iftttwall

Authored by Mike Shedlock via MishTalk.com,

Nearly the entire state of Tennessee has a single Obamacare provider. In sixteen counties, none of this year’s providers want to do business.

Mississippi, Alabama, South Carolina, Oklahoma, Alaska, and Wyoming are states where there is only a single provider for the entire state. Iowa is likely to be covered by a single provider next year. Most of North Carolina, Florida, Missouri, and Arizona are also in a single-provider situation.

Enrollment for 2018 starts in November. Will the problem be fixed by then? If not, What Happens if Places Have No Obamacare Insurers?

The markets created by the Affordable Care Act have always relied on the voluntary participation of private companies. If the government set up the right conditions for the market, the thinking went, insurers would want to jump in. But, as Sarah Kliff at Vox.com has reported, the law contained no real backup plan if that vision didn’t work out.

 

So far, there are parts of Tennessee where none of this year’s insurers want to sell insurance next year. Other counties have only one carrier, and in some of them, that carrier is looking shaky.

 

If insurers do all decide to exit a market, no one is exactly sure what will happen next. Some experts have brainstormed about possible workarounds, but all would entail uncharted legal territory.

 

Senator Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, the state currently at greatest risk of bare counties, has introduced a bill that would create options for customers shut out of their Obamacare market. But even if Congress passed such a law, regulators would have to work very fast to make anything happen before next year’s enrollment period, which begins in November.

No Backup Plan

Vox asks What if Obamacare Insurers Falls to Zero?

Multiple sources tell me that White House staff held a meeting today to discuss cost-sharing reduction subsidies — that $8 billion Obamacare program whose fate still hangs in limbo. Ending these payments could “blow up” the health law’s marketplaces, but President Trump has so far waffled on what he’ll do about the issue. The meeting didn’t include any outside advisers or industry officials, only administration staff.

 

Right now there are 16 counties in Tennessee where no health insurer wants to sell Obamacare coverage. Iowa could be next: Half its Obamacare insurers announced this month that they would no longer participate in the marketplace. That leaves 94 of the state’s 99 counties with just one insurer — and regulators there aren’t totally sure that plan, Medica, will stick around.

 

“We don’t have any commitment from the two carriers that remain that they will be there,” says Doug Ommen, Iowa’s insurance commissioner. “They’re not required to file with us until June. Certainly we’re hopeful, but unless Congress acts, our market will continue to be very unstable.”

 

What happens if no one wants to sell coverage? Does the law have any fallback plan? The short answer is no. There is no backup plan for places where no insurer wants to sell Obamacare coverage.

 

Even before the election, some big insurers had decided that the Obamacare marketplaces were not good for their bottom lines. Aetna and UnitedHealth mostly withdrew in 2016, leaving lots of places with just one insurer.

 

Since the election, health insurers have only gotten more skittish. Humana announced in February that it would no longer participate. That left those 16 Tennessee counties without any plans, and many more counties with just one option.

Ryan’s Folly

The articles mentioned that Trump could call up providers and bully them into offering coverage. But does that make any sense from a party that wants to Kill Obamacare?

The system is set up to implode and there is no point to doing anything until it does. After an implosion, there will be bipartisan support to do something. Right now there is no bipartisan support to do anything.

The folly of House Speaker Paul Ryan’s ill-fated attempt to fix the problem is readily apparent.

His poor decision to attempt to fix the unfixable accomplished nothing useful, but it did move partial ownership of the problem to Republicans.

via http://ift.tt/2ooD8Lz Tyler Durden

Silicon Valley’s tech giants are world renowned for their random employee ‘perks’ which include everything from free lunches prepped by expensive chefs, to free massages, nap pods and tricked out game rooms.

 

But the latest trend in Silicon Valley ‘fringe benefits’, which includes unlimited time off to protest the Trump administration, feels a little bit less like an attempt to attract and retain talent as it is an attempt to push a political agenda.

Nevertheless, as the Washington Post points out today, companies like Fauna of San Francisco are offering their employees unlimited paid time off to protest Trump in any way they see fit.

