IMPORTANT READS

REDRESSING RACISM-Since the founding of this country there has been what we might accurately call an affirmative action program that has given exclusive advantages to whites, while denying them to minorities. Be it initially de jure or now only de facto, what remains ensconced in this country is our still segregated political, economic, and social system that functions as a white affirmative action and entitlement program. 

THE CLUE: RICHARD NIXON, 1968--Almost a year into his presidency in 1969 Richard Nixon looked like he would not finish his first term. Nothing was working, abroad or at home.

CORPORATE MEDIA CALLED OUT-Last night I spent an unexpectedly insightful evening with filmmaker Oliver Stone who was being interviewed by Truth Dig's own Robert Scheer. The occasion was a fundraising event at Immanuel Presbyterian Church for the progressive and perpetually under financial siege radio station KPFK, to celebrate the station's 58th anniversary. The audience seemed pleasantly surprised by an increasingly rare phenomenon: real journalism, documented with primary sources, as opposed to the all too pervasive spin and general obfuscation of truth practiced by corporate-dominated public commercial media.

THE COHEN PAPERS--And to think, we could have had Lyin' Ted instead.

But according to Donald Trump, "Oh dear, mercy me, Cruz might not have been entirely truthful about something, sometime, can't vote for him."

HEALTH POLITICS--For decades, Democrats and liberal Americans campaigned on universal health coverage ... and after the taking of the Presidency and Congress, they passed it--and lost power in both Congress and the Presidency.  

THE WALL--United States Customs and Border Protection will begin constructing the first segment of President Donald Trump's border wall in November through a national wildlife refuge, using money it's already received from Congress.

NEW GEOGRAPHY-Perhaps no economic issue — even trade — is as divisive as the energy industry. Once a standard driver of economic progress, the conventional energy industry has become increasingly vilified by the national media, sued by blue state attorneys general and denounced throughout academia. Some suggest that the industry should be demonized and hounded much as occurred in the case of tobacco. 

GUEST WORDS--We have been living with nuclear weapons for 72 years, so that must make them safe and sustainable, right?

EDUCATION POLITICS--Going to college is a good thing, right? That’s at least what I was told as a kid, and what led me to get a college degree. I was the first one in my family to do so.

VOICES--On July 25, the highlight of the Senate discussion and vote to study and repeal/replace Obamacare or do something, anything, to form a new healthcare bill (probably building on the punitive Congressional bill) was the brave Senator John McCain. Even while facing a diagnosis of gioblastoma brain cancer, he made a statement directed at how the Senate should behave, recalling a history of cooperation on both sides of the aisle. It was a welcomed theme and there was raucous applause for some of his strongly enunciated comments. His most important statement seemed to stun this august body, yet it was clearly vital – a remark that was the bravest and most truthful of any that have been made during the disaster of the Donald Trump presidency. 

BRANDING THE TRUMPSTER--I don’t blame the Boy Scouts for President Donald Trump’s bizarre speech at the National Jamboree in West Virginia on Monday.

REPLACING SESSIONS--President Donald Trump is considering appointing Rudolph Giuliani, a former New York City mayor, to replace Attorney General Jeff Sessions as head of the Department of Justice (DOJ), White House officials told Axios.

URBAN PERSPECTIVE-I have heard all the arguments about why the slaying of Justine Damond is not the same as the slaying of Michael Brown and police slayings of countless other unarmed blacks. They all come down to race. 

LABOR WATCH--Working families in the U.S. are facing a new set of threats from right-wing corporate interests that are more harmful than anything we have seen in generations. A key part of this very deliberate strategy is the weakening of unions through the passage of so-called Right to Work laws. These laws limit the ability of unions to fund themselves by making it more difficult to collect union dues from members, which are used to fight for fair working conditions, elect progressive candidates, and push for policies that benefit working people. 

THE COHEN COLUMN--This is a  resource to give you a reliable voice of political truth and hopefully will productive activism.

NEW GEOGRAPHY--When President Trump pulled out of the Paris climate accords, embraced coal, and stacked his administration from people from fossil-fuel producing states, the environmental movement reacted with near-apocalyptic fear and fury. They would have been better off beginning to understand precisely why the country has become so indifferent to their cause, as evidenced by the victory not only of Trump but of unsympathetic Republicans at every level of government. (Photo: Leonardo de Caprio.)

GUEST WORDS--Recently, at the Community Church in Woodland Hills, California, a woman sang “Amazing Grace.” She sang slow with sweet, lilting sorrow, letting each dolorous, weighty note saturate the space with sound. She sang right in front of the same pulpit where Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., once preached, on his birthday, on January 15, 1961.  (Photo above: Ohio Governor John Kasich.) 

I want to be the first to congratulate the Republican Party on passing a health care bill based on conservative principles that will help millions of people. It's called Obamacare. The Democrats passed it for you in 2010.

THE COHEN FILE--A lot of people may not know that Benedict Arnold, the most infamous of colonial traitors, a prominent revolutionary war general who endeavored to sell the surrender of the fort at West Point for a price, had published a series of open letters to the "Inhabitants of the Colonies" justifying himself. Here are some selected excerpts from those letters.

LEANING RIGHT--While it's entirely fair to blame the GOP-led Congress for not having a plan or consensus to replace or improve ObamaCare after years of running for election/re-election against it, it isn't fair to not place the blame that belongs to so many Americans who want their health care for free.  Particularly because so much of the "free" health care that we believe works so preciously well in Europe and Canada is being paid for indirectly by US, the American people. (Graphic above.) 

With the revelation that Donald Trump, Jr. leaped at the opportunity to find some dirt on Hillary Clinton, we have our first clear idea of what his father is hiding concerning the Russia connection.