will likely drive the stake further into the heart of independent media while merging Silicon Valley with mainstream publishers traded on Wall Street and aligned with the agendas of beltway politicians in Washington.

According to Google:

The commitments we’re making through the Google News Initiative demonstrate that news and quality journalism is [sic] a top priority for Google. We know that success can only be achieved by working together, and we look forward to collaborating with the news industry to build a stronger future for journalism.”

Launched in a partnership with a range of traditional corporate media giants – including The Washington Post, The New York Times, Financial Times, and U.S. newspaper giant Gannett – the project promises to combat so-called “fake news” and misinformation. Many reasonably fear, based on recent trends, that this will mean the further marginalization of non-hegemonic left-wing and conservative media — as well as a sort of “death by algorithm” for already-struggling publishers who once flourished, prior to the hysteria over alleged “Russian interference” and propaganda in the 2016 elections.

The initiative will include a new lab to analyze and parse out what is deemed “mis- and disinformation during elections and breaking news moments;” a fact-checking partnership with Stanford University and corporate media non-profit groups like the Local Media Association and the Poynter Institute; and a new service meant to expedite reader subscriptions to pay-gated news websites, among other new projects.

In the past decade, companies that enjoyed a monopoly in the U.S. media market — such as Gannett, Hearst, and The Times — saw their readership base, as well as the advertising revenue on which they depend, largely evaporate in the face of the rise in online news outlets. Such new competition included state-funded broadcasters like Al-Jazeera, PressTV and RT, as well as dissident voices at smaller news sites offering original journalism, like MintPress News, Truthout, Monthly Review, the World Socialist Website, and a range of alternative and volunteer-based journalism outfits across the globe.

Last April, Google clamped down on alternative media with new structural changes to its algorithms — accompanying the change with an announcement tarring alternative media with the broad black brush of “misleading information, unexpected offensive results, hoaxes and unsupported conspiracy theories” as opposed to what it called “authoritative content.”

As a result, organic search-engine traffic to these sites uniformly plummeted to less than half of what it had previously been, devastating many publishers.

 Google parent company, Alphabet Inc., has seen its stock dive this week amid a broader selloff of tech stocks resulting from the Cambridge Analytica controversy embroiling Facebook.

While former Google and Alphabet Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt once argued that “policymakers should work with the grain of the internet rather than against it [and] allow innovation to flourish,” tech platforms have faced mounting pressure from governments across the globe, which are constant threats to step in and regulate the lawlessness that once reigned across the world wide web.

Indeed, companies from the same corporate-media roster with which Google is now partnering have been leading the charge calling for regulation, arguing that the tech giant failed to protect users from alleged abuse in the form of false information spread by Russian operatives.

By last November, Schmidt was already caving in to pressure on the company resulting from the hue and cry over “Kremlin meddling” in the U.S. electoral process.
Arguing that he was opposed to censorship, the Google leader nonetheless announced that the company would begin to purposefully reduce the presence of “misinformation” sites, like Russian government-owned Sputnik and RT, on Google News by “deranking” the sites in news search results and “trying to engineer the systems” to prevent the classification of “propaganda” as legitimate news.

Facebook, which is witnessing a PR meltdown after the revelation that it allowed the data of 50 million users to be misused by right-wing political operatives, is also undertaking measures to prioritize content from mainstream outlets like The Times while using the fact-checking services of corporate nonprofits and wire agencies like Associated Press.

 An algorithmic gag to silence the people

As the share prices of corporate media outlets and Silicon Valley alike begin to tumble and the rise of anti-systemic social movements, anti-capitalist perspectives and opposition voices continues unabated, it’s become a matter of consensus for politicians, billionaire tech geeks and media moguls alike that the internet must be policed in a stricter manner.

The “new media” monopolists of Silicon Valley and the once-dominant traditional print media have clearly agreed that the “fake news” frenzy is a convenient pretext to step up their censorship of the internet through new algorithms, allowing them to boost their profit margins and silence opposition through a new framework of “algorithmic censorship.”

This new model overwhelmingly favors those who see information and journalism as an article of commerce alone. It poses a stark threat not only to internet users’ ability to access information, but to the ability of citizens and social movements that hope to interact with, participate in, and wield influence over the political and economic activities that determine our lives and the fate of communities across the world.

(Elliott Gabriel is a former staff writer for teleSUR English and a MintPress News contributor based in Quito, Ecuador. He has taken extensive part in advocacy and organizing in the pro-labor, migrant justice and police accountability movements of Southern California and the state’s Central Coast).