Fauna, a San Francisco-based database start-up, recently began allowing its 13 employees to take unlimited paid leave to participate in rallies, vote, write letters to elected officials and take part in other civic activities. Before February, employees could take time off on an as-needed basis. But the political climate — and polarization — after President Trump’s inauguration called for more defined measures, said Amna Pervez, director of recruiting and retention.

 

“Since there’s been such a divide in our country, we felt we should be very explicit about our policy,” Pervez said, adding that the company also provides unlimited vacation time. “We want our employees to know that we absolutely support the betterment of our country. People can take whatever they feel like they need to make a meaningful difference.”

 

A number of other start-ups, including Turbine Labs, Buoyant and Jelly Industries, have signed on to do the same. The new policies come as technology firms and other companies take a stand against the Trump administration’s plan to tighten restrictions for foreign workers. On Tuesday, Trump was expected to sign an executive order that would impose new restrictions on H1-B visas, a type of temporary work visa often used by firms to recruit and employ highly skilled workers.

Meanwhile, even Facebook joined in on the trend allowing employees to take May 1st off to attend a “pro-immigration” rally…

Facebook, for example, is allowing its employees to take time off to participate in pro-immigration rallies on May 1. The company, which relies heavily on foreign workers, informed employees and contractors last week that they would not be penalized for missing work to protest, Bloomberg News reported Tuesday.

 

“At Facebook, we’re committed to fostering an inclusive workplace where employees feel comfortable expressing their opinions and speaking up about issues that are important to them,” a company spokesman said in an email. “We support our people in recognizing International Workers’ Day and other efforts to raise awareness for safe and equitable employment conditions.”

 

“We will define this as we grow,” Gómez said. “But my hope is that policies like this become the norm. When Google began giving out free lunches, everyone else followed. Why should this be any different?”

Of course, this latest trend is afflicting not just Silicon Valley but our institutions of higher learning as well.  As we pointed out last night, one ASU professor recently allowed her students to opt out of a final exam in exchange for organizing a campus protest of Trump.

But don’t worry, there are some ground rules for Silicon Valley’s snowflakes: no violence, or activities that make others feel threatened…but what good is a disaffected liberal protest without a little property destruction to stick it to ‘the man?’

via http://ift.tt/2phFHDb Tyler Durden

Authored by Brandon Smith via Alt-Market.com,

Back in 2013 during the last major flare up between the U.S. and North Korea I wrote an extensive analysis on the North Korean wild card and how it could be used by globalists as a catalyst for international economic instability titled 'Will Globalists Use North Korea To Trigger Catastrophe?' As I have warned consistently over the years, like Syria, North Korea is a longstanding chaos box; a big red button that the elites can press any time they wish to instigate a chain of greater geopolitical tensions. The question has always been, will they actually use it?

Well, it appears that under the Trump administration the establishment might go for broke. I have not seen U.S. war rhetoric so intense since the second invasion of Iraq, and all over missile tests which have been standard fare for North Korea for many years. With whispers by Trump aides of a possible 50,000 boots on the ground in Syria, and open discussion of preemptive strikes in North Korea, this time kinetic conflict is highly likely.

Yes, we have seen such military pressures before, but this time feels different. Why is an aimless quagmire war with massive potential global financial repercussions more likely under Trump? Because Trump ran under a nationalist conservative banner, and he will forever be labeled a nationalist conservative even if his behavior appears to be more globalist in nature. Rhetoric is often more psychologically powerful in the minds of the masses than action. Therefore, EVERYTHING Trump does from now on will also be labeled a product of the “nationalist conservative” ideology; including all of his screw-ups. And, with Trump in office the establishment is perfectly happy to pursue actions once considered taboo, because demonizing conservatives and liberty proponents is one of their primary objectives.

When the real insanity starts, liberty movement activists will gnash their teeth and scream at the top of their lungs that Trump is “not acting like a conservative,” so how can conservative thinking be blamed by extension? But these people just don’t grasp the thought processes of the human mind. No matter how much we try to separate ourselves from the Trump-train if (or when) he goes full-bore globalist, our efforts will be futile. The mainstream media has spent considerable time and effort making sure that all of us are lumped in with the so-called “alt-right.”  Remember, I tried to warn the movement about this long before Trump won the election.

