MUSINGS!

MUSINGS!

1] Should BNC consider placing an anti-nuclear Charter Amendment on Baltimore’s 2020 ballot?

2] What did the Pentagon Papers conclude?

3] Why did JHU renounce its contract with ICE?

4] What does Trump have against monarch butterflies?

5] Why did the coal miners in Harlan County, KY provide Trump with 85% of their votes?

6] Which place is more dangerous – Baltimore or Afghanistan?

Let me know if you have any answers to the questions. Kagiso, Max

1] Here is a link to a How To Engage in a Charter Amendment petition campaign: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1vaiCUZXuS0Ssih_9RoHdpfKY322Xj_3QoF4v803UHDY/edit#slide=id.p1.  The proposed charter amendment would indicate to the voters that the government is wasting about a trillion dollars refurbishing the nuclear arsenal.

2] In Leslie Gelb’s September 1, 2019 obituary in the Washington Post, “Journalist, think-tank leader and foreign policy expert,” you will see that he was tasked in 1967 to produce the Pentagon Papers.  This is what Gelb wrote in the summary: “Part of the tragedy of Vietnam was that the compromises our Presidents were prepared to offer could never lead to an end to the war.”

3] We can only speculate why this happened – “University will not renew its contracts with ICE” – The Johns Hopkins News-Letter, September 19, 2019.  One can guess that the student-led occupation of the building which houses the president’s office played a major role.  However, Trump’s policy of separating children from their parents and placing them in concentration camps was probably also instrumental in the decision.  The policy to separate the children was so egregious that the innumerable protests of ICE made it too hot in the kitchen for the university administrators.

4] According to “Plight of monarchs here and elsewhere,” an August 26, 2019 The Baltimore Sun article, the suffering has occurred because “Trump order weakens protections for butterflies.” The Associated Press article explained that “The Trump administration’s new order weakening the Endangered Species Act could well make things worse for the monarch, one of more than 1 million species that are struggling around the globe.”

5] See “Ky. Coal miners rebel over lost wages, “ The Washington Post, September 1, 2019.  Sadly, the miners fell for Trump’s bluster.  Will they make the same mistake in 2020? The article gives Trump credit for trying: “The Trump administration’s rollback of environmental regulations implemented by President Barack Obama have failed to spark a revival in communities like Cumberland [Harlan County] that formed his political base during the 2016 election.”

6] This one, “Ex-Taliban captive’s testimony stokes mystery about marriage to American,” The Washington Post, September 8, 2019, is in the category of being beyond belief.  Joshua Boyle is on trial in Ottawa, Canada for allegedly abusing his former wife Caitlan Coleman.  The couple decided to go backpacking in Afghanistan where they were abducted by the Taliban in October 2012.  According to testimony presented during the trial, Boyle refuted the prosecution’s suggestion that it was too dangerous to take a pregnant women to Afghanistan.  The defendant testified that “Afghanistan was less dangerous than American cities such as Baltimore.”

Donations can be sent to the Baltimore Nonviolence Center, 325 E. 25th St., Baltimore, MD 21218.  Ph: 410-323-1607; Email: mobuszewski2001 [at] comcast.net. Go to http://baltimorenonviolencecenter.blogspot.com/

"The master class has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles. The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject class has had nothing to gain and everything to lose--especially their lives." Eugene Victor Debs