A belated Happy New Year! Our resolution: to continue bringing you this morning compendium of news as well as all the other reporting, commentary and analysis you’ve come to expect at BillMoyers.com. And to go to the gym more.
Mario Cuomo, RIP –> In his prime, many hoped Mario Cuomo would run for president or be appointed to the US Supreme Court. The three-time New York State governor, 82, died New Year’s Day, just hours after his son Andrew was sworn in for his own second gubernatorial term. Over the weekend, tributes will continue to pour in for the eloquent liberal: here are some preliminary obituaries from The New York Times, the NY Daily News, the Albany Times Union and USA Today. AND: Here’s Mario Cuomo’s keynote address to the 1984 Democratic National Convention, considered one of the finest pieces of American political rhetoric ever written.
Deadliest –> The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reports that in 2014 more than 76,000 were killed in the fourth year of fighting in Syria, the worst yet. The Guardian has more.
See you in court –> A day after the UN Security Council rejected a resolution demanding an end to the Israeli occupation of the West Bank, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas announced that the PA would seek to join the International Criminal Court, “opening a new front in the Middle East conflict that could lead to war-crimes prosecutions of Israeli officials and that risks severe sanctions from Washington and Jerusalem,” according to Jodi Rudoren at the NYT.
New trial in Cairo –> At WaPo, Heba Habib and Erin Cunningham report that an Egyptian judge has announced the retrial of three Al Jazeera English journalists convicted in May of collaborating with the Muslim Brotherhood, accusations they deny. Meanwhile, Patrick Kingsley at The Guardian writes that two of the three “have formally applied to bypass Egypt’s legal system by being deported to their home countries,” making use of a decree from Egypt’s president in November “that allows foreign defendants to be tried in their home countries instead of Egypt.”
Ready the rice –> As per the Miami Herald, a federal judge ruled on New Year’s Day “that all Florida clerks are bound by the U.S. Constitution not to enforce Florida’s gay marriage ban and that any couple seeking a license on Tuesday should receive one.” The judge also warned the clerks that they could be sued for failure to comply.
Good news from Death Row –> On New Year’s Eve, outgoing Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley announced that he was commuting the sentences of all those still awaiting the death sentence in the state’s prisons to life without parole. In 2013, the state legislature repealed the death sentence for any future convictions. Josh Israel has details at ThinkProgress.
It’s about time –> Dionne Searcey of the NYT reports that despite GOP efforts to quash it, government spending is back on the increase and serving as a stimulus: “Looking ahead, some economists are counting on spending on infrastructure and other capital investments to help nudge the economy ahead.”
An honor he dreams not of –> French economist Thomas Piketty, whose best-selling tome, Capitalism in the 21st Century, made vivid the accelerating income gap between the very rich and everyone else, has turned down France’s highest official award, the Legion d’Honneur. He told AFP, “I refuse this nomination because I do not think it is the government’s role to decide who is honorable.”
Another resolution: No more 2014 year-end lists –> Okay, just two more. Micah Zenko at Foreign Policy has a list of 2014’s “top 20 bloviations, lies, and just plain dumb lines from US government officials and politicians.” And at Vanity Fair, Kia Makarechi and Matthew Lynch run down their choices for the 11 best media corrections of the past year.
Bombs away –> BBC World Service Radio reports on the plan of a group called Fighters for a Free North Korea to airdrop copies of The Interview into the Democratic People’s Republic via hydrogen balloon…
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