IMPORTANT READS

SILENCING FREE SPEECH - Three years ago, on 2 October 2018, a team of Saudi officials murdered journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul.

THE ONE PERCENT - The Pandora Papers leak serves as another reminder of the old saying, “time and truth are on the same side.”

FINANCIAL CORRUPTION - In what's being called the "biggest-ever leak of offshore data," a cache of nearly 12 million documents published Sunday laid bare the hidden wealth, secret dealings, and corruption of hundreds of world leaders, billionaires, public officials, celebrities, and others.

USPS POLITICS - Now more than ever the agency requires leaders who can adjust to new challenges in innovative ways while maintaining the agency's essential commitment to operating a democratic public service

CLIMATE POLITICS-Global warming in Siberia is on a hot streak! It was +6°C last year. In like manner, if the entire planet hit +6°C above pre-industrial, it would be lights out, life snuffed out, sayonara. 

BORDER WATCH-Five days after the 2010 earthquake that killed more than 200,000 people in Haiti, the United States sent a jumbo jet flying over the countryside.

COUNTER PUNCH-Political physical violence and the threat and capacity to use such violence, enforce ruling class power and other and related forms of domination and oppression.

DATA WATCH - Former President Donald Trump empowered associates from his private club to pursue a plan for the Department of Veterans Affairs to monetize patient data, according to documents newly released by congressional investigators.

CORPORATE RESPONSIBILITY - Is “corporate ethics” an oxymoron? Do you have to be a jerk to be a successful CEO? Is exploitation the only path to profit?

IMMIGRATION WATCH - Susie Lujano, 28, envisions herself living in Houston forever with her soon-to-be husband and the child they’re expecting.

SUPREMES & LGBTQ - Former Texas Solicitor General Jonathan Mitchell, who played a key role in writing the new Texas ban on abortions after the sixth week of pregnancy,

COVID WATCH - At this point last year, we hoped we'd be on the other side of COVID-19.

COVID WATCH - California’s COVID-19 deaths are skewing younger, with the average age dropping seven years in September.

CLIMATE WATCH - More than 1.2 million Americans are currently displaced from their homes because of climate change impacts—including increasingly severe storms, wildfires, and flooding. 

CA POLITICAL REVIEW - The working class have spoken, with their votes, that they support Governor Newsom’s bloated, sleepy, and sloppy bureaucracy that caters to the upper class:

COVID WATCH - In the late 19th century, people protested against mandatory smallpox vaccines. Despite them, today we live in a world without smallpox.

DATELINE BEJING - Chinese hardliners just had their stance justified by the erratic, verging on unhinged, behavior in the United States and by its military. 

TOM DISPATCH-Yoda, the Jedi Master in the Star Wars films, once pointed out that the future is all too difficult to see and it’s hard to deny his insight.

THe SUPREMES - Democrats cannot disgrace the Supreme Court by packing it (adding seats to it). It is already a disgrace.

TERRORISM ROOTS-Two decades after 9/11, the role of Saudi Arabia in the attack remains in dispute despite unrelenting efforts by the U.S. and Saudi governments to neutralize it as a live political issue. 

CAPITAL & MAIN-This year, natural disasters across the country — including epochal drought conditions and devastating wildfires in California —