Trina's Kitchen: Frico CA-do Toast in the Kitchen

As always, California Avocados has great recipes. This one is for Frico CA-do Toast:

Frico: Vegetable spray 4 cups shredded Parmesan cheese 4 cups shredded Cheddar cheese 1/4 cup everything but the bagel seasoning California Avocado Smash: 6 ripe, Fresh California Avocados, seeded and peeled 3 1/2 tsp. salt-pepper-garlic seasoning 4 1/2 oz. fresh lime juice Frico CA-do Toasts: 48 slices fresh tomato 3 ripe, Fresh California Avocados, seeded, peeled and quartered 10 hard-boiled eggs, diced

Frico:

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Line two half sheet pans with foil or non-stick baking mats and spray with vegetable spray.
In a bowl, mix the Parmesan and Cheddar. Divide it between the two pans, spreading the cheese mixture evenly.
Sprinkle both pans with everything seasoning.
Bake until the cheese is fully melted and lightly browned on both pans, 8 to 10 minutes.
Remove from the oven and use a pizza cutter to cut each pan into 12 squares. Let cool.

California Avocado Smash:

Halve the California Avocados and smash them in a bowl with the garlic seasoning and lime juice. Leave the mixture chunky.
To store, place a piece of plastic wrap directly on the surface of the smash and refrigerate until needed.

Frico CA-do Toasts:

For each serving, use two Fricos. Spread about 2 Tbsp. Avocado Smash on each one.
Thinly slice 1/4 avocado.
Top each Frico with 2 slices of tomato, a few slices of avocado and 1 Tbsp. diced egg. Serve 2 toasts per order.

Serving Suggestion: Balance the rich frico with a clean, light lager or Sauvignon Blanc.

*Large avocados are recommended for this recipe. A large avocado averages about 8 ounces. If using smaller or larger size avocados adjust the quantity accordingly.

News? Sonali Kolhatkar (CounterPunch) reports:

There are many issues on the line this election year but one that gets little attention is former President Donald Trump’s 2017 tax reform law that cut taxes on the wealthiest Americans and corporations. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act permanently reduced the tax rate for big corporations from an already-low 35 percent to a ridiculously minuscule 21 percent. It also lowered tax rates for the wealthiest people from nearly 40 percent to 37 percent. Several provisions of that law are set to expire in 2025, making this November’s Congressional and Presidential elections particularly critical to issues of economic fairness and justice.

A few months after Trump signed the bill, he boasted, “We have the biggest tax cut in history, bigger than the Reagan tax cut. Bigger than any tax cut.” It became a common refrain for him when touting his achievements. But, Trump, who was known for breaking all records on lying to the public while in office, conflated many different facts to come up with a positive-sounding falsehood in a nation already primed by the likes of Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton to view taxation as anathema. Trump’s tax cuts as a whole were the eighth largest in history. But his corporate tax cut was in fact the single largest reduction ever in that category.

Wealthy corporations have for years lobbied for and won so many carve-outs and loopholes to the U.S. tax system, and hidden so much money in offshore tax havens that their pre-2017 effective tax rates were already far lower than the official rates. Then, Trump lowered them even more. Imagine telling the American public that you are responsible specifically for the biggest tax cuts to the biggest corporations in U.S. history. It wasn’t a good look. And so, he lied, saying that he signed history’s biggest tax cut overall.

In the simplest terms, taxes are a way to pool collective resources so we can have the things we all need for safety and security. Progressive taxation is when wealthier individuals (and corporations) are taxed at higher-than-average rates because the richer one is, the less excess money one needs beyond one’s basic necessities. Progressive taxation ensures that wealth inequality doesn’t spiral out of control and helps ensure money that’s being sucked upwards, gets redistributed downward. When wealthy elites pay fewer taxes, they are effectively stealing from the public.

This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot" for Tuesday:

Tuesday, March 12, 2024. Steve Coll takes a break from attacking Julian Assange in order to serve up lies and revisionary history on the Iraq War, Iraqi Christians want safety (not a new church), starvation continues in Gaza, and much more.

Steve Coll. Usually we're further into March, close to the anniversary of the start of the Iraq War before the quacks come out with their lies. Coll's not a name you're familiar with when it comes to Iraq because he's never weighed in. That's because he's the kind of centrist War Hawk that was okay with the war. He didn't lack a position or space to speak from. He just didn't feel like calling it out.

