Food Isn't Medicine

 

Author: Dr. Joshua Wolrich

Summary: Do carbs make you fat?
Could the keto diet cure mental health disorders?
Are eggs as bad for you as smoking?

No, no and absolutely not. It's all what Dr Joshua Wolrich defines as 'nutribollocks' and he is on a mission to set the record straight.

As an NHS doctor with personal experience of how damaging diets can be, he believes every one of us deserves to have a happy, healthy relationship with food and with our bodies. His message is clear: we need to fight weight stigma, call out the lies of diet culture and give ourselves permission to eat all foods.

Food Isn't Medicine wades through nutritional science (both good and bad) to demystify the common diet myths that many of us believe without questioning. If you have ever wondered whether you should stop eating sugar, try fasting, juicing or 'alkaline water', or struggled through diet after diet (none of which seem to work), this book will be a powerful wake-up call. Drawing on the latest research and delivered with a dose of humour, it not only liberates us from the destructive belief that weight defines health but also explains how to spot the misinformation we are bombarded with every day.

Dr Joshua Wolrich will empower you to escape the diet trap and call out the bad health advice for what it really is: complete nutribollocks.

My Thoughts:

I've been following Dr. Wolrich on Instagram for a few years now, so when I saw he had written a book, I bought it immediately.  This book is BRAND NEW and because he's based in the UK, it may be difficult to find in the US. I purchased my copy from The Book Depository with free shipping. 

Now, what did I think of it? I thought it was excellent. Whether this book serves as a helpful companion to keep you from believing any of the claims it refutes, or if this book pulls you back out from a world of following every new diet that comes out, it's extremely helpful. My main takeaways from this book include: 

1. BMI is an absolutely nonsense measure for health, and you should absolutely disregard it. 

2. If you see anyone unilaterally demonizing or pedestalizing one specific ingredient or food group, run away.  In truth, all foods can fit within a healthy overall diet and there is no one food or food group that is going to magically solve all your problems. 

3. Eating healthy is really, honestly as simple as adding more vegetables and fiber to our diets. The end. So many of us are searching for the magic bullet, but that's really all there is to it. 

4. There are so many factors that contribute to a person's overall health, we cannot just always assume it's about how they eat. 

5. Your body needs carbs to function. Please stop trying to eliminate them from your diet. 

6. Weight stigma is a problem. 

I loved this book so much, particularly because Dr. Wolrich mentions at front the hierarchy of scientific research, with meta-analysis and systematic reviews at the top (meaning those are the most reliable types of research). And then throughout the book, he frequently references these two types of research papers as he is myth-busting diet claims. It's solid science. 

Language warning - there is a bit of language in the book, but it does not occur with overwhelming frequency. So please don't let that throw you off if the book sounds interesting.

Maid: Hard Work, Low Pay, and a Mother's Will to Survive

 

Author: Stephanie Land

Summary:

At 28, Stephanie Land's plans of breaking free from the roots of her hometown in the Pacific Northwest to chase her dreams of attending a university and becoming a writer, were cut short when a summer fling turned into an unexpected pregnancy. She turned to housekeeping to make ends meet, and with a tenacious grip on her dream to provide her daughter the very best life possible, Stephanie worked days and took classes online to earn a college degree, and began to write relentlessly.

She wrote the true stories that weren't being told: the stories of overworked and underpaid Americans. Of living on food stamps and WIC (Women, Infants, and Children) coupons to eat. Of the government programs that provided her housing, but that doubled as halfway houses. The aloof government employees who called her lucky for receiving assistance while she didn't feel lucky at all. She wrote to remember the fight, to eventually cut through the deep-rooted stigmas of the working poor.

Maid explores the underbelly of upper-middle class America and the reality of what it's like to be in service to them. "I'd become a nameless ghost," Stephanie writes about her relationship with her clients, many of whom do not know her from any other cleaner, but who she learns plenty about. As she begins to discover more about her clients' lives-their sadness and love, too-she begins to find hope in her own path.

Her compassionate, unflinching writing as a journalist gives voice to the "servant" worker, and those pursuing the American Dream from below the poverty line. Maid is Stephanie's story, but it's not her alone. It is an inspiring testament to the strength, determination, and ultimate triumph of the human spirit.

