Friday, December 26, 2025
Trump officials halt offshore wind-farm projects over ‘national security risks’
All of the projects were reviewed and approved under Joe Biden's administration, which found there were no undue national security concerns raised by the developments. Democrats have pointed to two assessments by the Pentagon of Revolution Wind that found the project "would not have adverse impacts to DoD missions in the area"...
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/dec/22/trump-wind-farms
Pope Leo calls for kindness to strangers and the poor in Christmas message
Refusing to help those in need is tantamount to rejecting God himself, says pontiff during Christmas Eve mass…
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/dec/24/pope-leo-christmas-message-kindness-strangers-poor
US labor unions gear up to fight against Trump’s ‘Billionaire First’ agenda
Trump is "rewarding the big corporations and the rich" while many Americans are "actually struggling", she added. "I think that's going to come into sharper focus as we go on into 2026. And that is what the labor movement is going to be very clear on. What are workers' demands? Who is standing with us when it comes to candidates, and elected officials? And which side are you on?"
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/dec/25/trump-labor-unions-afl-cio
Thursday, December 25, 2025
Republicans aim to exempt major polluters from Pfas cleanup costs
Utilities and state agencies typically have the power to order polluters to stop discharging Pfas into the sewer system, and the process is not difficult, advocates say. In Michigan, regulators in 2018 developed a successful program to identify companies that were a major source PFOA and PFOS discharges, then require them to reduce the levels of the chemicals they spit into the sewer.
"Utilities have complete control over the pipes and they don't have to allow industry to do this," said Emily Donovan, co-founder of Clean Cape Fear, a citizens group that formed in Wilmington, North Carolina in response to widespread Pfas pollution in the region...
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/dec/24/republicans-pfas-cleanup-costs
What I Saw at a Maternity Ward in Kenya After the U.S. Cut Off Food and Foreign Aid — ProPublica
Photographs tell a story of two mothers determined to help their babies gain enough weight to leave the hospital — only to face little to no food again...
https://www.propublica.org/article/kakuma-kenya-matenity-ward-foreign-aid-cuts
Supreme Court blocks Trump effort to deploy National Guard troops to Illinois - POLITICO
And while the latest decision is not a final one on the legal issues at stake in the National Guard deployments, it is a significant setback for the president in a battle with Democratic leaders who have taken legal action to resist his efforts to advance his immigration agenda by putting federalized troops on the streets in several major cities...
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/12/23/supreme-court-national-guard-ruling-00704962
Europe stands with Greenland as Trump threat returns – POLITICO
"In Greenland, nothing has changed. The future of our country is determined by the Greenlandic people. We are not Danes. We are not Americans, and we do not want to become one. We are Inuiaat Kalaallit, we are the Greenlandic people. Our land is ours and others will not control or own it."
Several European leaders reacted to Landry's nomination by expressing solidarity with Greenlanders.
"Greenland belongs to its people," French President Emmanuel Macron stated in a post. "Denmark stands as its guarantor."…
https://www.politico.eu/article/europe-stands-united-with-greenland-donald-trump-threat-looms/
UK, Canada and Germany condemn Israel for 19 new West Bank settlements
Fourteen countries, also including France, Italy, Ireland and Spain, say actions 'violate international law and risk fuelling instability'…
State attorneys general sue Trump administration over efforts to shutter CFPB - POLITICO
"My office and attorneys general across the country rely on the CFPB for consumer complaints and other data to get justice for consumers," said New York Attorney General Letitia James, one of the state attorneys general that brought the suit. "The administration's actions are a handout to those who drive up costs by cheating hardworking Americans."…
‘This is shattering’: Europe reels from Trump’s new world order - POLITICO
Europe still wants and needs to work with Trump. But this year's made it clear they're increasingly on their own…
History Minute (063): More debunking "Slaves liked being slaves."
"the conduct of the Negro in the late crisis of our affairs has convinced me that we were all laboring under a delusion. . . . I believed that these people were content, happy, and attached to their masters. But events and reflection have caused me to change these positions. . . . If they were content, happy and attached to their masters, why did they desert him in the moment of his need and flock to an enemy, whom they did not know; and thus left their perhaps really good masters whom they did know from infancy?"
Excerpt From
A People's History of the United States
Howard Zinn
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