Construction begins on desalination plant

10-billion-peso facility will be the largest in Latin America

by the El Reportero’s wire services

A groundbreaking ceremony yesterday initiated the construction of a desalination plant in Playas de Rosarito, Baja California. It will be the largest in Latin America.

The 10-billion-peso (US $540-million), privately-funded plant is expected to begin operating in three years’ time. In its first phase, scheduled for completion by the end of next year, it will produce 2.2 cubic meters of water per second.

Once the facility is fully operational, that output will double and be enough to supply 75 percent of the water currently provided by the Río Colorado-Tijuana aqueduct.

Governor Francisco Vega de Lamadrid explained that the plant’s water quality will comply with the highest standards.

He also said the water will only be for use within the state and will not be sold to the United States.

It sill supply agricultural needs and domestic water requirements in Rosarito and Tijuana, and could also serve to fulfill demand in Ensenada.

Baja California depends almost completely on the Río Colorado-Tijuana aqueduct to satisfy its water needs. With a carrying capacity of 5.3 cubic meters per second, the aqueduct is falling short in supplying water to the four coastal municipalities where 71% of the state’s population lives.

The Rosarito desalination plant is being built by a Mexican subsidiary of Cayman Islands-based Consolidated Water Co. Ltd, which will operate the facility for a period of 37 years, after which it will become property of the state.

Source: El Sol de Tijuana (sp)

AMLO won’t be part of airport ‘corruption’
Presidential candidate said legal action being taken to stop awarding more contracts

Leading presidential candidate Andrés Manuel López Obrador said yesterday he would take legal action to stop the government from awarding more contracts for Mexico City’s new US $13-billion airport.

And today he reached out to business leaders by proposing a special committee be struck to do an analysis of the project.

The leftist veteran of Mexican politics told reporters the project was “corrupt” and declared he would not be part of it. “…we will file an injunction so that they stop handing out contracts because they are awarding them to commit the next government [to the project] and tie our hands.”

He also said he would not waver in the face of pressure from the business community, which has urged the candidate to respect airport contracts should he be elected in order to guarantee investment and prevent economic uncertainty.

“Uncertainty, yes, that’s what they say. But then what? So that there is no uncertainty am I going to become an accomplice to corruption? No, I prefer that there is uncertainty…” he said.

López Obrador has previously said he will scrap the project altogether if elected, charging that it is too expensive and not needed.

Instead he favors keeping the current airport and expanding the Santa Lucía Air Force base in México state so that it can be used for commercial flights.

The leader of the “Together We Will Make History” coalition, who had an 18-point lead over his nearest rival in a poll published yesterday, also said that committing his administration — if he wins office — to the project would drain it of resources because it would be forced to pay for the “dirty tricks that they are currently contracting.”

“How is it that three months out from an election they’re awarding billion-peso contracts for works in the future?… They’re giving out contracts to commit federal participation in 20 years… it’s all very shady, very dirty…” he said.

In addition, López Obrador labeled both the project and those who support its construction as corrupt.

“I can’t be tolerant with corruption and I consider that the construction of the new airport is corruption and those who defend it being built on Lake Texcoco are involved in the business of corruption… that’s why they say that they want me to accept unfair contracts that are stained by corruption,” the candidate said.

President Enrique Peña Nieto, Mexico City Mayor Miguel Ángel Mancera and the powerful Business Coordinating Council (CCE) have all said that the new airport project is indispensable for both the capital and the country and that halting it would have devastating consequences.

It was the head of the latter organization who today accepted an invitation from López Obrador to participate in an in-depth and clear analysis of the project. The 15-member committee will consist of five business representatives, five from López Obrador’s Morena party and five from the federal government.

The agreement took place during the annual congress of the Mexican construction industry, where López Obrador was a guest speaker.

Celebration of the opening day of Mission Community Market La Placita

Compiled by the El Reportero’s staff

Mission Community Market returns. Join your favorite farmers market sellers and the Mission community in celebrating the first market of the spring season with a fun evening of good food, free family activities, live music, and more. Opening Day Festivities:

• Kids’ activities and tissue paper flower making with Casa Bonampak
• Live music by La Gente (4-6 pm) and Muchacho Mandanga (6-8 pm), brought to you in partnership with Little Mission Studio
• Market to Table Demo with chefs Alejandro Morgan and Juan Torres of Lolinda
•Seasonal Market Tasting: Spring Greens

Starting on April 5, the Mission Community Market will be operated by CUESA on Thursdays, 4 to 8 p.m.

