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Banks close 1,700 branches in past 12 months, fastest pace in decades

Rachel Louise Ensign, Christina Rexrode and Coulter Jones
Wall Street Journal
Mon, 05 Feb 2018 23:04 UTC
banks closing
© DAVID MORRIS FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
Charlene LeBlanc continues to bank at Regions even after it shut its branch in Centreville, Miss. She now has to drive 30 miles to get to the nearest branch
Banks are closing branches at the fastest pace in decades, as they leave less profitable regions and fewer customers use tellers for routine transactions.

The number of branches in the U.S. shrank by more than 1,700 in the 12 months ended in June 2017, the biggest decline on record, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis of federal data.

Branch numbers fell again in the second half of 2017, according to related data submitted to bank regulators and reviewed by the Journal. That would add to the thousands of locations closed following the financial crisis, and is the longest stretch of closures since the Great Depression.

Many of the closings were in big cities and surrounding suburbs, where branches were consolidated largely because of falling foot traffic. Others were in rural areas, where some large regional lenders are leaving town altogether.
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Dollars

Study: Resettling refugees costs US taxpayers more than $8B in five years

John Binder
Source
Mon, 05 Feb 2018 21:12 UTC
refugees
© Frederic J. Brown/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images
Over a five year period, American taxpayers are billed more than $8 billion for the resettlement of thousands of foreign refugees every year, a new study finds.

In research conducted by the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), analysts concluded that annual refugee resettlement costs American taxpayers about $1.8 billion a year, and over five years, about $8.8 billion.

FAIR's research found that of the $1.8 billion annual cost of resettling refugees in the U.S., about $867 million was spent on welfare.

Comment:

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Handcuffs

Complaint: 'Collateral arrests' by ICE amount to racial profiling, violation of immigrants' rights

Andrea Castillo
Los Angeles Times
Sun, 04 Feb 2018 05:00 UTC
ICE arrest
© ICE
They burst into View Park Automotive in South Los Angeles carrying semi-automatic weapons and wearing vests that simply read "police." Four men, including Juan Hernandez Cuevas, were handcuffed and taken away.

Hernandez, 46, said he had no idea which law enforcement agency had just arrested him - or why - until he arrived at a downtown L.A. processing facility and saw the word "immigration" written on a wall.

On that late September afternoon, at least six agents with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrived with a warrant for the owner of the shop, who had an outstanding deportation order based on multiple DUI convictions.

They didn't identify themselves or ask questions about the men's immigration status as they arrested every employee on the property. "In the moment, I just had the worry and anguish about what would happen with my wife and child," Hernandez said.

The Trump administration calls immigrants who are not the original targets but are swept up during enforcement actions "collateral arrests." While some do have criminal records, some have none. Immigrant rights advocates say the practice is a return to the George W. Bush presidency, a period when large-scale workplace raids were common.

Comment: When laws change and protocol is revised, mindsets remain more/less the same. There are those who have the capacity to understand the big picture and those who can only complain.

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Question

Syria: Is Turkey's attack on Afrin intended to split the US-Kurdish alliance?


Moon of Alabama
Tue, 06 Feb 2018 00:00 UTC
Map Afrin/NW Syria
© edmaps.com
The successful Syrian army operation to liberate Abu-Duhur airbase left a large enclave (pink) controlled by al-Qaeda and ISIS fighters in east-Hama. Further advances towards Idlib have been halted for now to clean up the cauldron that could otherwise create future troubles behind the lines.

Most of the al-Qaeda/HTS aligned Takfiris are thought to have fled the now enclosed area before it was encircled by the Syrian government forces. A few hundred ISIS fighters who had earlier slipped into there then claimed to have occupied dozens of empty local villages. But these forces are in fact too small to hold onto anything. They will now be sought out and destroyed. In just one day some 20 hamlets were liberated. It will take a week or two to bring the total area under control.
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Arrow Up

Momentum rising for tuition-free college in California

Chuck Collins
The Nation
Wed, 07 Feb 2018 07:00 UTC
Grads $
© CNN Money/KJN
"Put free college on the November ballot," urges Estuardo Mazariegos to a student walking by. "Make California higher education free again, like it was in the 1970s."

Mazariegos greets fellow students as they return from their holiday break to the Dominguez Hills campus of the California State University in Los Angeles, one of 23 state-university campuses in the sprawling state.

Across California, students have begun the formidable task of collecting over 585,407 signatures from registered voters to put their "College for All Act" on the ballot for this November. Inspired by Bernie Sanders's presidential campaign proposal to institute free higher education, these young activists are moving forward at the state level to make Bernie's vision a reality.

"All of the revenue raised will go to making public community colleges and universities in California tuition-free and reducing the barriers to young people attending college," said Mazariegos, who grew up in South Central Los Angeles, but now lives in the Crenshaw neighborhood.

Comment: It is one thing to reduce student costs or eliminate student loans and have a fair and acceptable plan - whether this one or something else. It is another to do so as bait in order to register this pool of potential voters (Bernie's idea/Democratic) with a compelling and personal issue in order to pad the voting booths at election time to capitalize party support. As was mentioned: "One lesson from the 2016 campaign is you can only go so far saying our opponent is a monster," said Bhalla. "You need to have a compelling progressive vision."