 

My Thoughts:

This book made me feel ALL the emotions. Frustration, anger, sadness, hope, faith, helplessness, and so many more. I loved the fact that this book took all the stereotypes of a "poor person on welfare" and turned them on their heads. As I read this book, I felt such deep compassion for Stephanie, and then angry that it was so difficult for her to survive. Yes, it all started with an unexpected pregnancy with a man she was not in a committed relationship with, but her struggle to survive could apply to women who end up raising a child on their own due to many different circumstances. Stephanie writes about how she ended up leaving her child's father and living in a homeless shelter with her daughter because he had become abusive. The choice between financial stability with abuse or freedom from abuse but living in poverty is one that so many other women have had to make. Women end up as single parents for a variety of reasons, and it's not easy for any of them.  Stephanie even relates how difficult it was to gain custody of her child. It broke my heart to read it. "While judges were rumored to say 'I don't care if the child sleeps on a concrete floor! They will have overnight visitation with their father,' mothers fighting for sole custody had to provide a sort of life that was simply impossible to obtain...I had to fight for the ability to mother my nursing infant, the infant Jamie (her boyfriend) had screamed at me to abort. I had been ground to a pulp by that judge. Like I had been in the wrong for leaving a man who threatened me."

 

One of the most important themes of this book was how there is a general stigma against those on government assistance in our society. There's this feeling that these people are lazy, just looking for handouts, unwilling to work and better themselves. And there may be SOME people who are that way, but I don't think it describes the majority of those living in poverty. Stephanie describes in the book how her lack of experience made it difficult to find a good job, and many of the jobs available to her would require her to work non-standard hours, hours when day care for her child wasn't an option. She relied on government assistance because she had no other choice. She worked as many hours as she could at the backbreaking and low-paying job of house cleaning. Several times in the book she mentions the hoops she had to jump through to get government assistance. She says "I was overwhelmed by how much work it took to prove I was poor."  She mentions the shame she felt as she used EBT cards and WIC to buy groceries, and others in the line would say things like "You're welcome!" or roll their eyes at her. She talks about the misconception that undocumented immigrants are using taxpayer money to qualify for free health care and free food (that's actually something that is only available to citizens). 

 

Another quote "Anyone who used food stamps didn't work hard enough or made bad decisions to put them in that lower-class place. It was like people thought it was on purpose and that we cheated the system, stealing the money they paid toward taxes to rob the government of funds...When people think of food stamps, they don't envision someone like me...Someone like them...Maybe they saw in me the chance of their own fragile circumstances, that, with one lost job, one divorce, they'd be in the same place as I was."  

Stephanie talks about how although her daughter qualified for Medicaid, she did not. So she was completely unable to afford any doctors visits at all, even though she desperately needed them. Add that to the fact that she was severely traumatized from her abusive relationship, homelessness, and the Herculean struggle to just make it to the next day and keep herself and her daughter alive and safe, and she was in desperate need of some mental health services, which she also couldn't access or afford. 

When she describes the temporary shelter she lives in that doubles as a halfway house, she says "I thought of how many times the police, firemen, and paramedics had come to our building in the last couple of months; of the random checks to make sure living spaces were kept clean or to make sure broken-down cars in the parking lot had been repaired; to patrol us so that we weren't doing the awful things they expected poor people to do, like allowing the laundry or garbage to pile up, when really, we lacked physical energy and resources from working jobs no one else wanted to do. We were expected to live off minimum wage, to work several jobs at varying hours, to afford basic needs while fighting for safe places to leave our children. Somehow nobody saw the work; they saw only the results of living a life that constantly crushed you with its impossibility." 

She also says "When a person is too deep in systemic poverty, there is no upward trajectory. Life is a struggle and nothing else." I will admit that I have been one who used to think that people who were poor just didn't try hard enough, that they just needed to find a better job and work on a budget. This book cleared the last of those lingering prejudices from my mind. Stephanie kept the tightest budget I've ever heard of. She lived on coffee and peanut butter sandwiches in order to make sure her growing daughter had enough to eat. She worked out a trade with the owner of a local kids consignment store - cleaning after hours in exchange for clothing for her daughter. There is this general idea in the world that government assistance keeps people poor. It provides no incentive for them to improve. And this is actually true, but not in the way you would expect. In the book, Stephanie says "The most frustrating part of being stuck in the system were the penalties it seemed I received for improving my life. On a couple of occasions, my income pushed me over the limit by a few dollars and I'd lose hundreds of dollars in benefits....There was no incentive or opportunity to save money. The system kept me locked down, scraping the bottom of the barrel, without a plan to climb out of it." 