Uncommon Law presents, Crime After Crime

Crime After Crime is the story of the battle to free Debbie Peagler, an incarcerated survivor of brutal domestic violence.

Over 26 years in prison cannot crush the spirit of this determined woman, despite the injustices she has experienced, first at the hands of a boyfriend who beat her and forced her into prostitution, and later by prosecutors who cornered her into a life behind bars for her connection to the murder of her abuser.

Her story takes an unexpected turn two decades later when a pair of volunteer attorneys take on her case, and attract global attention to the troubled intersection of domestic violence and criminal justice.

After the film, stay to hear from award winning filmmaker Yoav Potash, former UnCommon Law client Alicia Nolan and UnCommon Law attorney Lilli Paratore, whose Equal Justice Works Fellowship is focused on parole policy change that recognizes the experience of gendered trauma and abuse.

Tuesday, April 10th, 6:50 p.m., at The New Parkway Theater, 474 24th St. Oakland.

Cinco de Mayo with Third Sol & Camino

Third Sol makes a return to Club Fox to celebrate this big day of music at the annual celebration of Mexican Independence Day, Cinco de Mayo! 

Third Sol, known for their original soul music and many favorite tribute renditions, will fill the dance floor with their brand of East Bay sounds. 

Also making a return themselves as the openers of the show will be Camino who have been making waves in the bay area performing movement through many venues across the peninsula and San Francisco area.

Camino brings a Latin smoky flavor with their original music and captivating sounds. This band is to become an immediate favorite of anyone who hears them. 

At Club Fox – Sat May 5. For reserved seating (limited) call the LRI office at 415-285-7719. 

Tickets also available through PayPal on LRI website. Be sure to make your purchase through link for each band on the page.

http://www.latinrockinc.net/events/2018-05-05-camino.aspx 

At the SF Public Library: The Imagination of American Poets

San Francisco Public Library celebrates San Francisco’s literary cultural heritage and National Poetry Month, presenting more than 50 portraits of local and national poets accompanied by their handwritten work selected from photographer Christopher Felver’s publications Tending The Fire: Native Voices and The Poet Exposed.

The exhibition features cultural luminaries Allen Ginsberg, Billy Collins, Louise Erdrich, U.S. Poet Laureates W.S. Merwin, Robert Hass and Kay Ryan. The exhibition also presents first San Francisco Poet Laureate, Lawrence Ferlinghetti and current laureate Kim Shuck.

 Christopher Felver: The Imagination of American Poets opens on March 24 in the Main Library’s Jewett Gallery with the opening event featuring the first Poet Laureate of San Francisco, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, San Francisco’s current Poet Laureate, Kim Shuck, and U.S. Poet Laureate, Robert Hass. The exhibition will be enhanced by artist talks, film screenings and other related programs through June. The exhibition is curated by Sue Kubly and Dr. Peter Selz, noted art historian, and sponsored by Friends of the San Francisco Public Library.

March 24 – June 24, at the SF Main Library, Jewett Gallery, 100 Larkin Street, San Francisco

Honduras: Arrest in Cáceres murder a feeble attempt at image rehab

El comportamiento del régimen de Hernández es en muchos sentidos similar al de las dictaduras violentas que existieron en toda la región en el siglo XX – regímenes que se mantuvieron en el poder a través del terror

por José Luis Granados Ceja

TEGUCIGALPA, HONDURAS – Según un activista, el arresto el 3 de marzo de un ejecutivo comercial hondureño, por presuntamente orquestar el asesinato en 2016 de la reconocida ambientalista Berta Cáceres, no ha inspirado la confianza pública generalizada en la aplicación de la ley. Por el contrario, Karen Spring, coordinadora de la Red de Solidaridad Hondureña, dijo a MintPress News que el arresto, dos años después de la muerte de Cáceres, se ha debido principalmente al cinismo de la clase trabajadora y pobre del país centroamericano.

La sospecha que prevalece es que la medida tenía como objetivo reparar la maltratada reputación internacional del gobierno y apaciguar a los votantes enojados por las políticas corporativas del partido político en el poder, las acusaciones de fraude electoral y una represión cada vez más violenta contra los disidentes.

Una mujer indígena lenca, Cáceres ganó el prestigioso Premio Ambiental Goldman en 2015 por liderar una exitosa campaña popular para bloquear la construcción de una presa hidroeléctrica a lo largo de las orillas del río Gualcarque en el oeste de Honduras. Fue asesinada el 2 de marzo de 2016 por una banda de intrusos armados, lo que llevó a ocho arrestos. A principios de este mes, la policía arrestó a un noveno: Roberto David Castillo Mejía, presidente del constructor de represas, Desarrollos Energeticos, que se conoce con el acrónimo DESA.