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Footprints

Syrian madhouse is getting even crazier

Eric Margolis
The Unz Review
Sat, 03 Feb 2018 00:00 UTC
Turkish military
© Rudaw
Turkish Military
Last summer, I was positioned just across the border from the Syrian town of Afrin around which Turkish and Kurdish and, possibly, American forces, are now poised for a head-on clash. It seems crazy to me that anyone would want to fight over this one-donkey farm town. We were there on a mission to rescue wild animals trapped in a zoo in war-torn Aleppo, Syria.

Why on earth are at least 2,000 US troops mixed up in this fracas in darkest Syria? Because the pro-Israel neocons in Washington, who pretty much run US foreign policy these days, are determined to have revenge for the defeat of US-backed rebel forces in Syria. So it's once more into the breach near Afrin and the town Manbij though America has zero national interests in Syria. The US first tried to overthrow Syria's governments in Damascus in 1948 because it was too independent and flirting with the Soviets. Today's intervention is part of Israel's plan to fragment Syria and gobble up its water and fertile land resources.


Comment: No one wants to fight over a one-donkey farm town. It is about dominance and foothold.


Comment: Margolis is not a war strategist, nor an unbiased commentator regarding 'who did what and why'. His perspective is movie-script colorful. See also:

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Light Sabers

Snowden takes issue with Tucker Carlson claiming intelligence agencies have misused their powers 'for the first time'


RT
Wed, 07 Feb 2018 20:14 UTC
snowden
© Brendan McDermid / Reuters
Whistleblower Edward Snowden called out Fox News host Tucker Carlson for claiming Americans have grounds to believe intelligence agencies have misused their powers "for the first time."

Carlson tweeted Tuesday: "For the first time in generations Americans have reason to believe that our intelligence and law enforcement agencies gravely misuse the powers we have given them."

While the US government's inclination to spy on its citizens may have come as a surprise to Carlson, former NSA contractor Edward Snowden - who leaked documents showing the agency's mass surveillance of Americans in 2013 - begged to differ.

Tucker's 'revelation' was ignited by a declassified intelligence memo, released Friday which claims the FBI and DOJ secured a warrant to spy on Trump adviser Carter Page using the 'Steele dossier' paid for by the Hillary Clinton campaign. The dossier played a key part in the order obtained by the FBI from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. The DOJ and FBI objected to the release.

Comment: Snowden is right to point out that what the public is finding out is nothing new:

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Red Flag

Vulnerable groups of people make up half of Taser deaths by police in US


RT
Wed, 07 Feb 2018 20:06 UTC
taser
© Regis Duvignau / Reuters
Vulnerable groups of people, including the elderly, pregnant women, and people with heart conditions, make up half of the Taser deaths caused by US police, according to a new investigation by Reuters.

People who could be classified as 'vulnerable' comprise more than half of the 1,028 cases identified by Reuters in which people died after being shocked by Tasers. Out of these, 245 people had a heart condition and 643 people were drunk or high on drugs.

Nearly a third of the US population can be considered a 'vulnerable' group and are at greater risk of death or injury from Taser shocks, the Reuters report found. Stun guns are used by police to immobilize targets by delivering a painful electric shock.

Axon Enterprise Inc, the Arizona-based company which produces Taser guns, warns against using them on "higher risk populations." These people should be targeted "only if the situation justifies an increased risk" of injury or death, the company said.
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Chess

Senate agrees on two-year budget proposal thwarting possible government shutdown


RT
Wed, 07 Feb 2018 19:58 UTC
capitol hill
© Jim Bourg / Reuters
Leaders of both parties in the US Senate have agreed on a two-year budget proposal that would remove the threat of government shutdowns. The compromise removes spending caps on both military and domestic programs.

The deal eliminates the civilian and military sequester for two years, increasing the Pentagon funding by $80 billion and domestic spending by $63 billion for the fiscal year 2018, NPR reported citing congressional sources.

"This budget deal is a genuine breakthrough," said Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-New York), adding that it consigns the "arbitrary... sequester caps to the ash heap of history."

"No one would suggest it's perfect but we worked hard to find common ground," said Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky), introducing the deal on the floor. He added the bill will have an amendment process that's "fair to all sides."
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Heart

Bassem Tamimi writes heartfelt letter to daughter Ahed Tamimi on her 17th birthday


samidoun.net
Fri, 02 Feb 2018 19:17 UTC
Bassem and Ahed Tamimi

Bassem and Ahed Tamimi support the campaign to free Georges Abdallah at the September 2017 conference on Palestinian women and resistance.
Bassem Tamimi, the father of imprisoned Palestinian teen activist Ahed Tamimi (and the husband of Nariman Tamimi, imprisoned alongside their daughter) issued a powerful message on his Facebook account on 2 February, greeting his daughter as she turned 17 on 31 January.

Palestinians and solidarity organizers around the world held demonstrations, celebrations and gatherings demanding Ahed's freedom as well as that of her fellow Palestinian prisoners - and Palestine itself. Further events and actions are planned in the coming days.

Bassem Tamimi himself has spent years in prison - including as an Amnesty International recognized prisoner of conscience - for his role in the indigenous land defense movement in the Palestinian village of Nabi Saleh, targeted for repression and land and water confiscation by occupation forces and settler colonial Zionism.
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