Now he's written a really bad book explaining that the reason the Iraq War started was Saddam Hussein. Not Bully Boy Bush, mind you. No, in fact the whore told PBS' NEWHOUR, "And he ended up in a dispute with the Kuwaiti royal family and then decided basically to sack the country. Of course, George H.W. Bush organized an international military coalition to successfully expel him from Kuwait. But he survived in power. And that became the unfinished business of the 1990s that George W. Bush inherited on 911."

Yes, he's a War Hawk. Of course, he's also a chicken ass.

He wants you and your children to be sent off to war but Princess Steve doesn't want to put his ass on the line and never has. He's part of the school that wants to use revisionary tactics to try to sell future wars. The Iraq War was a worldwide nightmare and it has really slowed down efforts to go full out War Hawk for these crazies so they're trying to water it down and now it's about how crazy old Saddam brought the whole Iraq War down on Iraq. Not Bully Boy Bush, you understand, it was all crazy old Saddam. It was crazy old Saddam controlling THE NEW YORK TIMES and crazy old Saddam controlling CNN and THE OPRAH WINFREY SHOW and every other US outlet that was pimping war -- or that's what Steve Coll wants you to believe.

He's being hailed as left and he's not left. He's a man of little ethics (don't sleep with 'fellows' of the institute you're president of and, no, marrying them doesn't make it any better -- don't use your position on the Pulitzer board to give your wife a Pulitzer) and that probably explains why this 'left' man is part of The Federalist Society.

Looking at his WIKIPEDIA history, my favorite item that fell out is this from September 16, 2009:

He was arrested on August 15 2008 for having sexual intercourse with a horse. As result much of his previous prestige and dick, has been lost. Tod this dat he is working to reobtain his old public love. The court has issued a restraining order; he must saty 50 feet away from all farm animals.

Woah, Nelly!

Presumably, that was someone being creative -- for the sake of the horse, I pray it was someone being creative.

But this is accurate:

Atlantic contributor David Samuels criticized Coll's "shameful attacks" on Wikileaks head Julian Assange. According to Samuels, Coll "sniffed that 'the archives that WikiLeaks has published are much less significant than the Pentagon Papers were in their day' while depicting Assange as a 'self-aggrandizing control-freak" whose website 'lacks an ethical culture that is consonant with the ideals of free media.'

And it was up for years before Steve had it pulled. Someone should restore it. Cindamuse is the one who pulled it from Coll's entry.

Of course, Steve Coll would hate WIKILEAKS and Julian Assange -- they told the truth about the Iraq War. Now here comes Coll to try to lie and invent a revisionary history that will soften reality and allow the US to return to large scale war.

That's what the New America Foundation has always been about and it's why Coll was a president there and why the disgusting Anne-Marie Slaughter is president (and CEO) of it now -- though it calls itself New America now (having dropped the foundation -- the thing that Coll once swore was going to save journalism).

A liar like Steve Coll promotes wars so he'll be invited onto all the programs while Julian Assange rots in a UK prison. That's what happens to truth tellers versus whores.

Earlier this month, the United Nations issued the following:

GENEVA (1 March 2024) – A UN expert today expressed concern that the possible extradition and imminent prosecution in the United States of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange could have serious implications for freedom of expression.

“Gathering, reporting and disseminating information, including national security information when it is in the public interest, is a legitimate exercise of journalism and should not be treated as a crime,” said Irene Khan, the Special Rapporteur on freedom of expression.

The Australian editor, publisher and activist is awaiting the decision of the High Court in the United Kingdom on his appeal against extradition to the United States, where he is facing 17 charges under the 1917 Espionage Act for publishing classified information on the WikiLeaks platform. The charges carry a maximum sentence of 175 years in prison.

“I am concerned about the use of the Espionage Act in this case, as this statute provides no protection for the publication of information in the public interest,” Khan said.

She noted that if extradited, Julian Assange would be the first publisher to be prosecuted in the US under the Espionage Act.

“It would set a dangerous precedent that could have a chilling effect on investigative journalism in the United States and possibly elsewhere in the world,” the Special Rapporteur said.

“International human rights law provides strong protections for whistle-blowers, journalistic sources and reporting in the public interest,” Khan said. “I call on the United States and the United Kingdom, which profess to uphold the right to freedom of expression, to uphold these international standards in the case of Julian Assange.”