Currently, there are questions as to whether or not a naval task force is en route to North Korea.  I would not trust the latest reports that all units are headed to Australia when Vice President Mike Pence is in Japan yesterday saying "the sword stands ready".  Could this be more posturing or a precursor to a strike scenario? I am reminded of the U.S.S. Maddox which was sent to patrol the waters off of Vietnam, the same destroyer that reported an attack by North Vietnamese torpedo boats which was used as justification for the initiation of the Vietnam War. As it turned out, no such attack actually occurred.

The presence of a U.S. fleet off North Korea could only be intended to instigate further aggression, not defuse the situation.

So, if war with North Korea is inevitable given the circumstances, what would such a war look like? Here are some elements I think are most important; elements that make the war almost unwinnable, if winning is even the purpose…

North Korean Air Defense

The North Koreans spent the better part of the last war with the U.S. being heavily battered by air bombardments. They have had plenty of time since then to consider this problem and prepare. Even the most gung-ho American military minds are forced to admit that using only air based attacks in North Korea is not practical. And where we have been spoiled by steady video streams of laser guided hell dropped on Iraqi and Afghani targets in the past, don’t expect things to go so easily in North Korea.

While North Korea is still rife with economic problems (like every other communist and socialist nation), they still have an industrial base and produce many of their own arms. This includes and extensive missile net backed by a maze of radar systems. Their air force is by all accounts obsolete, but as I have mentioned in the past, advanced missile defense is the wave of the future. It’s cheaper and can render expensive enemy air force and naval units impotent.

North Korea uses an indigenous built surface-to-air missile (SAM) system called the KN-06 which is as capable as some Russian SAM systems. They also field huge numbers of MANPAD (man-portable air defense) units against planes and helicopters attempting to dodge radar defenses at low altitudes. This is layered on top of a vast array of anti-aircraft artillery. And, most of this anti-air apparatus is either mobile or based underground.

What this means is, a ground invasion is the ONLY way to attack North Korea effectively and make room for air units to strike interior targets.

Underground Facilities

The Pentagon estimates at least 6,000 to 8,000 underground military facilities in North Korea. New bases are being discovered all the time.  While “bunker buster” bombs can possibly damage these facilities, it is unlikely that they would be completely destroyed or rendered ineffective. There is also an estimated 84 large tunnels through mountains on the southern border which would allow an immediate invasion by North Korean ground forces into South Korea. Only four of these tunnels exits have been found and blocked by South Korea.

It is important to remember that underground infrastructure has always been the bane of the modern western military. These facilities will not be taken by air. They will have to be taken the hard way — with ground troops.

North Korean Infantry

In 2013 the Department of Defense reported North Korean ground forces at around 950,000. This, of course, does not count their nearly 8 million infantry reserves. They also boast over 200,000 highly trained paramilitary soldiers. North Korea has no means whatsoever to project these forces overseas against the U.S. or anyone else other than South Korea. The only way they can do damage to U.S. forces is if we show up on their doorstep.

Since a ground invasion is the only way to proceed with what will obviously be “regime change” in North Korea, U.S. forces will be facing an endless mire of mountain warfare worse than Afghanistan with limited air support options. If it comes down to a war of attrition rather than superior technology, victory will be impossible in North Korea.

The Nuclear Option

The consensus view among military analysts is that North Korea will never attempt to use nukes offensively because the resulting retaliation by the U.S. would be devastating.  But you often do not hear much discussion about NK using nukes defensively, and what that would mean for an invading army.

I agree that though the mainstream media is bombarding us constantly with images of a psychotic dictatorship, North Korea is not insane enough to use nukes against the U.S. or its allies outright. If such an event did occur, I would immediately suspect the possibility of a false flag because there would be zero gain for North Korea. That said, in the event of a ground invasion into North Korea, the use of nuclear weapons becomes highly advantageous for Pyongyang.

Consider this, with vast numbers of U.S. ground forces operating in the region, nuclear retaliation by the U.S. is simply not going to happen.  A pullout of most troops would have to take place. North Korea needs only one nuke strike to destroy a U.S. fleet or hit a large civilian target in South Korea killing potential millions or hit a U.S. troop base in South Korea killing tens of thousands of American soldiers.

