"An educated electorate is a prerequisite for a democracy."
Mon, March 29, 2021, 3PM (CT). POSSIBLE TOPICS: Voting info; TX DMV announces 4/13 end date for waiver of vehicle title, registration; ; ; MORE. Guest: [AUDIO/VIDEO] #KPFTHouston 90.1FM
Due to technical circumstances beyond our control, we were unable to record Monday’s show.
The topics and excerpts will be posted, however.
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This program was recorded on SUNDAY, March 28. Due to Covid-19, shows are being prerecorded beginning March 13, 2020 and until further notice. We miss our live call-in participants, and look forward to a time we can once again go live.Thinkwing Radio with Mike Honig(@ThinkwingRadio), a listener call-in show airing live every Monday from 3-4 PM (CT) on KPFT-FM 90.1 (Houston). My co-host and Editor is Andrew Ferguson.
Listen live on the radio, or on the internet from anywhere in the world! When the show is live, we take calls at 713-526-5738. (Long distance charges may apply.) Please take a moment to visit Pledge.KPFT.org and choose THINKWING RADIO from the drop-down list when you donate.
For the purposes of this show, I operate on two mottoes:
An educated electorate is a prerequisite for a democracy.
You’re entitled to your own opinion, but not your own facts.
“There’s a reason why you separate military and police. One fights the enemy of the State. The other serves and protects the People. When the military becomes both, then the enemies of the State tend t become the People.” ~ Commander Adama, “Battlestar Galactica” (“WATER”, Season 1 episode 2, at the 28 minute mark.)
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Next Election: May 01, 2021 – Uniform Election. Early Voting: April 19th – April 27th
If you are denied your right to vote any place at any timeat any polling place for any reason, ask for (or demand) a provisional ballot rather than lose your vote.
Fill out a declaration at the polls describing a reasonable impediment to obtaining it, and show a copy or original of one of the following supporting forms of ID:
A government document that shows your name and an address, including your voter registration certificate
Current utility bill
Bank statement
Government check
Paycheck
A certified domestic (from a U.S. state or territory) birth certificate or (b) a document confirming birth admissible in a court of law which establishes your identity (which may include a foreign birth document)
States may have different filing deadlines for state and local taxes.
Winter storm disaster relief for Louisiana, Oklahoma and Texas: Earlier this year, following the disaster declarations issued by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the IRS announced relief for victims of the February winter storms in Texas, Oklahoma and Louisiana. These states have until June 15, 2021, to file various individual and business tax returns and make tax payments. This extension to May 17 does not affect the June deadline.
The above information applies to IRS/Federal taxes ONLY. It is strongly advised that you go to the IRS.gov website and verify for yourself. For State and local taxing authorities, deadlines may be unchanged from usual, or not. You are urged to check with your accountant, tax preparer or for yourself at your City, County, and State taxing authorities
More than 1 million COVID-19 vaccine doses have been distributed throughout Harris County as of March 25, County Judge Lina Hidalgo announced during a press conference March 25.
She commended Harris County Public Health for reaching a higher proportion of vulnerable individuals compared to overall vaccination rates by providers countywide, mentioning the importance of equitably vaccinating Black and Hispanic populations among other demographics who traditionally lack access to health care. …
Black and Hispanic residents encompass 17.5% and 31.1% of individuals who have had at least one dose from HCPH [Harris County Public Health],, compared to 9.8% and 19.9% of those who have received vaccines countywide. However, nearly 12% of individuals vaccinated by all providers countywide did not have a known race, according to a report the county released March 25. …
But officials said the Black and Hispanic populations are still being vaccinated by HCPH at a disproportionately low rate when compared to the county’s population …
County initiatives to increase vaccine access for marginalized populations include bringing vaccines to the ZIP codes hit hardest by COVID-19, offering transportation to appointments for those who need it, visiting homeless shelters and nursing homes to register residents, and setting up a vaccine hotline at 832-927-8787 for individuals without the capabilities to register online. …
The city of West University Place will receive an estimated $3.4 million in funding from the federal American Rescue Plan Act, designed to help speed up its recovery from the economic and health effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and the ongoing recession.
The city, which lost about $850,000 in parks and recreation income in 2020 caused by COVID-19 health and safety guidelines, will join the cities of Bellaire and Southside Place in receiving funds. …
[U.S. Rep. Lizzie Fletcher, D-Houston] said she worked with legislators to ensure the three cities would receive direct aid when the piece of legislation was signed into law March 11. In total, Fletcher’s 7th Congressional District is estimated to receive $1.54 billion. In addition to West University Place, the cities of Bellaire and Southside Place will receive an estimated $4.1 million and $410,000, respectively.
… [T]he funding from the American Rescue Plan Act can be used to plug holes in the budget, as opposed to CARES Act money, which could only be used on new COVID-19-related expenses. However, city leaders said they are waiting for federal guidance before committing any funds.