The expert urged the UK authorities not to extradite Assange and the US Government to drop the charges.

Yesterday, Kevin Gosztola published an essay about Julian and noted:

Assange was 38 years of age when WikiLeaks garnered praise for publishing disclosures from US Army whistleblower Chelsea Manning. Assange was an ardent, nimble, and sharp-witted advocate for the truth. But at 52, Assange is increasingly frail as delays in proceedings compound physical and mental health problems that he must endure in Belmarsh prison.

President Joe Biden’s administration may prefer the limbo to an unprecedented trial that will invite global condemnation. No Biden official has expressed any reservations when it comes to charging Assange.

Biden officials still sidestep reporters, who ask why the US government won’t drop the charges against Assange. Biden’s National Security Council spokesperson said in October, “This is something the Justice Department is handling, and I think it’s better if you go to them on that.”

But the State Department has not always been so disciplined. On World Press Freedom Day in 2023, State Department spokesperson Verdant Patel endorsed the prosecution that was launched under President Donald Trump.

“The State Department thinks that Mr. Assange has been charged with serious criminal conduct in the United States, in connection with his alleged role in one of the largest compromises of classified information in our nation’s history. His actions risked serious harm to U.S. national security to the benefit of our adversaries,” Patel stated.

Patel added, “It put named human sources to grave and imminent risk and risk of serious physical harm and arbitrary detention.”

What the State Department uttered was familiar. This is how officials responded when WikiLeaks first published US diplomatic cables in 2010.

To be clear, Assange’s “role” was that of a publisher who received documents from Manning and engaged in standard newsgathering activities.

A 2011 Associated Press review of sources, whom the State Department claimed were most at risk from publication of the cables, uncovered no evidence that any person was threatened. In fact, the potential for harm was “strictly theoretical.”

Julian remains imprisoned for the 'crime' of truth telling while Steve Coll makes the media rounds trying to resell the Iraq War and reform Bully Boy Bush's image. I think Coll should volunteer to swap places with Julian -- the world would be better off with Coll and his ilk behind bars.

If you really want to be disgusted, check out his infomerical at The Wilson Center where not only is Bully Boy Bush excused for lying about WMDs, not only is Saddam blamed for WMDs but so is the Clinton administration. Shame on The Wilson Center. They don't have much to their reputation but who knew they'd throw in with Coll to put more blame on the Clinton administration than that of Bully Boy Bush for the Iraq War that started in 2003. Coll is a liar and a danger to any honest exchange.

Let's stay on Iraq for a minute more. REUTERS noted:

The bell of a new church built near Iraq’s ancient city of Ur chimed for the first time last week as part of a push to lure back pilgrims to a country that is home to one of the world’s oldest Christian communities.

The church is part of a complex that rises from a desert plain in the shadow of the pyramid-shaped Ziggurat of Ur, a city traditionally believed to be the birthplace of the Prophet Abraham that was visited by Pope Francis three years ago.

Construction of the church is to be completed this month. Last week, the large bell was fixed into its steeple, which is made of traditional Iraqi yellowish mud brick. Workers polished the large, brightly-coloured stained-glass windows.

On his historic visit to Iraq in March, 2021, Pope Francis held an inter-religious prayer at a site in Ur believed to have been the house of Abraham – the father of Christianity, Judaism and Islam.

Oh, we're hailing it as historic now, are we, REUTERS?

Because it was historic but in real time while we could say that -- and did say that -- the press was tut-tutting the visit because the US government wasn't behind it. Go back and read their reporting. It was a historic visit.

Check out the rest of the article -- including the headline -- and REUTERS is still stupid. A new church is not what Iraqi Christians need or have needed. Jean Charles Putzolu and Lisa Zengarini (VATICAN NEWS) note:

In a country of around 40 million people, the Christian population has been steadily declining for decades, from around 1.4 million in 2003 to about 250,000 today.

Archbishop Najeeb explained that, though Pope Francis brought them comfort and encouraged expatriated Iraqi Christians to resettle following the military defeat of ISIS in 2017, many still hesitate, and families continue to emigrate from the Nineveh Plain and Iraqi Kurdistan, due to ongoing insecurity.

He said that Christians in the region continue to endure intimidation and violence from local militias, and that most of their houses which were destroyed during the ISIS occupation are still in rubble.

“Christians don’t want to restart their life in a place that is still unsafe for them and that the government can’t control”.”