Every time I put down this book I was some combination of intensely sad and incredibly angry. It's just absolutely not RIGHT that people in this country should have to struggle so much just to survive. Survival is a bare minimum goal! We want people to thrive. We should want people to be able to enjoy their lives and their children. One quote towards the end of the books really hit me hard. "The [other mothers] at Mia's day care..limited screen time, scheduled craft projects, limited sugary snacks, and served appropriate servings of fruit and vegetables at every meal. [They were mothers] with the privilege, time, and energy to mother well and who might judge me for not doing the same."

Basically everything I do as a mother to ensure that my children grow up in a safe, supportive, emotionally and physically healthy environment is largely only possible because I don't happen to live in extreme poverty. Even the year of our life where we struggled more financially, I was still able to provide a pretty good home environment for my kids. I left this book feeling like there are most certainly some sound policy decisions that could be made that will help kids be able to grow up in better environments than their parents can provide on their own. And for me, the argument that "some people will take advantage" is not a good enough reason to allow all the rest to just keep languishing in poverty, with little to no hope of making it out. 

Please read this book. It is so good. It helped me gain a better perspective on those who are living in poverty, and I will think twice before I start jumping to conclusions about the person at the store paying with food stamps.

How Fascism Works: The Politics of Us and Them

Summary: As the child of refugees of World War II Europe and a renowned philosopher and scholar of propaganda, Jason Stanley has a deep understanding of how democratic societies can be vulnerable to fascism: Nations don’t have to be fascist to suffer from fascist politics. In fact, fascism’s roots have been present in the United States for more than a century. Alarmed by the pervasive rise of fascist tactics both at home and around the globe, Stanley focuses here on the structures that unite them, laying out and analyzing the ten pillars of fascist politics—the language and beliefs that separate people into an “us” and a “them.” He knits together reflections on history, philosophy, sociology, and critical race theory with stories from contemporary Hungary, Poland, India, Myanmar, and the United States, among other nations. He makes clear the immense danger of underestimating the cumulative power of these tactics, which include exploiting a mythic version of a nation’s past; propaganda that twists the language of democratic ideals against themselves; anti-intellectualism directed against universities and experts; law and order politics predicated on the assumption that members of minority groups are criminals; and fierce attacks on labor groups and welfare. These mechanisms all build on one another, creating and reinforcing divisions and shaping a society vulnerable to the appeals of authoritarian leadership.

By uncovering disturbing patterns that are as prevalent today as ever, Stanley reveals that the stuff of politics—charged by rhetoric and myth—can quickly become policy and reality. Only by recognizing fascists politics, he argues, may we resist its most harmful effects and return to democratic ideals.

My Thoughts:

 I found this book to be completely fascinating. It's not very long, and it's a pretty easy read, very accessible and not too philosophical. Simple enough for the average person to comprehend. I just checked out his earlier book "How Propogranda Works" and it is much thicker and denser, so I'm not sure I'll end up slogging through that one. 

I thought this book was really important to read, especially in today's world where most of us can agree that there is a large amount of division going on in our country. The author pointed out how incredibly important it is that we not allow ourselves to get sucked into the "us vs them" rhetoric. I have been worried about that myself, as I have seen a lot of stuff on Facebook and even directly stated by political commentators about how "all" members of certain groups are "evil" "criminals" "rapists" "drug dealers" etc. It's really important to be aware of these tactics so we can prevent truly evil things from happening here in the United States. We have to leave our hearts open with compassion to those who are different from us. There are bad people EVERYWHERE, it's true, but we cannot lump all the bad people into one racial, ethnic, or political group and just be able to make blanket statements that condemn them all. 

Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong

 

Summary: Americans have lost touch with their history, and in Lies My Teacher Told Me Professor James Loewen shows why. After surveying eighteen leading high school American history texts, he has concluded that not one does a decent job of making history interesting or memorable. Marred by an embarrassing combination of blind patriotism, mindless optimism, sheer misinformation, and outright lies, these books omit almost all the ambiguity, passion, conflict, and drama from our past.

In this revised edition, packed with updated material, Loewen explores how historical myths continue to be perpetuated in today's climate and adds an eye-opening chapter on the lies surrounding 9/11 and the Iraq War. From the truth about Columbus's historic voyages to an honest evaluation of our national leaders, Loewen revives our history, restoring the vitality and relevance it truly possesses.

Thought provoking, nonpartisan, and often shocking, Loewen unveils the real America in this iconoclastic classic beloved by high school teachers, history buffs, and enlightened citizens across the country.