The first portion of funding is expected to be allocated within 60 days, Fletcher said. The deadline to spend the funding is Dec. 31, 2022.
GEORGIA’S VOTING RESTRICTION LEGISLATION COMES TO TEXAS, COURTESY OF THE TEXAS REPUBLICAN PARTY: Restrictions on Texas voting could tighten under Republican bill advanced by Senate committee – Senate Bill 7 would make sweeping changes to Texas voting by limiting extended early voting hours, prohibiting drive-thru voting and requiring Texans to provide proof of disability to qualify for mail-in voting. by Alexa Ura | TEXASTRIBUNE.ORG | March 26, 2021, 11 PM Central
[Local election officials] also would not be able to proactively send out applications to voters who do not request them — a practice that is commonly used by political parties. Some Texans would also have to provide proof of disability to qualify for mail-in voting under the bill.
… Republican state Sen. Bryan Hughes described the legislation as an effort to strike a balance between “maintaining fair and honest elections with the opportunity to exercise one’s right to vote.” …
… Advocates for people with disabilities and voting rights tagged the proof of disability requirement as harmful and potentially unlawful. The bill was also widely panned as detrimental to local efforts that would widen access to voting, particularly extended early voting hours and drive-thru voting offered in Harris County in November. …
[Said Jeff Miller, a policy specialist with Disability Rights Texas:] “What this bill does, whether intentionally or not, is in several ways treats voters with disabilities differently than other voters — both in terms of having to prove their disability and not trusting the people that assist them. And that’s problematic on lots of levels, but fundamentally it violates the Americans with Disabilities Act.” …
[U]nder SB 7, voters wanting to request mail-in ballots annually based on a disability would have to provide proof, including written documentation from the Social Security Administration or a doctor’s note, to qualify. Texas allows older voters or those looking to vote by mail based on a disability to request a ballot for an individual election or apply once for every election election in a calendar year.
… After a pandemic-era election with increased voting by mail, Republicans have partly focused on limiting a method of voting that until last year was lightly used and largely uncontroversial. …
On Friday, Hughes also framed the legislation as a response to some local officials who he said went beyond the letter or “the spirit of the law” in 2020.
[Republican state Sen. Bryan Hughes said, ] “We’re all big on local control to varying degrees, in different circumstances to let local communities adjust to their own needs,” Hughes said. “We like this approach because, again, each community varies. But we also recognize that that power — that local control, that power to decentralize — can be abused.”
The bill was originally written to limit early voting hours from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. That would pull back efforts like those recently adopted in Harris and Bexar counties — home to Houston and San Antonio — where voting ran until 10 p.m. for several days to accommodate people like shift workers for whom regular hours don’t work. A slightly reworked version adopted by the committee on Friday would allow for voting only between 6 a.m. and 9 p.m. — a revision that would still outlaw initiatives like the day of 24-hour voting Harris County offered last November. …
But Harris County’s election administrator Isabel Longoria defended the efforts before the committee late Friday evening, noting they were particularly successful in reaching Black and Hispanic voters who cast more than half the ballots counted at both drive-thru sites and during extended hours. Longoria also rebutted Ingram’s comments, telling lawmakers that the county staffed the 24-hour polling places without issue so voting during extended hours was carried out under the same conditions and strict state rules that exist during daytime hours. …
Her concerns focused, in part, on a provision that would allow partisan poll watchers to video record voters if they are receiving assistance the poll watcher “reasonably believes to be unlawful.”
“Only voters who receive assistance are singled out in this way by these provisions,” Perales said. “Most limited English proficient voters in Texas are Latino; many use assisters to vote and will be intimidated and deterred from voting by having poll watchers record them and stand close to them while they vote.”
Multiple government agencies are engaged in conversations and planning, coordinated by the White House, as this kind of system will play a role in multiple aspects of life, including potentially the workforce, the official said. …
Some sectors … like the travel industry, have clamored for a uniform system to be developed as they seek a return to normalcy. Governments around the world may seek proof of vaccinations before foreigners can enter their borders again. …
CNN previously reported that several companies and technology groups have begun developing smartphone apps or systems for individuals to upload details of their Covid-19 tests and vaccinations, creating digital credentials that could be shown in order to enter concert venues, stadiums, movie theaters, offices, or even countries. …
Parler tried to throw Facebook under the bus. Now the right wing social network’s users are angry.
Just as Congress was finishing up grilling the CEOs of Facebook, Google, and Twitter at a hearing on Thursday, Parler published its response to a separate Congressional inquiry into the company’s ties and finances.
In its letter, Parler accused the Big Tech companies of trying to scapegoat the right wing social network in order to avoid accountability for their own roles in what transpired on Jan. 6 when supporters of then-President Donald Trump violently stormed the U.S. Capitol building. Parler also called for an investigation into collusion between the Big Tech companies and alleged anticompetitive practices.
