What’s coming up on Sunday Kos:
- The alt-right has a plan to win 2020, and it involves YOU—so listen up, by Chris Reeves
- #CowardTrump can't disavow racist 'send her back' chant a day later. When it counted he said nothing, by Ian Reifowitz
- Ignore conservatives' advice on how to pick the Democratic nominee, by Sher Watts Spooner
- It took a lot more than a small step to land on the moon, by Mark E Andersen
- We must stop Trump from winning with the race card. It starts with the traditional media, by Egberto Willies
- 'Mapping Resistance': Activism past and present and the New York Young Lords, by Denise Oliver Velez
- Why you can't be nice to neo-Nazis or their enablers in the GOP, by Frank Vyan Walton
- How the press rewards GOP cowardice in the age of Trump, by Eric Boehlert
• Jakarta is drowning: As sea levels rise, and water is pumped out of underground aquifers at an unsustainable rate, the coastal capital of Indonesia with its 10 million people has been sinking. In some places, the rate is a nearly a foot a year. One researcher estimates that 95 percent of north Jakarta could be underwater by 2050. This ongoing disaster is made worse by the fact that so few people have insurance. As is the case elsewhere in the world, the poorest people in Jakarta tend to live in the most flood-prone areas of the megapolis, and they are least able to afford insurance. Then, too, many of the Muslims who make up the vast majority of the population view most insurance as counter to their faith. A few companies will write sharia-compliant policies. But that doesn’t help poor people who have a tough time making enough money to put food on the table, and see insurance as a luxury.
• Some investigators say fraud eats up 10% of all money spent on health care in the U.S.: But we don’t know for sure because nobody tracks all the scams and schemes.
MIDDAY TWEET
• On the 75th anniversary of an attempt to assassinate Hitler, German Chancellor Angela Merkel praises those who sought to take him out: "Following their conscience, they proved themselves to be true patriots," Merkel said at a military ceremony in Berlin. "They urge us to be vigilant and to confront racism and nationalism in all its facets." Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg, a war hero, and other senior officers planned to kill Hitler with a bomb in his "Wolf's Lair" headquarters in what today is Poland. The plan was to kill Hitler, neutralize the SS, take over the government and seek peace with the Western alliance, with the hope of preventing what they saw as the coming destruction of Germany. But the bomb failed to kill Hitler and the conspirators were soon tracked down, arrested, and executed. Following her speech, Merkel laid a wreath at the site where Stauffenberg and other plotters were shot by firing squads.
• Study shows that some very common health supplements don’t do what is claimed for them:
In a massive new analysis of findings from 277 clinical trials using 24 different interventions, Johns Hopkins Medicine researchers say they have found that almost all vitamin, mineral and other nutrient supplements or diets cannot be linked to longer life or protection from heart disease.
Although they found that most of the supplements or diets were not associated with any harm, the analysis showed possible health benefits only from a low-salt diet, omega-3 fatty acid supplements and possibly folic acid supplements for some people. Researchers also found that supplements combining calcium and vitamin D may in fact be linked to a slightly increased stroke risk.
• Two years after Los Angeles officials promised to issue “cannabis social equity” licenses, none has been granted: The program was “designed to give the people and places most affected by the misbegotten war on drugs a piece of the potentially lucrative cannabis business,” reports Robin Abcarian. But so far no licenses have been issued even as fancy operations in chic neighborhoods have long since opened. Meanwhile, people of color in struggling neighborhoods are spending thousands of dollars in rent each month to hang onto empty spaces they had planned would be filled with customers long ago. Cat Packer, the city’s cannabis czar, says the delay has occurred for three big reasons: the city was focused on licensing the 180 dispensaries already in existence; many of those applying for licenses need to be trained on how to run a business successfully, something the city allocated $3 million to achieve; and investors to provide the capital for these would-be dispensaries has proved tough. With the July 29 deadline looming, about 700 people have applied for the social equity licenses so far. Only 100 will receive licenses during this phase of the program.