Welcome to The Breakfast Club! We’re a disorganized group of rebel lefties who hang out and chat if and when we’re not too hungover we’ve been bailed out we’re not too exhausted from last night’s (CENSORED) the caffeine kicks in. Join us every weekday morning at 9am (ET) and weekend morning at 10:30am (ET) to talk about current news and our boring lives and to make fun of LaEscapee! If we are ever running late, it’s PhilJD’s fault.
This Day in History
The Iraq War begins; Televangelist Jim Bakker quits as head of his PTL ministry amid a sex-and-money scandal; Nevada legalizes casino gambling; Bob Dylan’s debut album released.
Breakfast Tunes
Something to Think about over Coffee Prozac
The police must obey the law while enforcing the law.
Breakfast News
Refugees will be sent back across Aegean in EU-Turkey deal
Refugees and migrants arriving in Europe will be sent back across the Aegean sea under the terms of a deal between the EU and Turkey that has been criticised by aid agencies as inhumane.
In an agreement that raises the prospect of a desperate last-minute rush to Greek shores by refugees and migrants hoping to beat the deadline of midnight on Saturday, the European council president, Donald Tusk, resolved sticking points with Turkey’s prime minister, Ahmet Davutoğlu, before all of the EU’s 28 leaders approved the deal at talks in Brussels.
Anyone arriving after Saturday midnight can expect to be returned to Turkey in the coming weeks. The UN’s refugee agency said big questions remained about how the deal would work in practice and called for urgent improvements to Greece’s system for assessing refugees.
U.N. says Saudi-led bombing of Yemen market may be international crime
The Saudi-led coalition fighting in Yemen may be responsible for “international crimes”, a category that includes war crimes and crimes against humanity, the top U.N. human rights official said on Friday.
Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, condemned an air strike in Yemen this week and added that the coalition was “responsible for twice as many civilian casualties as all other forces put together”.
More than 6,000 people have been killed since the coalition campaign began a year ago to fight Iranian-allied Houthis and forces loyal to ex-president Ali Abdullah Saleh and to restore the president they ousted, Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi.
Coalition spokesman Brigadier General Ahmed al-Asseri said on Friday major combat operations were less extensive than earlier in the war and there were “good signs” the U.N. might soon restart peace talks between warring Yemeni factions.
US military personnel face punishment over Afghan hospital strike
US military personnel involved in a devastating airstrike on a hospital run by Médecins Sans Frontières in Afghanistan have been or will be punished, officials have said.
The bombing last October of the MSF hospital in Kunduz – which came as Nato-backed Afghan forces clashed with insurgents for control of the northern provincial capital – left 42 people dead. The US military carried out an investigation and blamed human error. [..]
More than 10 military personnel face administrative action, another official said. This could range from “negative counselling”, or being told not to do something again, to a letter of reprimand, which generally blocks further promotion, the official said. Removal of command is also a possibility.
Redaction error reveals FBI did target Lavabit to spy on Edward Snowden
A redaction oversight by the US government has finally confirmed that the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s targeting of secure email service Lavabit was used specifically to spy on Edward Snowden.
Ladar Levison, creator of the email service, which was founded on a basis of private communications secured by encryption and had 410,000 users, was served a sealed order in 2013 forcing him to aid the FBI in its surveillance of Snowden.
Levison was ordered to install a surveillance package on his company’s servers and later to turn over Lavabit’s encryption keys so that it would give the FBI the ability to read the most secure messages that the company offered. He was also ordered not to disclose the fact to third-parties.
‘A tipping point’: record number of Americans see global warming as threat
A record number of Americans believe global warming will pose a threat to their way of life, new polling data shows, amid strengthening public acceptance that rising temperatures are being driven by human activity.
“I think a shift in public opinion and consciousness has been underway for several years now,” Michael Mann, a prominent climate scientist at Pennsylvania State University, told the Guardian.
A spokesman for 350 Action, the political arm of climate activist group 350.org, said meanwhile that politicians who cast doubt on climate science would soon have to take such polling into account. Republicans, he said, “are going to be screwed if they don’t change their tune”.
Polling firm Gallup, which has been tracking public sentiment on the topic annually since 1997, found that 41% of US adults feel warming will pose a “serious threat” to them during their lifetimes. This is the highest level recorded by Gallup, a 4% increase on 2015.
Breakfast Blogs
The Problem of the Liberal Elites Part 3 on Trade Ed Walker, emptywheel
Today in Mitt Romney’s Alleged Power Moves Charles Pierce, Esquire Politics
Yep, that crack-up we’ve been hearing about for so long has arrived digby aka Heather Digby Parton, Hullabalo
David Brooks: The Sword and The Shield driftgass
US Government Has Apparently Demanded, And Obtained, Tech Companies’ Source Code In The Past Tim Cushing, Techdirt