My Thoughts:

I thought this book was fascinating and SO good. I was lucky to have a really great history teacher in high school who did his best to teach us actual history and not just white-washed, feel good history, but there was still so much I didn't know. For example, did you know that Woodrow Wilson was actually super racist, that as President he SEGREGATED areas of government that had previously been integrated? Did you know that at the beginning of post-Civil War Reconstruction, things were actually going pretty well race-relations wise, and Black people were seeing greater equality, until Southern Whites got back the reins and made things awful again? Did you know that Helen Keller as an adult was a strong supporter of socialism? Did you know that Columbus and basically everyone else at the time already knew the earth was round and the whole point of his expedition was to see if he could get rich somewhere? Did you know that the pilgrims likely would not have survived to colonize America if it hadn't been for previous explorers bringing diseases that decimated Native populations? Did you know that the 9/11 terrorist attacks were motivated not because Osama bin Ladin just hates freedom, but as retaliation for what he saw as way too much meddling in the Middle East on the part of America? Did you know that although we like to present the picture of the US being this "international good guy" we've actually stuck our noses where they don't belong many times and completely screwed things up?

I highly recommend reading this book. I thought it was incredibly informative and I think it presented a really important look at how we teach history and how we can do better. I think many of the problems of today stem from a complete lack of accurate understanding of our history. We are taught all our lives half-truths and sometimes outright lies, is it any wonder we still believe them and act as if these things are true (sometimes to our own detriment) as adults? A lot of people think they know history, and they would probably be wrong. Seriously, read this. I am begging you. It was so worth the time. 

Jefferson's Sons: A Founding Father's Secret Children

 

Author: Kimberly Brubaker Bradley

 Rating: PG - I feel like this book would be really good for about 7th grade and up. There's nothing overly graphic in it, a man is publicly whipped twice but that's about the extent of the violence. 

Summary:
Beverly, Harriet, Madison, and Eston are Thomas Jefferson's children by one of the people he enslaved, Sally Hemings, and while they do get special treatment - better work, better shoes, even violin lessons - they are still slaves, and are never to mention who their father is. The lighter-skinned children have been promised a chance to escape into white society, but what does this mean for the children who look more like their mother? As each child grows up, their questions about slavery and freedom become tougher, calling into question the real meaning of "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."

Told in three parts from the points of view of three of the children enslaved by Jefferson - Beverly, Madison, and a third boy close to the Hemings family - these engaging and poignant voices shed light on what life was like as one of Jefferson's invisible offspring.

My Thoughts: I LOVED this book. I felt like it did an incredible job addressing the disconnect between Thomas Jefferson, the great patriot and American president who wrote the Declaration of Independence, and Thomas Jefferson, a man who enslaved his fellow human beings. I love how the story was told through the eyes of children, who are trying to understand what slavery means, what freedom means, and why people think it's ok to enslave their fellow human beings. For instance, at one point, the children have a conversation with their mother about whether or not Thomas Jefferson is a good person. They are conflicted, because they can see how he is kind, how much he has done for the country, but they are also living in slavery and they know that is not right. The mother says to them "all of the good things about him - patriot, president, gentleman, educated and intelligent man - those are all true too. he's done many great things. I hope you can be proud of that part of him." But she also tells them that although she has had a very good life, she has never been mistreated and her children are safe "it's not freedom. Sometimes it looks pretty close to freedom. Sometimes it feels okay. Then something happens...and I'm reminded all over again that we live in a prison on this mountain. It's a prison no matter how comfortable it may feel." I thought this was so profound because there is this idea sometimes that "At least some slave owners were nice to the people they enslaved. Some of them were kind." As one of the characters declares in the book, "There isn't such a thing as a nice slave owner. Slavery is bad. It's evil. All slave owners are bad. If a person would own another person, you can't trust a word they'll say."

In another place in the book, two of the boys are looking at the framed Declaration of Independence on the wall in the hallway of the main house, and they read the first lines "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." The younger boy is confused. He asks, "If Master Jefferson wrote that, how come he doesn't believe it?" The older boy replies, "He does believe it. At least, he thinks he does." They go on to discuss that the Declaration says "All men" not "all white men" and that self-evident means everyone knows it because it's so obvious. The younger boy says "But people don't know it." The older boy says, "I didn't read it to tell you that. I read it so you'd understand what those two old men (Jefferson and Lafayette) were crying about. They believed this a long time ago, when almost nobody else did, and Master Jefferson wrote it down, and they made a whole new country around it. And now they're so old they're almost dead and they're crying for what they did a long time ago." The younger boy says "But they didn't really do it" and the older replies, "I know. But they think they did." 