Un vocero del Ministerio Público hondureño dijo a Reuters que Castillo “estaba a cargo de proporcionar logística y otros recursos a uno de los perpetradores ya procesados por el crimen”. A través de intermediarios, Castillo ha negado cualquier participación en el asesinato.

Pero Spring, que había trabajado estrechamente con Cáceres desde que se mudó a Honduras desde Canadá en 2009, dijo que la participación de Castillo ha sido un secreto a voces. Los grupos que exigían justicia para Cáceres habían mantenido durante mucho tiempo que él era el autor intelectual detrás de su asesinato y pidieron su arresto. De hecho, la propia Cáceres había denunciado públicamente a Castillo en varias ocasiones, acusándolo de hostigamiento y amenazas.

“Creo que el estado ha sabido por mucho tiempo que David Castillo ha sido uno de los autores intelectuales de su asesinato”, dijo Spring a MintPress.

Desde el golpe de 2009, sucesivos gobiernos hondureños han sido sometidos a un intenso escrutinio por presuntas violaciones de los derechos humanos; Mientras tanto, el crimen violento se ha disparado, convirtiendo al país en uno de los más peligrosos del mundo.

Spring cree que el arresto de Castillo en relación con el asesinato de Cáceres fue solo el resultado de una intensa presión nacional e internacional y que no debe verse como una señal de que el gobierno de Hernández está interesado en mejorar su historial de derechos humanos.

Thousands of Honduras took to the streets to demonstrate against Hernandez’s disputed reelection. During those protests, eyewitnesses reported the use of live ammunition by state security forces against demonstrations. Human rights defenders allege that at least 38 people were killed by the Honduran police and armed forces in the weeks following the vote.

“In all those cases, the state hasn’t even lifted a finger,” stated Spring.

Meanwhile, dozens of pro-democracy activists and demonstrators have been detained.

Spring added:

“When you look at the lack of investigation into those 38-plus murders by state security forces and you look at the political will of the Honduran state to go after the 27 political prisoners who were jailed as a result of their involvement in the protests, it becomes very obvious that, in Honduras, the state lacks the will to really apply the rule of law.”

Both the U.S. and Canadian governments have justified sending millions of dollars in international aid into Honduras on the grounds that the country needs these funds to bring down the levels of violent crime and build a transparent justice system.

Spring contends that the U.S. and Canadian governments are not supporting human rights or the Honduran people at all, but instead are trying to advance their countries’ economic and geopolitical interests.

Both have long-running interests in Honduras. Many mining companies headquartered in Canada have operations in Honduras and the U.S. has long used the country as a staging point in its efforts to dominate the region. It thus follows that both were quick to legitimize the highly disputed presidential election.

“I think the only reason this government is in power is because of the U.S. government support,” argued Spring.
The Hernandez regime’s reliance on support from foreign governments serves, however, to further undermine its legitimacy inside the country and in the region.

The Honduran government finds itself mired in perpetual crisis and in an unstable situation.

It seeks greater legitimacy in the international community by moving to arrest a suspect in the murder of a prominent activist, but simultaneously it continues to detain a pro-democracy activist on spurious charges.

The arrest of David Castillo in connection to the murder of Berta Caceres was indeed due partially to the international pressure exerted on the government, a clear indication that solidarity can make an impact.

Homemade bomb was cause of Mexico’s ferry blast

Federal investigators have found it was detonated by remote control – The United States embassy issued a security alert

by Mexico News Daily

The explosion on a passenger ferry in Playa del Carmen, Quintana Roo, Feb. 21 was caused by a homemade bomb, federal authorities have determined.

According to a joint investigation by the federal Attorney General’s office (PGR) and the Secretariat of the Navy, the explosive device was placed intentionally on the vessel operated by the company Barcos Caribe and detonated remotely.

The investigation file, seen by the newspaper El Universal, also said that the person who made the bomb had knowledge of materials used in the mining and construction industries.

Twenty-six people were injured in the blast that occurred shortly before 1:00pm when the ferry was docked in Playa del Carmen following a voyage from Cozumel.

The vessel was left with a gaping hole in its starboard side next to a passenger seating area. Authorities initially said the explosion was most likely caused by a technical failure.

However, criminal investigators who attended the scene found five cylindrical cardboard cartridges attached to fragments of copper wire with yellow covering among other debris from the ferry.

The cardboard cartridges were used as explosive charges that were activated by a remote control, the investigation established.