Once we commit ground troops into the region, we make a nuclear attack USEFUL to North Korea, when it never would have been useful before. This is why the preemptive strike rhetoric based on a rational of stopping a “more nuclear capable” North Korea is either pure stupidity or an engineered crisis in the making.

The Chinese Question

Is China’s strange shift in support of tougher actions against North Korea legitimate? Well, if it is, then I think this would support my longtime assertion that China is NOT anti-globalist at all, but just another branch of the globalist cabal. Perhaps Trump’s refusal to label them currency manipulators is also evidence of this. That is a discussion for another time, though.

China’s sudden softening of stance against U.S. pressures on North Korea seems to me to be the most blatant signal that an actual war is coming. If China refuses to present military or economic repercussions to act as a deterrent to invasion, then an invasion is likely to happen.  This does not mean, though, that a future crisis between the U.S. and China is not scheduled.

In fact, an invasion by America into North Korea opens numerous doors to all kinds of crisis events the establishment can exploit. For example, how many people are naive enough to expect that U.S. air maneuvers will respect Chinese air space restrictions? I hope not many.  Having American military units in a war stance so close to the Chinese border is a recipe for disaster, and I am not necessarily referring to military disaster.

War, contrary to popular belief, is not good for the economy. In fact, war is the perfect poison for economic trade and production. The U.S. in particular is utterly dependent on the international use of the dollar as the world reserve currency. Without this status, the American economy is dead in the water. China is a central pillar in global trade and could, with the help of a few other nations, kill the dollar's reserve status very quickly.

If you are curious as to why international financiers would be interested in undermining the U.S. economy in such a way, I suggest you read my article The Economic End Game Explained. The greater point is this — a war with North Korea would have nothing to do with North Korea. It would only be a means to a greater end. There are those people out there who claim to be "conservative" that always weasel out of the woodwork in times like these to pound the war fever drum.  But if you think that forced regime change overseas is America's job or duty you are not a conservative, you are a statist.

I also cringe at the crowd of dupes that constantly bubbles to the surface claiming this time around, the invasion will be "easy", parroting the party line.  "Done in two months!", they say.  The delusion inherent in this thinking is astounding, and comes from the old-guard Republican/Neo-Con ideology.  Remember how quick and cheap they said Iraq and Afghanistan would be?  At bottom, there is little or nothing to be gained by Americans in this kind of conflagration.  So we should be asking ourselves, who actually would gain from it?

via http://ift.tt/2pEhtQM Tyler Durden

After an ‘icy’ (pardon the pun) meeting between Rex Tillerson and Russia Foreign Secretary Sergei Lavrov last week in Moscow, Vladimir Putin has just released the first public photos of a giant, top-secret military base recently built on the arctic island of “Alexandra Land.”  According to media reports, the base is believed to be fully-armed with missile systems and nuclear-ready fighter jets.

A virtual tour of the facility can be viewed here.

 

Per The Sun, Russian economists figure the arctic outpost could hold the key to the Kremlin unearthing almost $25 trillion of oil and gas buried deep beneath the snow.  And with that kind of money on the line, it’s only natural that the base would be heavily fortified with nuclear ready fighter jets and reindeer-riding specials forces.

More than 150 troops will be based at the clover-shaped compound – which is decked out in the red, white and blue of the Russian flag.

 

And more worryingly, Moscow’s defence minister Sergei Shoigu confirmed nuke-ready Su-34 fighter jets will be deployed at a nearby air base.

 

The 150,000 sq ft (14,000 sq m) facility is designed to house 150 personnel, on 18-month tours of duty, and includes living quarters, a cinema, a chapel, a gymnasium, a billiards room and an orangery.

 

Meanwhile, in a heaping dose of the obvious, Defense Secretary James Mattis confirmed: “Russia is taking aggressive steps to increase its presence there.” 