One major point Parler focuses on its letter is that the company “referred violent content and incitement from Parler’s platform over 50 times before January 6th” as well as “specific threads of violence” relating to events being planned at the Capitol on Jan. 6. …
[Commented one user on Parler’s own post about the letter to it’s Parler profile page:] “So you are snitches over nothing but democrat conspired bs???”
… Parler found itself unironically explaining the First Amendment to its user base filled with members who declare themselves to be “Constitutionalists” and “Free Speech” advocates.
“Some users have raised questions about the practice of referring violent or inciting content to law enforcement,” begins Parler’s latest statement. “The First Amendment does not protect violence inciting speech, nor the planning of violent acts. Such content violates Parler’s TOS. Any violent content shared with law enforcement was posted publicly and brought to our attention primarily via user reporting. And, as it is posted publicly, it can properly be referred to law enforcement by anyone. Parler remains steadfast in protecting your right to free speech.”
Of course, this type of speech that Parler says violates its rules is the same type of speech that social networks like Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube say violates their rules. The whole appeal of Parler to its conservative userbase is that the platform supposedly differs from the others on that. …
[Replied one user:] “I want some damned response to the farce that we called an election,” “Sometimes, violence IS the answer.”
MIKE: DISCUSS
Postal banking, alcohol delivery could save the U.S. Postal Service, experts say – “Postal banking is an elegant solution that would provide the USPS upwards of $9 billion a year in revenue and would address the high cost of being poor in America,” Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., said. By Mary Pflum | NBCNEWS.COM | March 27, 2021, 5:01 AM CDT
But missing from his new 10-year plan were two ideas economists, members of Congress and consumer advocates say could generate billions of dollars for the beleaguered service and bring the post office into the 21st century: a return to postal banking and the post office’s entry into the lucrative alcohol delivery business. …
[Said Rakim Brooks, senior campaign strategist for the American Civil Liberties Union] Postal banking … is among the new services the post office of the 21st century could — and should — provide. It would include basic banking services, including check cashing, providing low- or no-fee checking accounts, installing low-fee ATM machines, and providing wire transfer and bill payment services.
“Postal banking is a win-win solution: It can help the post office’s bottom line and serve millions of Americans that are currently underbanked and unbanked,” Brooks said, referring to the more than 30 million Americans who do not have sufficient access to mainstream financial services or who have no bank accounts at all, often because of the fees associated with traditional commercial banking.
Postal banking is not a new concept. Banking was part of the menu of services the post office offered for decades, beginning in 1910 when Congress established the Postal Savings System to encourage people to put their money in financial services. By 1947, the postal banking system had $3.4 billion in deposits. But in the 1960s, interest in the program waned when commercial banks started offering higher interest rates, and in 1967 postal banking was phased out.
Porter McConnell, who runs the Save the Post Office Coalition, says it’s now time for postal banking to make a comeback.
She points to a 2014 report from the Postal Service Office of the Inspector General that indicates postal banking could generate $9 billion in new revenue for the post office. …
FedEx and UPS are currently allowed to ship wine, beer and spirits, but because of Prohibition-era legislation, the Postal Service is not.
According to the Congressional Budget Office, the Postal Service could make an additional $50 million a year if it were to be able to ship alcohol. …
“[O]wners of microbreweries in particular are really hopeful that the post office might be able to start shipping their products in the near future.”
In a statement, the American Postal Workers Union said it supports the expansion of the agency’s services to include alcohol delivery. “Allowing the USPS to ship beer and wine is a common-sense step that allows customers better access to this growing trend … There’s no good reason why beer and wine couldn’t be included with other mail and packages.”
… Even the recently expanded Suez and Panama Canals aren’t equipped to handle some of the largest vessels used in international trade, according to Quartz. Triple E and Q-Max vessels, the largest container ship and natural gas liner, respectively, are too large to make the trip through the Panama Canal, and can only get through the Suez Canal if they are partially loaded, which runs counter to the purpose of utilizing massive ships to move huge volumes of product.
Are container vessels getting too big?