The remains of three rows of badly damaged seats located near the center of the blast were also taken to a laboratory for analysis where it was determined that dust impregnated in them had originated from an improvised explosive device.

Navy personnel found another more powerful homemade bomb March 1 on the hull of another Barcos Caribe ferry anchored off the coast of Cozumel.

Marines with special training in dismantling explosive devices determined that it had similar characteristics to the bomb that exploded February 21.

Both devices contained potassium perchlorate, aluminum and boric acid but the undetonated bomb had eight PVC tubing cartridges rather than five cardboard ones.

Given their similarity in structure and the substances used, investigators concluded that both devices were made by the same person.

The United States embassy issued a security alert following the explosion and the subsequent discovery of the second device, which prohibited government employees from using ferries between Playa del Carmen and Cozumel.

The Canadian government followed the lead of the United States, issuing its own alert cautioning travelers against using the ferry services in Quintana Roo.

The United States also closed its consular agency in Playa del Carmen and ordered government employees not to travel to the popular tourist destination but has now announced that the office will reopen on Monday.

One of the owners of Barcos Caribe is the father of former Quintana Roo governor Roberto Borge Angulo, currently in custody awaiting trial on corruption charges.

Roberto Borge Martín was on board the ferry when the explosion occurred but was uninjured. Barcos Caribe rejected a claim by the Quintana Roo government that the explosive devices were planted by the company.

But according to El Universal columnist Raúl Rodríguez Cortés, a security video from the company that has been reviewed by the PGR shows Borge boarding the vessel in Cozumel with an unidentified man carrying a backpack.

However, when the same man disembarked in Playa del Carmen he no longer had the backpack with him. In the footage, Rodríguez said that sources who have seen the video told him that Borge Martín “is seen leaving the ferry hastily.”
The journalist said that the video could be “the key evidence that it was a self-inflicted attack” designed for the purpose of collecting a large insurance payout and to destabilize the current Quintana Roo government led by Carlos Joaquín González.

Meanwhile, new security measures went into effect today.

The Federal Police announced in a statement that 60 tactical personnel have been deployed to mount a security operation in Quintana Roo, concentrating on the ferry terminals in Cozumel and Playa del Carmen.

The officers, accompanied by a canine unit trained in the detection of firearms, explosives and drugs, will conduct inspections of terminal buildings and vessels.

The state government announced it will invest 50 million pesos (US $2.68 million) to install new security equipment at the two terminals during the next two weeks.

Source: El Universal (sp), La Razón (sp)

Mexican presidential candidate says PRI is behind attack

by he El Reportero’s wire services

Ricardo Anaya, presidential candidate from the coalition Por Mexico al Frente, accused the ruling party Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI, in Spanish) of being behind the group that attacked him.

Anaya returned early this morning from Germany, where he held a meeting with Chancellor Angela Merkel, and on his arrival at the Mexican international airport was greeted by people that shouted him ‘corrupt’ and carried banners with messages against him.

On his Twitter account Anaya, from the National Action Party, posted a video of the incident, which he denounced as ‘the new chapter of the PRI’s dirty war’.

He also said that the Attorney General’s Office (PGR) and President Enrique Peña Nieto should ‘take their hands’ off the electoral campaign for the July 1st elections.

There are accusations of money laundering, embezzlement and use of ghost companies against Anaya and in this regard, PRI has presented documents to Luis Almagro, Secretary General of the Organization of American States (OAS).

Panama, country with less work opportunities in the region

After being leader in work opportunities in the last 10 years, today Panama emerges as the country with least possibility of finding jobs for the second quarter of 2018.

According to the survey of ManpowerGroup, the Central American nation is in the last place of the ranking in perspectives of employment in the region of a total of 10 Latin American countries analyzed, below Colombia and Costa Rica, fall also registered in the second quarter of 2017.

The study estimated the greatest possibilities of job offers for the second quarter of 2018 will again be located in the United States, Canada, Mexico, Guatemala, Peru, Brazil, Costa Rica, Argentina and Colombia in that order.

Such a situation does not mean that Panama is in crisis, but it does reflect the deceleration that affects it for the last two years, said the director for Central America and the Caribbean of Manpower, Alberto Alesi.

Despite Panama being one of the countries with highest economic growth in Latin America and the Caribbean, unemployment rose over the last four years, provoking a worsening of the relation between the relation of Non-Financial Public Sector Debt and the nominal Gross Domestic Product, said a recent study of Latin Consulting, AIH Capital and Aguaclara Consulting and Investments.

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