 

We’re still awaiting confirmation of whether the gallons of vodka required daily to operate such a facility will be imported or distilled on the premises.

via http://ift.tt/2otBXcX Tyler Durden

We almost made it a full month without a prominent hedge fund shuttering – an eternity in an age when ETFs and passive vehicles soak up several billion in capital each day at the expense of “active” managers – and then Bloomberg spoiled the streak when moments ago it reported that John Burbank, one of the handful of investors who made a killing from shorting subprime, and head of the $2.4 billion Passport Capital is shutting down one of his core hedge funds, the latest in a string of closings hitting the industry.

Passport Capital’s Long-Short Strategy Fund is winding down and will return money to investors. The fund, which had an AUM of $833 million as of December 31, and $636 million as of March 17 according to HSBC, lost 2.1% in the first two months of this year. In 2016 the Long-Short fund lost 11.8% reversing its 2015 gains, when Passport Long/Short gained 10.1%.

A catalyst for the closure may have been a January 2017 decision by the San Bernardino employees fund to pull its funds from Passport.

Bloomberg adds that the firm’s flagship Passport Global Strategy Fund will remain open.

A recent report by Hedge Fund Research showed that more hedge funds closed in 2016 than in any year since the financial crisis. Also on Wednesday, Guard Capital told investors that it’s closing its $885 million macro hedge fund. Last month, former Goldman Sachs trader Eric Mindich said he’s winding down his $7 billion firm, Eton Park Capital Management, which was one of the biggest hedge fund startups when it launched 13 years ago. In September, Richard Perry threw in the towel on his almost three-decade-old hedge fund.

Many more will follow, because as Goldman explained earlier this week, in a centrally-planned market, one which never falls, active returns are no nearly enough to prevent an LP exodus.

 

via http://ift.tt/2ooJ1IT Tyler Durden

Authored by Antonius Aquinas,

It is altogether fitting that the US attack on a Syrian airport, the dropping of a MOAB on defenseless Afghanistan, and the potential outbreak of nuclear war with North Korea have all come in the very month one hundred years earlier that an American president led the nation on its road to empire.  President Trump’s aggressive actions and all of America’s previous imperialistic endeavors can ultimately be traced to Woodrow Wilson’s disastrous decision to bring the country into the First World War on April 6, 1917.

This month, therefore, should be one of national mourning for the decision to enter that horrific conflict changed America and, for that matter, the world for the worse.

Had the US remained neutral, the war would most likely have come to a far quicker and more politically palatable conclusion, however, the entry of America on the Entente side prolonged the conflict and extended its economic and political destruction to such a degree that the Old Order could not be put back together again.  The great dynasties (Germany, Russia, and especially Austria) were ruthlessly dismantled at the conclusion of WWI by the explicit designs of Wilson which left a power vacuum across Central Europe.  The vacuum, of course, was filled by the various collectivist “isms” which produced the landscape for another global conflagration even greater than WWI.

For America, after a brief revival of isolationism and non-interventionist sentiment throughout the land, the country, led by another ruthless and power-mad chief executive, provoked and schemed its way into the second general European war within a generation, this time via “the backdoor” with Japan.  A second US intervention, making the war global, could not have come about had there been no WWI, or if that war had ended on better terms.

After the Second World War, the US emerged as the world’s dominant power with bases across the globe and entered into a string of never ending hot and cold wars, regime changes, destabilizations, assassinations, bombings, blockades, and economic sanctions that have continued to this very day and hour.  Quickly after the war’s conclusion, the American media, academia, and the security and military industrial complex had to invent the myth that the Soviet Union and the US were of equal military might which turned out to be a blatant lie.  After being decimated in WWII and its adherence to unworkable and economic destructive socialistic planning, the Soviet Union could never produce the wealth necessary to maintain a global empire as the US did, and still does.  The “Soviet threat” was always a ruse to get gullible Americans to vote for and support greater and greater “defense” spending.

Besides Ron Paul and to a far lesser extent his son, Donald Trump was the only viable candidate who spoke of taking a new, less interventionist foreign policy which is why he was able to garner so much support from millions of empire-weary Americans during the presidential campaign.  He rightly called the Iraqi War a “disaster,” spoke of getting along with Russia, and the US’s commitment to NATO should be rethought, among other refreshing comments on foreign affairs.

