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Dean Obeidallah at The Dean's Report:

Rev. Munther Isaac—a Christian pastor and theologian living in Ramallah—has a message for his fellow Christians. That message is this: Christian Palestinians have been living in the Holy Land since the origins of Christianity, but their existence is now at risk because of the Israeli settlers non-stop attacks them together with the policies of the Netanyahu administration. Isaac added—disputing the misinformation of some on the right like Mike Huckabee—”To say the West Bank is a safe country for Christians is wrong.” He continued with this powerful challenge: “I wish people would just come and spend a week with us in Palestine, and then they will understand what Christians go through.”

To be clear, Rev. Isaac does not view Palestinians through the prism of Christian or Muslim. He explained as Palestinians we are “all indigenous people,” adding, “We share the same culture, go to the same schools, we’re business partners, we’re classmates, we live together as one people.” And of course they have to endure the same campaign designed to drive them from their home. But part of his work is to connect with Christians in the West—especially America—so that they understand the plight of their fellow Christians living under a cruel Israeli occupation. And recently that cruelty has exploded.

Over the past two years, Israeli settlers have been increasingly terrorizing Palestinians in the West Bank. A recent United Nations report reported that violence by the settlers in the West Bank has reached record levels, with an average of six attacks daily causing casualties or damage. Even the Israeli military—which protects the settlers—reported a huge spike in settler violence with attacks on Palestinian homes, cars and of course physical--often deadly--attacks on Palestinians.

The goal of the Israeli settlers to cleanse from the West Bank all Christians and Muslim to make it Jewish only—just like the massive Israeli settlements are Jewish only. But please understand that these so-called radical settlers are simply carrying out the vision of the Netanyahu government. Israeli Minister of National Security Itamar Ben Gvir and other Netanyahu ministers have openly championed the “voluntary” migration of Palestinians Christians and Muslims so it can free from these religions they view as inferior. (These people are Jewish supremacist like we have white supremacists in the US.)

What is lost in the reporting is that some settlers are intentionally targeting Christians in the West Bank and Jerusalem as the Reverend noted. And this is not by accident. Yisca Harani, a Christianity expert and founder of an Israeli hotline for anti-Christian assaults told The Guardian: “What happened with rightwing religious nationalism is that Jewish identity has been growing around anti-Christianity.” He added, “Even if the government doesn’t encourage it, they hint that there will be no sanctions.” But Harani’s comments were made two years ago—it’s far worse now.

[...]

Other right-wing Jews have intentionally spit at Christian clergy and people who appear Christian in Jerusalem. And this vile practice has been defended by Netanyahu’ minister Ben-Gvir as a “tradition” saying, “I still think spitting at Christians is not a criminal case.” The “tradition” per the Armenian Weekly comes from anger over the “Jews in Europe being subjected to forced conversion by the Catholic Church under threat of expulsion or death.” This has caused for some Jews “a collective trauma and resentment toward Christians worldwide.”

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David Smith at The Guardian:

Donald Trump has kicked off America’s 250th birthday weekend with an extraordinary partisan attack on the “communist menace” in America, framing its supporters as “the enemy of July 4th 1776”. The US president spoke for half an hour on Friday night at Mount Rushmore in South Dakota, the latest stop on his tour celebrating the milestone anniversary of the US Declaration of Independence from Britain. Greeted by chants of “USA! USA!” and briefly interrupted by a flyover of F-16 jets, Trump praised the four presidents whose faces are carved into the granite mountain: George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln.

“They were men of action, men of ambition, men of daring, men of destiny and men of truly great intelligence,” said Trump, who has never ruled out the idea of his own face being added to Mount Rushmore. “Above all, they were the great men of history.” The president asserted that US exceptionalism is rooted not only in its constitution, but its distinctive culture and identity. He condemned recent attempts to “beat the American spirit out of us” and “alienate us from our history”, vowing to an overwhelmingly white crowd: “We are going to give our country its identity back.” Trump then abandoned any pretence of making a traditional head of state’s speech designed to rise above the fray, unify political parties and strike a chord with citizens of all persuasions. Instead, four months before November’s midterm elections for US Congress, he picked up on a theme he has repeatedly hammered lately: casting progressive Democrats as communists, who pose an existential threat to America. He was speaking hours after Zohran Mamdani, the mayor of New York and a democratic socialist, delivered a pro-immigrant address widely seen as a rebuke of Trump and his “Make America great again” movement. [...]

Trump also tied his anti-communist rhetoric to the anti-immigrant theme that fuelled his election. “As we approach this magnificent anniversary, we see our American identity under a renewed attack,” he said. “A generation after we fought and won the cold war against the menace of communism, there is now a resurgence of the communist menace in our land, including from newcomers to our country who embrace ideas totally opposed to our way of life and our great success.”