Staying with Iraq and the Church, Sinan Mahmoud (THE NATIONAL) reports:

The leader of the Chaldean Catholic Church in Iraq, Louis Sako, called for a complete overhaul of the country’s political process, which has been in place since the 2003 US-led invasion.

Cardinal Sako’s remarks coincide with the country's upcoming commemoration of the 21st anniversary of the invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein's regime and the introduction of an ethno-sectarian quota system.

“There must be a reconsideration of the entire political process,” Cardinal Sako said, while extending his congratulations to Muslims on the start of Ramadan.

“A new nonsectarian agreement needs to be reached based on full citizenship, ensuring a better future for Iraqis and preserving the [society's] components and their rights."

Turning to Gaza, Ramadan began Monday. The Israeli government celebrated the start of the holy month by killing 67 Palestinians.

THE IRISH TIMES notes, "UN secretary general António Guterres has reiterated his calls for an end to hostilities in Gaza and the increased delivery of humanitarian aid, describing international humanitarian law as in tatters." Kendra Nichols, Cate Brown and Leo Sands (WASHINGTON POST) report, "An aid ship has departed Cyprus for the Gaza Strip carrying nearly 200 tons of food, the relief organization World Central Kitchen said Tuesday morning on social media. The aid is a fraction of the amount required to stave off a famine in Gaza, but -- if successfully delivered -- would mark the first shipment into the Strip via a new maritime route."

Everyone needs to stop pretending this just happened. Starvation was the plan of the Israeli government all along -- certain leaders made remarks making that clear. Various UN aid agencies warned what could happen, the World Health Organization and Human Rights Watch warned what could happen. The attack on UNRWA by the Israeli government was part of the plan to starve Palestinians. After so many lies, it is way past time the the mainstream press stop treating pronouncements by the Israeli government as believable. (Check out David Knox's article at FAIR for more on how there is no accountability in the mainstream media for the various lies they've promoted.) They brought on this starvation and they intended to bring it on.

On UNRWA, Binoy Kampmark (COUNTERPUNCH) notes:

The steady and ruthless campaign by Israel to internationally defund the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), is unravelling. The lynchpin in the effort was a thin, poison pen dossier making claims that 12 individuals were Hamas operatives who had been involved in the October 7 attacks. Within a matter of days, two internal investigations were commenced, various individuals sacked, and US$450 million worth of funding from donor states suspended.

As the head of the agency, Philippe Lazzarini, explained at a press conference on March 4, he has “never been informed” or received evidence of Israel’s claims substantiating their assertions, though he did receive the prompt about the profane twelve directly from Israeli officials. Every year, both Israel and the Palestinian authorities were furnished with staff lists, “and I never received the slightest concern about the staff that we have been employing.”

Had Israeli authorities signed off on these alleged participants in bungling or conspiratorial understanding? Certainly, there was more than a pongy whiff of distraction about it all, given that Israel had come off poorly in The Hague proceedings launched by South Africa, during which the judges issued an interim order demanding an observance of the UN Genocide Convention, an increase of humanitarian aid, and the retention of evidence that might be used for future criminal prosecutions for genocide.

An abrupt wave of initial success in starving the agency followed, with a number of countries announcing plans to freeze funding. In the United States, irate members of Congress accused the agency of having “longstanding connections to terrorism and promotion of antisemitism”. A hearing was duly held titled “UNRWA Exposed: Examining the Agency’s Mission and Failures” with Richard Goldberg, a senior advisor of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies frothing at an agency that supposedly incited “violence against Israel, subsidizes US-designated terrorist organizations, denies Palestinians their basic human rights, and blocks the pathways to a sustainable peace between Israel and the Palestinians.”

The attempt to cast UNRWA into gleefully welcomed oblivion has not worked. Questions were asked about the initial figure of twelve alleged militants. News outlets began questioning the numbers.

The funding channels are resuming. Canada, for instance, approving “the robust investigative process underway”, also acknowledged that “more can be done to respond to the urgent needs of Palestinian civilians”. The initial cancellation of funding to the agency, charged Thomas Woodley, president of Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East, had been “a reckless political decision that never should have been made.”

The Swedish government was also encouraged by undertakings made by UNRWA “to allow independent auditing, strengthen internal supervision and enable additional staff controls”, promising an initial outlay of 200 million kroner (US$19 million)

ALJAZEERA notes:

The UN refugee agency for Palestinians has said there is no other agency that is able to respond to the humanitarian needs in Gaza at UNRWA’s scale.