In one of the most memorable and hopeful passages of his Inaugural Address, the new president championed non-intervention abroad:

We will seek friendship and goodwill with the nations of the world, but we do so with the understanding that it is the right of all nations to put their own interests first. We do not seek to impose our way of life on anyone, but rather to let it shine as an example. We will shine for everyone to follow.

Unlike Ron Paul, however, Trump had no grounding in a true America First foreign policy.  While critical of his predecessors’ foreign policy decisions, Trump was not opposed philosophically to the US Empire or saw it as the greatest threat to world peace which currently exists.

Without an ideological basis against American globalism, Trump was easy pickings against the threats and machinations of the Deep State.  Without a refutation of the ideology which drove Wilson and all of his successors to promote military adventurism abroad, Trump will be little different than his imperial predecessors and with a personality that is thin-skinned, impulsive and unpredictable, Trump could, God forbid, become another Woodrow Wilson.

via http://ift.tt/2pE61aF Tyler Durden

The enemy of my enemy has safe air bases.

In a move which either suggests that i) Syria is preparing for more US attacks, ii) really likes Russians, or iii) is simply doing the logical thing, CNN reports that the Syrian government has moved most of its combat planes to a base located in close proximity to the Russian air base in Syria to protect them from potential US strikes. The movement of the aircraft to the air base at Bassel Al-Assad International Airport began shortly after the US’s April 6 Tomahawk cruise missile strike on Sharat air base, which destroyed some 24 Syrian warplanes.

After the move, the majority of Syria’s operation airforce will be located next to Russia’s Khmeimim Air Base, where the majority of Russian air forces helping ally Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime are based, in Latakia, Syria.

The Khmeimim base, along with a naval facility in Tartus, is one of the two of the primary Russian military installations in Syria, and has in the past been shown to be protected by one or more Russian anti-aircraft missile installations.

While the motive behind the move is obvious, CNN nonetheless points it out:”The regime in Damascus may be calculating that the US would be more reluctant to strike in close proximity to the Russian troops and their anti-aircraft systems.”

Two weeks ago, the US warned Moscow via a pre-established channel in advance of its April 6 cruise missile strike in order to prevent any Russian casualties. So with Russian military assets clearly on the “do not target” list, it was only logical that Assad would do everything to move as many of his own assets as close to the Russian air base as possible.

It was unclear what the current state is of the transported Syrian airplanes. Shortly after the April 6 strike, US defense officials said that the its retaliatory strike incapacitated some 20% of the regime’s operational fixed-wing aircraft, making the preservation of the remaining planes of the utmost importance to Damascus.

“The Syrian Air Force is not in good shape. It’s been worn down by years of combat plus some … significant maintenance problems,” Secretary of Defense Gen. James Mattis told reporters at the Pentagon.
The US has not ruled out additional strikes against the regime should it opt to use chemical weapons in the future. “The Syrian regime should think long and hard before it again acts so recklessly in violation of international law against the use of chemical weapons,” Mattis said, later adding: “If they use chemical weapons, they are going to pay a very, very stiff price.”

Unless, of course, as Oliver Stone most recently suggested, it wasn’t Syria using chemical weapons and instead the attack was as Putin said last week, a false flag. Which begs the question: should another “chemical attack” or “false flag” take place, will the US dare to target Syrian assets in dangerous proximity to the Russian base, or will it simply decide to aim for Assad’s palace. After all, by now it is clear to most that the US goal, from the beginning, has been regime change.

via http://ift.tt/2pDVF7E Tyler Durden

Japanese adjusted trade balance tumbles over 500 billion yen in March (after surging around 500 billion yen in February) as lunar new year effects washed out and left the lowest trade surplus since January 2016.

 

Exports (up 12% YoY) and Imports (up 15.8% YoY) both soared at the fastest pace in years.

Japan’s exports expanded for a fourth consecutive month in March, supporting a moderate economic recovery, according to data released by the Ministry of Finance on Thursday.

Under the surface it was all China…

• Exports to the U.S. increased 3.5 percent from a year earlier.
• Those to the EU rose 1.4 percent.
• Shipments to China, Japan’s largest trading partner, climbed 16.4 percent.

“The February exports number was pretty high because of the Lunar New Year, so the March number will be more stable,” said Yoshiki Shinke, chief economist at Dai-Ichi Life Research Institute, before the release. “That should just be seen as volatility from the holiday. Exports are continuing to increase.”

via http://ift.tt/2pE15j8 Tyler Durden

In an open letter to outgoing Pomona College President David Oxtoby, a group of  self-identified black students from the Claremont Colleges assail the president for, of all things, affirming Pomona’s commitment to free speech, a concept which they argue simply allows “hegemonic institutions” who seek to “perpetuate systems of domination a platform to project their bigotry.”

The letter was written in response to an April 7th email from President Oxtoby in which he reiterated the college’s commitment to “the exercise of free speech and academic freedom” in the aftermath of protests that shut down a scheduled appearance by an invited speaker, scholar and Black Lives Matter critic Heather Mac Donald, on April 6.

“Protest has a legitimate and celebrated place on college campuses,” Oxtoby wrote. “What we cannot support is the act of preventing others from engaging with an invited speaker. Our mission is founded upon the discovery of truth, the collaborative development of knowledge and the betterment of society.”

But that statement was just more than the ‘triggered’ snowflakes of Pomona could handle.  As such, they fired off a letter to the president explaining that apparently the notion of “free speech” was only intended for “marginalized” persons and not society as a whole.

Free speech, a right many freedom movements have fought for, has recently become a tool appropriated by hegemonic institutions. It has not just empowered students from marginalized backgrounds to voice their qualms and criticize aspects of the institution, but it has given those who seek to perpetuate systems of domination a platform to project their bigotry.

 

“Thus, if ‘our mission is founded upon the discovery of truth, how does free speech uphold that value?”

 

The students go on blast the president for apparently requiring minority students to “subject themselves routinely to the hate speech of fascists”….because ignoring visitors with whom they have a difference of opinion would simply be impossible.

As President, you are charged with upholding principles of Pomona College. Though this institution as well as many others including this entire country, have been founded upon the oppression and degradation of marginalized bodies, it has a liability to protect the students that it serves.  The paradox is that Pomona’s past is rooted in domination of marginalized peoples and communities and the student body has a significant population of students from these backgrounds. Your recent statement reveals where Pomona’s true intentions lie.

 

Either you support students of marginalized identities, particularly Black students, or leave us to protect and organize for our communities without the impositions of your patronization, without your binary respectability politics, and without your monolithic perceptions of protest and organizing. In addition, non-Black individuals do not have the right to prescribe how Black people respond to anti-Blackness.

 

The idea that we must subject ourselves routinely to the hate speech of fascists who want for us not to exist plays on the same Eurocentric constructs that believed Black people to be impervious to pain and apathetic to the brutal and violent conditions of white supremacy.

And, of course, the students finish their letter with a list of demands that includes, among other things, a call for punishment of the entire “Claremont Independent editorial staff for its continual perpetuation of hate speech, anti-Blackness, and intimidation toward students of marginalized backgrounds.”

Also, we demand a revised email sent to the entire student body, faculty, and staff by Thursday, April 20, 2017, apologizing for the previous patronizing statement, enforcing that Pomona College does not tolerate hate speech and speech that projects violence onto the bodies of its marginalized students and oppressed peoples, especially Black students who straddle the intersection of marginalized identities, and explaining the steps the institution will take and the resources it will allocate to protect the aforementioned students.

 

We also demand that Pomona College and the Claremont University Consortium entities take action against the Claremont Independent editorial staff (http://ift.tt/2oMGryR) for its continual perpetuation of hate speech, anti-Blackness, and intimidation toward students of marginalized backgrounds. Provided that the Claremont Independent releases the identity of students involved with this letter and such students begin to receive threats and hate mail, we demand that this institution and its constituents take legal action against members of the Claremont Independent involved with the editing and publication process as well as disciplinary action, such as expulsion on the grounds of endangering the wellbeing of others.

Let this be a lesson to all you college presidents out there who may be thinking about taking a stand in support of ‘free speech’…that kind of aggression will not stand, man.

The full letter can be viewed here:

via http://ift.tt/2oN4Nsj Tyler Durden