It's almost an hour long. But really informative. I was born in Jamaica. The way I learned the history of " Coolies" in Jamaica when I was younger, was that they came as indentured servants after slavery was abolished in Jamaica. Admittedly, I was a child at the time. At the time I thought it was always voluntary and life was great. When I got older, and more curious about things. I learned differently.
[link:|
Here's an article that talks about it if you can't bear to sit for an hour
Britain and Australia's hidden history of Indian slavery
by Vinil Kumar
17 June 2020
Indian indentured slavery should be remembered as one of British and Australian capitalism’s historical atrocities. The indenture system, as it is commonly called, existed between 1834 and 1920, during which time about 2 million Indians were transported to 19 colonies across the British empire, and to some French and Dutch territories. More than 400,000 were taken to both Mauritius and Malaysia, 240,000 to what was then British Guiana, 150,000 to Natal (now part of South Africa), 145,000 to Trinidad and Tobago and more than 60,000 to Fiji. The mass displacement created a substantial diaspora, with Indian migrants and their descendants approaching half the population in some countries.
By the turn of the 19th century, the international slave trade had become less central to British capitalism. The Haitian revolution, a mass uprising of slaves against French colonialism, showed the threat slavery could pose to colonial rule. There were mounting calls for the trade to be banned, which Britain and the United States did in 1807. The abolition of slavery across the British empire followed in 1833. But abolition created a shortage of cheap labour for the sugar plantations of the British Caribbean and other developing colonies across the empire. Without a new supply, the profits of these plantations and the sugar industry were in jeopardy. Among the profiteers was the Australian-based Colonial Sugar Refining Company (CSR), which had to find cheap labour for the Fijian sugarcane fields it would come to dominate.
“Indenture” was an attempt to quench this thirst for labour while tiptoeing around the new legal restrictions on slavery. The system was based on an agreement (girmit), which each labourer would enter into for five years. They would leave India to work for a small wage for an employer. When the contract expired, they could return home at their own expense, or extend their indenture for a further five years, after which they would be granted free return passage for themselves and their immediate family.
The British plunder of India had left vast regions impoverished and famine-struck for decades. Young men (and some women) from these areas were approached by local recruiters offering work and the promise of fortune. They were taken to local recruitment depots for medical checks and to finalise a written agreement. Calcutta and Madras (Kolkata and Chennai) became the main departure ports.
The seemingly consensual and paid nature of indenture allowed the British government and many historians subsequently to argue that the system was nothing like slavery. Reality tells a different story. The low regard for Indian indentured labourers was reflected by the derogatory term “coolies”, which was associated with the Urdu word “kuli”, meaning slave. Deception was rife in recruitment. Thumbprints were used to sign agreements because many couldn’t read or write. Historian Brij Lal recounts the complaints during a 1907 strike at CSR’s Labasa plantation in Fiji. Khani Zeman, one of the labourers, insisted that he was illiterate at the time of recruitment. “Nor did we even put our thumb-marks to any paper”, nor had any agreement been read to him, he said.
My sister and her ex have been fighting over custody of my niece since they separated earlier this year. I won't say what I think about him. I'll just leave it as, mom always said when you have nothing nice to say then zip it. In any event, my sister allowed him to take my niece for the weekend. I face timed my niece today, and to my horror he had taken her to a football game with his new family and none of them were wearing masks. My niece has asthma.
I immediately called my sister after I got off the phone with my niece to let her know
and she tells me that its something that they have been fighting about, how he parents now that they are no longer together.
IMO, this should be non negotiable. He's already told me I am not her parent so I don't get a say so. It won't stop me from telling him how irresponsible he is when I see him though. Its bad enough he took her out to a crowded place, but even worse to not put a mask on her, and even worse to tell her she didn't need a mask because she was outdoors. When I asked her, where's your mask, that's exactly what she said, I don't need one, I'm outside. Ridiculous! They were surrounded by a lot of other people and they sure as hell were not 6 feet apart. My niece knows better, she reminds me we need to put our masks on when she's with me. I was really annoyed that her father was feeding her disinformation.
Here is a recent article on this issue
No mask, no child custody. COVID-19 is a new factor in family law.
Melanie Joseph wants to see her son, but a judge won’t let her — for no reason except that she won’t wear a mask.
Joseph’s 14-year-old son has asthma, a condition that could put him at risk of contracting COVID-19 during this pandemic, court filings show.
Broward Circuit Judge Dale Cohen called the mother an “anti-mask person” who had the “audacity” to brag about it on Facebook.
Conservatives take issue with the decision, but it illustrates how judges in family court now must consider the health risks of COVID-19 on top of juggling the interests of feuding ex-spouses, single parents and reluctant child-support payers.
COVID first made family law news in South Florida early in the pandemic, when an emergency room doctor treating coronavirus patients was stripped of custody of her 4-year-old daughter.
An appeals court quickly overturned the decision, and the child’s estranged parents eventually resolved their custody disagreement.
in NY. He said trump knows all the trouble he's in and is going to create as much havoc in hopes that he gets a deal to leave and not get prosecuted. He said things will probably get much worse. Whatever horrible thing you can think of, its going to be much worse.
Well, now for the good news. He doesn't think trump will run again. He thinks the Republican Party will move on from trump when he gets prosecuted and the evidence starts coming out. He doubts they will want to associate themselves with him when all the fraud he's guilty of starts to come out.