He described communism as a greater threat to American liberty than the first and second world wars and the September 11 2001 terrorist attacks. “It’s the enemy of the constitution,” he declared. “Above all, it’s the enemy of July 4th, 1776 … Communism is the exact opposite of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. It’s death, tyranny and the pursuit of evil.” Trump argued that communists do not love God or religion and have no respect for law, justice, principle, tradition or God-given rights. “You can be loyal to Karl Marx or you can be loyal to America. You can be a communist or you can be a patriot. You cannot be both.”

The president has been widely criticised for weaponising the semiquincentennial to rewrite history, promoting a narrative focused on white Christian men such as Washington and Jefferson while neglecting to acknowledge that both were slaveholders. He used Friday’s speech to attack progressive narratives.

“As for those who peddle Marxist lies about our heritage, tell our children that we live on stolen land or that our heroes were oppressors, they’re doing something much worse than slandering our past,” said Trump. “They are slandering and attacking our future – not going to let that happen.” Yet he was speaking in the Black Hills, which the US government illegally seized from the Sioux Nation in 1877 after Congress forced the tribe to cede land it had been guaranteed under treaty. Trump went on to equate the alleged communist threat with immigrants whom he suggested could be expelled. Pledging to “vanquish communism quickly” and “send them into exile”, he told the cheering crowd: “We will send them quickly away, and we will continue to build our country bigger and better and stronger than ever before. America will never be a communist country.”

Dean Obeidallah at The Dean's Report:

Call it Supreme Court “reform,” call it expansion or even call it “court packing.” The label doesn’t matter. What does is matter is that 2028 Democratic presidential candidates need to make winning control of the corrupt GOP Supreme Court a top priority. And by doing so, it will enable them to say that he or she has a mandate to reform this so-called “court.” We have watched these six GOP justices gut the Voting Rights Act, strip women of constitutional right to reproductive freedom, protect Trump from prosecution, legalize discrimination, given the wealthy more political power, overturn progressive federal/state laws and more. And they did this by invalidating federal and state laws, overturning nearly 100-year-old precedents and in essence legislating from the bench all in service of the GOP’s goals.

Look at what we saw in just the past seven days. The Court delivered for the GOP on issue after issue. In a six to three ruling on Tuesday, the GOP justices sanctioned discrimination against transgender Americans by holding that states may ban transgender girls from participating in sports at publicly funded schools. The added pain and stigma this will cause to the transgender community is immeasurable--but the GOP enjoys this cruelty.

On Monday—in another six to three ruling—the GOP justices ruling gave Trump more power by overturning a 91-year-old precedent that prevented presidents from removing members of independent agencies like the FTC at will. The ruling effectively turns FTC commissioners and others into at-will employees who serve at the pleasure of the president despite Congress clearly not wanting that. But the six GOP justices don’t care what elected officials have enacted—they care about power for the GOP.

The six GOP justices on Tuesday also struck down longtime campaign finance rules challenged by Vice President JD Vance that place limits on how much a national political party committee can spend in coordination with individual candidates. In other words, the wealthy GOP oligarchs can now have even more influence over our elections as they can more easily buy and sell candidates.

Last week, the six GOP justices did what Trump wanted and ended temporary protected status for 330,000 plus Haitians and Syrians living in the United States because their nations are too dangerous. This is all part of Trump and MAGA’s agenda to protect white supremacy by deporting Black and Brown people. And speaking of white supremacy earlier in this term the GOP justices—again in a 6 to 3 ruling—gutted what was left of the seminal 1965 Voting Rights Act. It was this law that finally fulfilled the promise that Black Americans would have the same rights as whites to vote and have their vote matter. That is why the GOP has long been hostile to the VRA. And shortly after this court ruling, numerous states that had been part of the Confederacy redrew their congressional maps to erase Black elected officials.

[...] It appears with each term, these right-wing justices become more drunk on power and emboldened to overturn laws, take away freedoms, help the wealthy and create a President who is almost a king. It’s almost as if the GOP justices believe there will not be another Democratic President for many, many years to come—and if they have their way, that would be the reality. That is why the 2028 election may be our last, best hope to reign in this court. And it’s why Democrats need to make court reform a visible issue. We openly work to win control of the White House, Senate and House. We should view the Supreme Court no different. We need to plan to win it using every available means. In fact, these unelected justice have more power than any member of Congress because all they need is five votes to legislate new laws and rules we are required to follow. Perhaps we need to refer to the Supreme Court as simply a supreme council—like a city council. But regardless how we frame it, if a 2028 Democratic presidential candidate or candidates for Congress refuses to commit to winning the Supreme Court, they are telling you they are on board with what they are seeing. If not, we will live the rest of our lives under GOP Supreme Court rule. Are you ready to simply allow that or do you want to fight?!

Dean Obeidallah is right: the Democrats should consider expansion of SCOTUS to be a major priority in the 2028 Presidential elections.