Some people have even asked the question, are container ships getting too big? … These huge ships are becoming a burden on the unloading resources of some ports. …
Global port and canal capacities, as well as a limited supply of skilled seamen, are placing strains on the industry’s ability to adapt to the emergence of ever-larger ships. In addition, experts are worried about the prospect of a shipping accident involving one of these vessels. …
This is a struggle confronted by all nations and peoples: Dealing with their history honestly: The Historians Under Attack for Exploring Poland’s Role in the Holocaust – To exonerate the nation of the murders of three million Jews, the Polish government will go as far as to prosecute scholars for defamation. By Masha Gessen | NEWYORKER.COM | March 26, 2021
Two Polish historians of the Holocaust, Jan Grabowski and Barbara Engelking, are fighting a court ruling that pronounced them guilty of defaming a long-deceased Polish village official. Grabowski and Engelking are the editors of “Dalej Jest Noc. Losy Żydów w Wybranych Powiatach Okupowanej Polski” (“Night Without End: The Fate of Jews in Selected Counties of Occupied Poland”). It was published in 2018, to significant academic acclaim and surprisingly brisk sales for a two-volume, seventeen-hundred-page scholarly title. One chapter, written by Engelking, mentioned Edward Malinowski, the prewar mayor of a small village called Malinowo. According to testimony uncovered by Engelking, Malinowski led the Nazis to Jews who were hiding in the forest outside the village; twenty-two people were killed. Last month, a Warsaw district court found that this passage of “Night Without End” defamed Malinowski, and ordered Grabowski and Engelking to apologize in print. Grabowski and Engelking have appealed the ruling.
The two historians’ legal troubles stem from the Polish government’s ongoing effort to exonerate Poland—both ethnic Poles and the Polish state—of the deaths of three million Jews in Poland during the Nazi occupation. When facts get in the way of this revisionist effort, historians pay the price. In 2016, Polish authorities charged the Polish-American historian Jan Tomasz Gross, author of the groundbreaking book “Neighbors: The Destruction of the Jewish Community in Jedwabne, Poland,” with insulting the Polish people, for his observation that Poles killed more Jews than Germans during the Second World War. The case dragged on for three years, with Gross subjected to hours of police interrogations; the government also threatened to strip Gross of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland, a state honor he had received in 1996. (The state dropped the charges after Gross retired from his job at Princeton.) Over 2019 and 2020, Dariusz Stola, the head of Warsaw’s acclaimed museum of Polish Jewry, found himself slowly squeezed out of his job, again by the Polish government.
MIKE: DISCUSS HOW THIS RELATES TO THE U.S.AND OTHER COUNTRIES.
The Philippines’ air force has been conducting daily aerial patrols over Chinese fishing vessels parked near a disputed reef, the country’s defence chief said, as he repeated a call to Beijing for their withdrawal from their area.
The diplomatic row was touched off earlier this month when some 220 boats were first spotted at the boomerang-shaped Whitsun Reef, west of Palawan Island.
The Philippines ordered China to recall the vessels, describing their presence as an incursion into its sovereign territory. But China, which claims almost the entirety of the South China Sea, said the flotilla is made up of fishing vessels sheltering from bad weather. …
Philippine navy and coast guard ships have been deployed to the area to monitor the situation, in addition to the aerial patrols …
Beijing often invokes the so-called nine-dash line to justify its claimed historic rights over most of it, and has ignored a 2016 international tribunal decision that declared this assertion as without basis. …
[Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte] is being pressed to take a stronger stand against the Chinese government in the face of a separate revelation of “significant construction activity” by China at an artificial island built on top of Subi Reef, also within the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone. …
The Philippine defense chief on Sunday demanded more than 200 Chinese vessels he said were manned by militias leave a South China Sea reef claimed by Manila, saying their presence was a “provocative action of militarizing the area.” …
A government watchdog overseeing the disputed region said about 220 Chinese vessels were seen moored at Whitsun Reef, which Beijing also claims, on March 7. It released pictures of the vessels side by side in one of the most hotly contested areas of the strategic waterway.
ISTANBUL (Reuters) – U.S. and European leaders denounced what they called Turkey’s baffling and concerning decision to pull out of an international accord designed to protect women from violence, and urged President Tayyip Erdogan to reconsider.
Erdogan’s government on Saturday withdrew from the Istanbul Convention, which it signed onto in 2011 after it was forged in Turkey’s biggest city. Turkey said domestic laws, not outside fixes, would protect women’s rights.
The Council of Europe accord pledged to prevent, prosecute and eliminate domestic violence and promote equality. Killings of women have surged in Turkey in recent years and thousands of women protested on Saturday against the government’s move in Istanbul and other cities. …
AMMAN (Reuters) – Russian jets hit a gas facility, a cement factory and several towns and cities in northwestern Syria near the Turkish border on Sunday, as Syrian army artillery killed seven civilians and injured 14 medics in an attack on a hospital in the area, witnesses and rebel sources said. …
The spokesman for the National Army, a Turkish-backed rebel alliance in the northwest, said Russia, which backs the government in Damascus, sought to destabilise the last rebel stronghold in Syria and disrupt commercial activity but the strikes did not signal an imminent major assault against Idlib. …
Turkey’s Defence Ministry said a missile launched by Syrian government forces had struck Qah and a truck and trailer park near Sarmada, injuring seven civilians.
It said a statement had been sent to Russia asking for the attacks to stop immediately and Turkish troops had been alerted. There was no immediate comment from Moscow. …
Thinkwing Radio with Mike Honig 