The Hypocrisy of Republican Attacks on Raphael Warnock’s Sermons
SNIP---
Loeffler and her Republican allies have seamlessly transferred their 2020 general-election attacks on Joe Biden as a “far left” extremist to Warnock (and to his ally Jon Ossoff, who faces incumbent Republican David Perdue in another January 5 Senate runoff in Georgia). But there’s something special about the attacks on Warnock: They utilize material from his sermons at Ebenezer and positive comments he has made about another Black minister, the very controversial Jeremiah Wright of Chicago.
Now before even looking at the specifics, my immediate reaction echoed this sarcastic question from Sam Stein: “Why are Raphael Warnock’s faith and sermons fair game for attack but Amy Coney Barrett’s religious views not?” The question arose after Loeffler ran an ad resurrecting a highly edited clip of Warnock at the pulpit in 2011
Anyone with basic biblical literacy would recognize Warnock’s words, even ripped out of context as they were, as reflecting a teaching of Jesus Christ in the Sermon on the Mount: “No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other; or else he will be devoted to one and despise the other.”
That particular scriptural reading aside, Jesus consistently taught that placing anything on the same plane as fidelity to God — tribe, country, even family — is a betrayal. So that would apply to “the military” as well. It doesn’t mean the military (or the country) is not worth honoring, but simply that nothing should compete with love for God. It’s an extremely orthodox reading of the Gospel.
SNIP---
But the Black church isn’t the only exponent of the prophetic tradition: It’s also a mainstay of Evangelical Protestantism generally. And it is precisely the tradition that conservative white Evangelicals have appealed to in their headlong rush into partisan politics during the past 40 years. When they attack legalized abortion and feminism and “moral relativism” and marriage equality and all the other offenses to the patriarchal “family values” they identify with godliness, they, too, are calling down divine wrath on the wickedness they perceive as consuming their society. Like Wright, they presume to speak for God to a wicked nation full of apostates. But they also presume to speak for Americanism, too. So while the Franklin Grahams and James Dobsons and Paula Whites of the Christian right are perfectly willing to “damn” the Americans who disagree with their views (or even with their interpretations of the Gospels), they don’t think of those they damn as real Americans. So they can have their patriotism and their rebellious prophecy, too.
[link:https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/11/the-hypocrisy-of-attacks-on-raphael-warnocks-sermons.html|
Why hasn't she been fired? She has been reassigned with no contact with students pending an investigation, but what is there to investigate? Its on tape. Not only is she racist, her hostility and disrespect to this student clearly demonstrate that she is unfit for the job.
The nation’s top-paid radio host said on his Monday show that talks about President Trump starting a television network after his presidency ends are laughable. He also urged the president to stop working his “loony hillbilly” followers into a frenzy with unfounded conspiracy theories about election fraud.
Snip----
Stern repeated OANN isn’t on his radar, but said he had seen reports speculating that the president was interested in starting a news channel where he’d have complete control.
Snip---
“(If) he thinks running the country is hard, wait ‘til he has to run a news network," Stern said. "That’ll fail inside of a year like all the other businesses. This is just insanity what’s going on.”
The president has a long history of misadventure in the business world, including six bankruptcies, according to the Washington Post. The New York Times, has reported on “billions of dollars in business losses that have defined (Trump’s) career.” The president has called the Times “fake news” and claimed he’s worth more than $10 billion, while declining to release his tax returns.
She's one of the smartest people I have heard talk about money. I just think she would become a boogie man for the right. I hate that we have to make decisions based on what they would do, but there are other bright stars that could be chosen. Plus, Mellody would not deserve the hate that would come her way from the right. I know she probably has dealt with it being a black woman in power and married to George Lucas - but the wrath that the hateful deplorables would bring would probably be very different.
It would give them a chance to talk about elitists- no matter how great of a job she did.
Meet The Women Being Considered For Treasury Secretary
Snip ------
Mellody Hobson is the president and co-CEO of asset-management firm Ariel Investments. She's also the former chairwoman of DreamWorks Animation. Hobson is well known throughout the corporate world and in the circles of some of the most influential people in the country.
Her wedding guest list boasted names like Steven Spielberg, Oprah Winfrey, Samuel L. Jackson, and Harrison Ford. Sheryl Sandberg credits Hobson with inspiring her book "Lean In," and when asked about her, Howard Schultz, the chairman and CEO of Starbucks, said, "When I think of her, I think of grace." Hobson serves on the board of many organizations, including JPMorgan Chase & Co, and on the board of directors for Starbucks and Estée Lauder. She's also served as a regular financial contributor on CBS This Morning.
Hobson's selection as Treasury Secretary would make her the first woman—and the first black woman in the position. That said, those on the left have been fairly vocal with their disapproval of someone with a corporate background stepping into the role that would set the economic tone of the administration.
Italian company sees US citizenship applicants quadruple since 2016
Amid the Covid-19 pandemic and a turbulent few years in American politics, many US citizens are now seeking Italian citizenship in a bid for free healthcare, affordable university education and a less frenetic lifestyle. CNN's Ben Wedeman reports.
Interesting note ... - They mention in the video, Italy was once politically unstable. Now they seem to be more stable politically and people are leaving America to live in Italy for that reason.