Dan Rather at Steady:

Despite what you may hear from the president, the rise of democratic socialism is a far cry from the “godless communists” he claims are taking over the Democratic Party. Donald Trump would have you believe Karl Marx is on the ballot. But today’s socialists are not the old school communists who demanded state ownership of everything. Historically, socialists have sought collective control of major means of production — such as factories, steel mills, power plants, and natural resources. Democratic socialism differs from straight-up socialism because it includes democratic principles like voting.

In our time and place, Republicans’ cult-like behavior has swung the political pendulum so far to the right they can be called autocratic or worse. Some Democratic voters, desperate to find an alternative, are going further to the left with democratic socialism. In steps Trump, the master of fear-mongering. He can’t stop talking about the “Communist threat” and calling democratic socialists “animals.”

“I think it’s the biggest threat to our nation there is, maybe since our founding. That includes World War I, World War II, September 11th, it includes the Pearl Harbor attack,” Trump said with his trademark hyperbole. The Republican Party has been selling fear for as long as I can remember. In the 1950s it was Senator Joseph McCarthy’s communist witch hunt and the first Red Scare. Then Richard Nixon frightened white voters with his “Southern Strategy,” condemning advancements in civil rights.

When Ronald Reagan became president, he built political advantage on people’s concerns about a second Red Scare, which allowed him to up the Pentagon’s budget to counter what there was of a real Soviet threat. Then there was George H.W. Bush and Willie Horton. In 1988, the Bush campaign released a misleading ad depicting Bush’s opponent, Governor Michael Dukakis, as soft on crime. Horton, a convicted murderer, escaped while on furlough and went on to commit more crimes. Republicans have known for a long time that fear sells, which is why the recent primary wins by a handful of democratic socialists is red meat for the right. And they are gleefully spreading the word. “You can call it the Bolshevik Revolution of 2026,” Speaker of the House Mike Johnson said with a smirk last week. Let’s hope he isn’t teaching civics anytime soon. The Republican National Committee is so confident the surging democratic socialists will mean losses for Democrats nationally, they sent a condolence card and flowers to House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries.

But the wins may not be the political kryptonite Republicans are hoping for. First, let’s clear something up: Communism and democratic socialism are not the same thing. Communism is a form of government popularized by Marx, in which a violent revolution by the working class seizes the means of production. Communal self-governance is the stated goal. The former Soviet Union, China, and Cuba, among other countries, attempted to adopt this type of modern communism. In practice, these countries have turned away from the ideals of Marx’s manifesto. The regimes are now one-party systems that completely control the public and private lives of their citizens.

The ideals of pure communism have never been achieved. We can leave the why to political theorists, but that doesn’t stop Republicans from trying to paint the Democrats with a red brush. Democratic socialists are a subset of Democrats. When they run for office they usually run as both. Defining democratic socialism can be a challenge, which helps Republicans hoping to cast it in a bad light.

[...] A version of what is already seen in parts of Europe and elsewhere is catching on in parts of the U.S. It includes universal healthcare, free higher education, raising the minimum wage, replacing fossil fuels with green energy, and paid family leave. You could find any number of these ideas on the websites of Democrats, even moderate ones. However, the Democratic Socialists’ core platform also aims to eliminate the Electoral College, restructure the Senate, expand the House, close local jails, open U.S. borders, give legal status to all undocumented immigrants, demilitarize the police, and drastically cut military spending.

Even with these far-left policy stances, democratic socialists are making headlines for recent wins. Last week, all three congressional candidates endorsed by popular New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who is a democratic socialist, won their primaries. Two of them unseated long-standing incumbents.

Some pundits believed the democratic socialist wins would be confined to deep-blue New York City. Not so.

In Tuesday’s congressional primary in Denver, Melat Kiros, a 29-year-old democratic socialist, beat 15-term incumbent Rep. Diane DeGette. Kiros was not even born when DeGette was first elected. “If we share the same goal of delivering affordable health care to Americans, of delivering affordable housing to Americans, then I think it’s worthwhile to have that conversation and have that debate about what’s the best course of action to get that done. That’s what a Democracy is supposed to look like,” Kiros told 9News. In Washington D.C., Janeese Lewis George won the primary to be the city’s next mayor. Trump wasted no time attacking her. He said he would not let D.C. “be destroyed by a Communist adherent” on social media.

All of these candidates won in heavily Democratic districts, so they will be favored to win the seats in November. At a time when approval of Congress is sitting just above single digits, Republicans are considered enablers of an autocrat, and Democrats are called “weak” and “ineffective.” Many people are looking for an alternative. Right now, democratic socialists are one option because they are considered outsiders. In addition, their young, energetic, multicultural candidates appeal to people who are sick of the establishment getting richer while they struggle to make ends meet.

Democratic socialism, certainly to the left of many mainstream Democrats, is gaining in some appeal for an electorate that sees the gulf between the haves and have-nots growing every day. Some of what we are seeing is a reaction to the MAGA agenda. Historically, when politics swings one way, in this case to the right, it is common for there to be a pendulum swing in the other direction.