The UNRWA runs more than 150 shelters and has at least 3,000 working staff in Gaza, the agency said in a post on X.

“We are the backbone of the humanitarian response,” the statement said.

“With over two million people in dire need of life-saving humanitarian assistance in Gaza, no other agency is able to respond at the same scale,” it added.

Gaza remains under assault. Day 158 of the assault in the wave that began in October. Binoy Kampmark (DISSIDENT VOICE) points out, "Bloodletting as form; murder as fashion. The ongoing campaign in Gaza by Israel’s Defence Forces continues without stalling and restriction. But the burgeoning number of corpses is starting to become a challenge for the propaganda outlets: How to justify it? Fortunately for Israel, the United States, its unqualified defender, is happy to provide cover for murder covered in the sheath of self-defence." CNN has explained, "The Gaza Strip is 'the most dangerous place' in the world to be a child, according to the executive director of the United Nations Children's Fund." ABC NEWS quotes UNICEF's December 9th statement, ""The Gaza Strip is the most dangerous place in the world to be a child. Scores of children are reportedly being killed and injured on a daily basis. Entire neighborhoods, where children used to play and go to school have been turned into stacks of rubble, with no life in them." NBC NEWS notes, "Strong majorities of all voters in the U.S. disapprove of President Joe Biden’s handling of foreign policy and the Israel-Hamas war, according to the latest national NBC News poll. The erosion is most pronounced among Democrats, a majority of whom believe Israel has gone too far in its military action in Gaza." The slaughter continues. It has displaced over 1 million people per the US Congressional Research Service. Jessica Corbett (COMMON DREAMS) points out, "Academics and legal experts around the world, including Holocaust scholars, have condemned the six-week Israeli assault of Gaza as genocide." The death toll of Palestinians in Gaza is grows higher and higher. United Nations Women noted, "More than 1.9 million people -- 85 per cent of the total population of Gaza -- have been displaced, including what UN Women estimates to be nearly 1 million women and girls. The entire population of Gaza -- roughly 2.2 million people -- are in crisis levels of acute food insecurity or worse." ALJAZEERA notes, "At least 31,184 people in Gaza have been killed and 72,889 wounded by Israeli attacks on the enclave since October 7, according to the Health Ministry." Months ago, AP noted, "About 4,000 people are reported missing." February 7th, Jeremy Scahill explained on DEMOCRACY NOW! that "there’s an estimated 7,000 or 8,000 Palestinians missing, many of them in graves that are the rubble of their former home." February 5th, the United Nations' Phillipe Lazzarini Tweeted:

And the area itself? Isabele Debre (AP) reveals, "Israel’s military offensive has turned much of northern Gaza into an uninhabitable moonscape. Whole neighborhoods have been erased. Homes, schools and hospitals have been blasted by airstrikes and scorched by tank fire. Some buildings are still standing, but most are battered shells." Kieron Monks (I NEWS) reports, "More than 40 per cent of the buildings in northern Gaza have been damaged or destroyed, according to a new study of satellite imagery by US researchers Jamon Van Den Hoek from Oregon State University and Corey Scher at the City University of New York. The UN gave a figure of 45 per cent of housing destroyed or damaged across the strip in less than six weeks. The rate of destruction is among the highest of any conflict since the Second World War."

This morning, CNN's Pauline Lockwood reports:

Children in Gaza are experiencing "relentless mental harm" after five months of war, hunger, displacement and years of a blockade, according to nongovernmental organization Save the Children, which talked to mental health services and four parents in the strip.

In a report released on Tuesday, one parent told the organization:

"I wouldn’t even say that their mental health has deteriorated – it’s been obliterated. Complete psychological destruction.”

Another said:

"Children here have seen everything. They’ve seen the bombs, the deaths, the bodies – we can’t pretend to them any more. Now they understand and have seen everything. Now, my son can even tell what types of explosives are falling – he can hear the difference.”

According to the report, the collapse of healthcare and psychological services in Gaza limits the possibility that children will get the treatment they need to recover.

Director of Save the Children for the Occupied Palestinian Territory Jason Lee said there is hope the psychological impacts of the war could be reversed with support, but added that "none this is possible without an immediate, definitive ceasefire and safe, unfettered aid access so that humanitarians can provide the critical support needed."

The following sites updated: