Arthur Blank Family Foundation Donates $50 Million to Atlanta’s Historically Black Colleges

The Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation announced a $50 million donation to Atlanta’s historically Black colleges and universities on Monday, aiming to close financial aid gaps that might otherwise prevent students from completing their degrees.

The money will support nearly 10,000 students with “gap scholarships” if they are approaching graduation in good academic standing and have exhausted all other sources of financial support. The aim is to raise graduation rates at Clark Atlanta University, Morehouse College, Morris Brown College and Spelman College, according to the foundation’s announcement. [MORE]

"State of LA Report" says Black People More Likely to; have Poor Health, Lower Life Expectancy, be Homeless, Targeted and Stopped by Police and Have Lower Incomes in City Controlled by Elite Liberals

Is Compensation Owed to Members of a Group Maintained in Subordinate Positions through Empirically Demonstrable Oppression? Gov Gavin Newsom Vetoes 5 Bills for Reparative "Justice" for Black People

From [HERE] Gov. Gavin Newsom on Monday night vetoed several bills that were part of the Legislative Black Caucus’ ‘Road to Repair’ priority package, intended to address a legacy of injustice toward Black Californians. Of the caucus’ 15 bills, only ten made it to the governor’s desk, and he vetoed more than half of them.

The governor vetoed bills that would have given descendants of slaves more opportunity for university admission, home-buying and professional licenses, and also shot down proposals to expand Diversity Equity and Inclusion strategic planning and help people regain property after racially-motivated eminent domain.

Newsom attributed several of the vetoes to a lack of state funds or capability. Others he said were unnecessary or would diminish the utility of an existing program.

On the subject of Assembly Bill 7, which would have clarified that California colleges are allowed to consider whether an applicant was a descendent of slaves, Newsom thanked author Assemblymember Isaac Bryan, D-Jefferson Park, but said the bill was “unnecessary” because state universities already have the power to determine whether to make such admission preferences.

“I encourage the institutions referenced in this bill to review and determine how, when, and if this type of preference can be adopted,” he wrote.

Bryan said the veto was “more than disappointing.”

“While the Trump Administration threatens our institutions of higher learning and attacks the foundations of diversity and inclusivity, now is not the time to shy away from the fight to protect students who have descended from legacies of harm and exclusion.”

Earlier this month, Newsom signed SB 518, from state Sen. Akilah Weber Pierson, D-San Diego, which will create the Bureau for Descendants of American Slavery, a state agency “responsible for verifying eligibility, safeguarding privacy, educating the public, and coordinating future reparative justice initiatives.”

On Monday night, he also signed three bills that were part of the package: one that would authorize the California State University to conduct a $6 million study to explore how to determine whether or not someone is the descendant of slaves, another that would expand how much pay equity data private employers need to report to the state’s Civil Rights Department, and a third requiring the CRD to better monitor and publish data about the complaints they receive.

Advocates expressed frustration Monday night about the bills that were denied by the governor.

“While we acknowledge the signing of SB 518 as a meaningful step, the Governor’s selective support undermines the very vision of comprehensive reparations that began with AB 3121,” said Juliana Williams, a spokesperson for the Alliance for Reparations, Reconciliation, and Truth, referencing the bill that required the state to make a task force to study reparations.

[barbarians pause massacre until the next massacre] Israeli Soldiers Torched Food, Homes, and a Critical Sewage Treatment Plant in the Wake of Ceasefire Announcement

From [HERE] In the immediate aftermath of Donald Trump’s announcement on Thursday that both Hamas and Israel had signed off on an agreement to stop the fighting, the Israeli military launched an arson spree, setting fire to civilian infrastructure, including the destruction of an essential sanitation plant in Gaza City. After publication, the Israel Defense Forces told Drop Site it “is aware of the incident and it is being reviewed.”

The destruction of Palestinian structures following the departure of soldiers who had used them as temporary bases has been a hallmark of Israel’s approach to Gaza for two years. In July, Israeli reporter Yuval Abraham collected testimonies from soldiers describing a myriad of arson methods. “Every Arab house we entered had olive oil [...] We poured the oil on the sofas, on anything flammable in the apartment, and then we ignited [it] or threw in a smoke grenade. This was a common practice,” one of them described.

The agreement came after months of a concerted effort to render Gaza uninhabitable by destroying residences and civilian infrastructure, culminating in the ground invasion of Gaza City and the leveling of several high rises in Gaza City. In September, Israeli government minister Gila Gamliel told Channel 7 News, “We have already completely annihilated 75% of the entire [Gaza] Strip. There remains 25%, which, as you know, it too...we are now taking over [the city of] Gaza—there will be nothing left there that would really [have] the potential to be habitable.” [MORE]

Forest Park (IL) Mayor says ICE-Hole Agents Made Warrantless Forced Entry Into a Closed Cemetery and then Detained US Citizens for 5 Hours Searching for Non-White Immigrants

ICE-Hole Cops Shot a White Christian Pastor in the Head w/a Pepper Ball from a Rooftop During Protest in Chicago; he Posed No Imminent Threat to them

New Report: ‘Garbage Science’ Behind Claims COVID Shots Saved Millions

From [HERE] A new report by Canadian researchers challenges widely cited claims that COVID-19 vaccines saved millions of lives in the U.S.

The authors of a preprint paper published this week by Correlation, a Canadian nonprofit research organization, argue that the claims are based on modelling studies that use flawed assumptions resulting in “fantastic and unverifiable” conclusions.

For example, Peter Hotez, M.D., Ph.D. — in interviews and in his 2024 congressional testimony — cited a 2022 study by Meagan Fitzpatrick, Ph.D., touting 3.2 million lives saved by the vaccines.

Legacy media latched onto Fitzpatrick’s and Hotez’s claims, widely repeating and amplifying them.

But according to all-cause mortality experts Denis Rancourt, Ph.D., and Joseph Hickey, Ph.D., Fitzpatrick used a “counterfactual theoretical calculation” that yielded incorrect assumptions about infection fatality rates and vaccine efficacy.

In their new paper, Rancourt and Hickey argue that counterfactual calculations like those used by Fitzpatrick and other researchers can lead to dangerous conclusions and shouldn’t be used to drive policy.

“False claims accepted by government officials and their advisers can have a disastrous effect on public health policy and society,” they said.

They also reassess the claims made in several studies that estimate the number of lives saved by COVID-19 vaccines, and challenge the validity of the studies’ underlying assumptions. [MORE]

["those in power want to kill you"] Dr. SHIVA: The SWARM Controls You — Until You Awaken

Authorities are Implanting the Population w/Self-Replicating Nanotech for Greater Control Over Humans

[MORE]

US Government Used a Massive Housing Project in St Louis as a Laboratory to Run Deadly Experiments w/Bio Weapons on Black Residents. Chemicals Put in Water and Air Caused Cancers, Disease and Death

Study Finds No Showers, Black Mold and Clogged Toilets in Reprehensible Prisons in Cleveland, St. Louis and Hinds County that are Filled w/Mostly Black People and Run by Elite, White Liberals

Poor sanitation in jails has been the subject of civil rights lawsuits for decades. Plumbing issues, vermin infestations, feces-covered walls, and limited access to basic hygiene products, such as soap or tampons, are common complaints.

Courts almost universally agree that a lack of basic sanitation violates detainees' constitutional rights, said David Fathi, director of the ACLU’s National Prison Project. Pre-trial detainees have sued, arguing that filthy conditions violate their due process rights. If a person has already been convicted, allegations of foul living conditions are considered cruel and unusual punishment.

Despite widespread legal challenges, many jails across the country are still filthy. Litigation against substandard conditions often ends in a settlement, Fathi noted, with officials agreeing to a change in policy, or better monitoring and enforcement, in exchange for not taking the case to trial. Settlements are typically the fastest route to clean things up, but they don’t set a legal precedent for other facilities, meaning there’s nothing requiring jails in the same county or state to adopt reforms.

Good hygiene in jail is often about more than detainees’ willingness to keep clean. Understaffing, overcrowding, facility maintenance, and mental health issues can all play a role. For example, the ACLU of Oregon, settled a lawsuit in 2019 against a county jail that had allegedly crowded a dozen women into a single intake cell, where they had to beg for toilet paper and menstrual products, and were denied showers.

“People don’t want to live in filth,” said Dr. Fred Rottnek, director of community medicine at St. Louis University and former medical lead at the St. Louis County Jail. “They are at the mercy of the administration to provide needed services because they can’t do it on their own.”

Reporters from The Marshall Project’s local news teams dug into the state of sanitation at jails in St. Louis, Cleveland and Hinds County, Mississippi, home to Jackson, the state capitol. They found that poor jail maintenance and management, as well as understaffing, mean many detainees are left to live in unsanitary conditions. [MORE]

Treadmilling Black Caucus Chases an Elusive Pot of Gold in CA: New State Agency Created for the Ostensible Purpose of Providing Reparations and the Actual Purpose of Diverting Gullible Black Voters

Five years after California Gov. Gavin Newsom created a task force to study the legacy of enslavement in California, a state agency has been created in order to facilitate restitution for the descendants of those who were enslaved in the state, despite not approving cash payments for the wrongs visited upon their ancestors.

According to Politico, in an episode of Van Latham and Rachel Lindsay’s "Higher Learning," which was released on Oct. 10, the same day Gov. Newsom announced the creation of the agency, he noted that the office is a necessary step to further action concerning reparations.

"I signed a bill two days ago with the Black Caucus as it relates to creating a new office to address these systemic issues," he told the hosts.

Previously, in 2024, Newsom signaled that part of the reason he vetoed a bill that would have compensated the victims of the state’s past use of racially-motivated eminent domain was because there was no state agency to disperse funds to Black Californians. [MORE]

Patterson Cops Stopped Black Man b/c ‘He Widened His Eyes and Touched His Bag When He Saw Them.’ Cops Brutally Assaulted Him While he was Cuffed Causing Brain, Testicle Injury. Suit Moves Forward

From [HERE] On Monday, a federal judge ruled that parts of a lawsuit alleging that Paterson police officers beat a Black man and ignored his medical needs during a 2022 arrest can proceed.

U.S. District Judge Jamel K. Semper ruled that Benjamin Jackson’s claims against the officers—John Rikowich, Corey Davis, Muhammed Dombayci, and Salameh—can move forward in court.

Benjamin Jackson, 53, of Saddle Brook, claims he was stopped without probable cause on Nov. 6, 2022, while walking in Paterson, thrown to the ground and beaten after officers falsely accused him of suspicious behavior. Jackson filed a federal civil rights lawsuit in November 2024, accusing more than a dozen Paterson police officers of excessive force, sexual assault, and denial of medical care. Jackson contends his arrest and subsequent treatment were racially motivated.

According to the complaint, Jackson was stopped by undercover plainclothes officers between 8 and 9 p.m. on Nov. 6, 2022, at Broadway and East 18th Street. The officers were all equipped with body-worn cameras that were activated during the incident.

The lawsuit states one of the police officers saw Jackson widening his eyes, appearing startled and slowing his pace after spotting the officers’ unmarked police vehicle. Another officer saw Jackson touch his fanny pack and mistakenly believed there might be a firearm inside.

The “officers wrongfully used these pre-textual and alleged behaviors as a justification to stop (Jackson),” the suit says.

The suit says the officers insisted on searching Jackson, who told them that New Jersey is “not a stop and frisk state,” and asked for a police supervisor to come to the scene.

In all, Jackson asked for a supervisor 15 times as officers placed him in handcuffs with one officer telling him, “All you was doing was making problems.”

The body camera footage shows Jackson complying with police commands before being thrown to the ground and placed in handcuffs, according to the suit.

Officers “brutally kicked him, punched him in the face, chest and stomach, and slammed his face and head into the ground,” aggravated the brain surgery wound, the suit alleges.

At one point, an officer allegedly grabbed Jackson’s genitals while his hands were cuffed behind his back. “That’s for free bro, don’t even worry about it,” the officer allegedly said, in a statement the lawsuit says was captured on body-worn cameras.

Other officers are accused of standing by and laughing during the incident, the complaint alleges.

Despite Jackson’s warnings about his condition and pleas for medical attention, the officers continued their alleged assault, leaving him with severe injuries, including a testicular condition requiring surgery, the suit alleges.

A separate claim accusing the city of failing to properly train and supervise its officers was also allowed to proceed.

However, many of Jackson’s other claims were dismissed, including those for false imprisonment, discrimination, emotional distress, and negligence.

Semper said some lacked detail, others didn’t meet legal standards, and one—alleging sexual assault—was duplicative of another claim already moving forward.

Although Jackson named more than a dozen officers in the lawsuit, the judge dismissed claims against several, including those alleged to have witnessed the incident or failed to intervene.

The judge also dismissed all claims against the Paterson Police Department because, under the law, the department isn’t considered a separate legal entity from the city itself.

That means the department can’t be sued directly; any legal claims must be made against the City of Paterson, which oversees and is legally responsible for the department.

Gallup Finds Trust in Massa' Media at New Low of 28% in U.S. (racial data not provided)

Americans’ confidence in the mass media has edged down to a new low, with just 28% expressing a “great deal” or “fair amount” of trust in newspapers, television and radio to report the news fully, accurately and fairly. This is down from 31% last year and 40% five years ago.

Meanwhile, seven in 10 U.S. adults now say they have “not very much” confidence (36%) or “none at all” (34%).

When Gallup began measuring trust in the news media in the 1970s, between 68% and 72% of Americans expressed confidence in reporting. However, by the next reading in 1997, public confidence had fallen to 53%. Media trust remained just above 50% until it dropped to 44% in 2004, and it has not risen to the majority level since. The highest reading in the past decade was 45% in 2018, which came just two years after confidence had collapsed amid the divisive 2016 presidential campaign.

The latest 28% confidence reading, from a Sept. 2-16 poll, marks the first time the measure has fallen below 30%. [MORE]

The Media Loves “The Experts,” Until it’s Time to Count the Number of People Murdered in Gaza by Israel Authorities in One Sided, US Funded Massacre

Far from being inflated by sneaky Hamas propagandists, the commonly cited death toll of the war in Gaza is an extreme undercount. 

Virtually every news article about the Israel-Hamas war cites the death toll provided by the strip’s Ministry of Health. Currently at 60,900 (and climbing by the day), the MOH toll is widely accepted as an accurate minimum. Still, journalists and political figures aligned with Israel often call it into question in a range of ways, from attaching the label “Hamas-controlled” to the Ministry itself to outright denying its accuracy. In 2023, even former President Joe Biden invoked this idea, saying that he had “no confidence in the number that the Palestinians are using.”

Because the Ministry’s death toll has attracted this undeserved controversy, the standard reporting line is to explain why the MOH figures are considered reliable. For example, the Washington Post recently published a detailed accounting of the names, and in some cases the photos, of roughly 18,500 children who are counted among the dead overall.

But in defending and insisting on the MOH figures, media outlets have defended the bare minimum, and the result is a public debate that revolves around an understated count. Hence why New York Times columnist Bret Stephens can write an opinion piece arguing that 60,000 dead is tragic, but small relative to what Israel could do. Those terms of debate are accepted even by his harshest critics.

But the figure everyone knows is not an undercount of a few thousand or even ten thousand. The real toll could well be twice as high. That is according to a growing body of research that is conspicuously absent in news coverage of Gaza—despite the eagerness of newsrooms to emphasize expert opinion on other divisive topics, like COVID-19 policy or climate change.

The standard figure largely counts only those whose bodies reached health workers and those who were killed violently. But in reality, the institutions that count the dead are heavily degraded, thousands remain under rubble, and deaths due to malnutrition or easily preventable diseases are rarely included in MOH totals, if at all. [MORE]

The Vested Interests Reward Piece Activist Puppet w/Their 'Nobel Prize' to Promote Division, Erode Venezuela’s Sovereignty and to Help US Gov Steal the Largest Oil Reserves in the World

When I saw the headline “Maria Corina Machado Wins the Nobel Peace Prize,” I almost laughed at the absurdity. But I didn’t, because there’s nothing funny about rewarding someone whose politics have brought so much suffering. Anyone who knows what she stands for knows there’s nothing remotely peaceful about her politics.

If this is what counts as “peace” in 2025, then the prize itself has lost every ounce of credibility. I’m Venezuelan-American, and I know exactly what Machado represents. She’s the smiling face of Washington’s regime-change machine, the polished spokesperson for sanctions, privatization, and foreign intervention dressed up as democracy.

Machado’s politics are steeped in violence. She has called for foreign intervention, even appealing directly to Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the architect of Gaza’s annihilation, to help “liberate” Venezuela with bombs under the banner of “freedom.” She has demanded sanctions, that silent form of warfare whose effects—as studies in The Lancet and other journals have shown —have killed more people than war, cutting off medicine, food, and energy to entire populations.

Machado has spent her entire political life promoting division, eroding Venezuela’s sovereignty, and denying its people the right to live with dignity. [MORE]

Report: Trump Administration Working on Strategy To ‘Eliminate’ Venezuela’s President and Install Remotely Controlled Puppetician

From [HERE] The Trump administration is working on a strategy to “eliminate” Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, according to a report from POLITICO’s National Security Daily.

The report focused on US special envoy Ric Grenell, who was recently instructed to halt his diplomatic efforts with the Venezuelan government. Sources told NatSec Daily that they didn’t think the move meant Grenell was on the outs, but rather that the US was now focused on escalating its efforts to oust Maduro.

“The president is serious. No more mixed messages. No more excuses,” a person familiar with the Trump administration’s thinking told NatSec Daily. “There is now a coherent whole-of-government strategy to eliminate Cartel de los Soles and its leader.”

The “Cartel de los Soles” is a term used to describe a network of Venezuelan government officials allegedly involved in drug trafficking. The group does not actually exist as an organization, but the US has declared it a “terrorist” group and has claimed Maduro is its leader.

Maduro and other Venezuelan officials have strongly denied the US allegations, pointing to data that shows the majority of the cocaine that is produced in Colombia doesn’t go through Venezuela. President Trump has framed the military campaign in the region, which has involved bombing at least four boats, as a response to overdose deaths in the US due to fentanyl, but fentanyl isn’t produced in Venezuela, and it does not go through the country on its way to the US.

The Trump administration appears to be determined to escalate things to the next level, which could involve bombing Venezuela or attempting to seize strategic ports or airfields in the country, steps that would almost certainly provoke a full-blown war with the government.

Massa Media and ICE Pretend Small Number of White Folks w/Whistles and Signs in a Parking Lot are a Massive Group of Armed Terrorists Assembled to Overthrow Government