There were so many good moments in the book where I had to set it down to ponder for a bit. I thought the author did an excellent job writing this story and helping the reader (via the characters) come to their own conclusion about how to reconcile the amazing things the Founding Fathers did with the fact that many of them were also slave owners. I highly recommend this book.

2020 Democratic Platform Part 10: Renewing American Leadership

 

Part 10: Renewing American Leadership

1.       Revitalizing American Diplomacy

a.       Rebuilding America’s Tool of First Resort

                                                              i.      diplomacy

                                                             ii.      make the State Department more strategic, modern, agile, and effective

b.      Reinventing Alliances

                                                              i.      advance mutual priorities and deal with new challenges

                                                             ii.      work with allied democracies to end democracy’s global recession

                                                           iii.      make developing shared responses to non-military threats like disinformation, corruption, and economic coercion, priorities in our agenda

                                                           iv.      never treat alliances like protection rackets

                                                             v.      work to strengthen and build new partnerships in Africa and Latin America

c.       International Institutions

                                                              i.      rejoin and reform the WHO, the United Nations Human Rights Council, and the United Nations Population Fund

d.      Foreign Assistance and Development

                                                               i.      reject Trump Administration’s punitive and transactional approach to foreign aid and its use to advance domestic political arrands at the expense of our national interests.

                                                             ii.      multiply impact of foreign assistance

                                                           iii.      lead international efforts to help developing countries with COVID

2.       Transforming Our Armed Forces for the 21^st Century

a.       Ending Forever Wars

                                                               i.      Trump said he would get US out of Afghanistan but he just sent more people there and stoked regional tensions that made things worse

                                                             ii.      responsibly set priorities, lead with diplomacy, protect ourselves from terrorist threats, enable local partners, bring troops home

                                                           iii.      committed to a durable and inclusive political settlement in Afghanistan that ensures that al-Qaeda isn’t allowed to reconstitute, ISIS isn’t allowed to grow, and the international community can help Afghans safeguard hard-fought gains

                                                           iv.      end support for the Saudi-led war in Yemen, help bring the war to an end

                                                             v.      use force only when necessary, with the informed consent of the American people and the approval of Congress

1.       work with Congress to repeal authorizations for the use of military force and replace them with a narrow and specific framework

b.       Securing our Competitive Edge

                                                               i.      US military should be best-trained, best-equipped, and most effective fighting force in the world

1.       So…now I’m confused as to why Republicans keep saying that Democrats want to weaken the military…..

                                                             ii.      invest in technology and forces that meet the threats of the future

                                                           iii.      reinforce alliances and partnerships that enhance our collective security

c.       Defense Spending

                                                               i.      it’s not how much we spend, but how we spend it

                                                             ii.      we spend too much on military and not enough on diplomacy

1.       we can maintain a strong defense and protect our safety and security for less

2.       Ok, I think this is really cool. Let’s try to make nice and figure things out with words instead of fists.

                                                           iii.      conduct rigorous annual audits of the Pentagon

1.       This is something that the Republican platform also pledged to do

d.       Keeping Faith with Our Veterans and Military Families

                                                               i.      protect opportunities for anyone who can meet the standards to serve in combat roles

                                                             ii.      fight the scourge of rape and sexual assault in the military

1.       https://www.protectourdefenders.com/factsheet/

2.       https://abcnews.go.com/US/military-sexual-assault-victims-system-broken/story?id=72499053

                                                           iii.      reverse Trump’s transgender ban

1.       Yes. Anyone who wants to serve our country should be able to. There’s no good reason why trans people should be banned.

                                                           iv.      root out systemic racism from military justice system

1.       black service members are twice as likely as white ones to face court-martial

                                                             v.      service members, veterans, and their spouses should never face deportation

1.       create a parole process for veterans deported by the Trump Administration to reunite them with their families

                                                           vi.      Veterans deserve better health care

1.       Yep. And wasn’t that something that Republicans said they were gonna fix?

                                                          vii.      work to combat veteran homelessness

                                                        viii.      make sure veterans have access to mental health services

                                                            ix.      support military families better

1.       ensure pay and compensation keep pace with the economy

2.       increase time between deployments

e.       Civil-Military Relations

                                                               i.      end the Trump Administration’s politicization of the armed forces

                                                             ii.      safeguard the independence of the military justice system

                                                           iii.      hold regular press briefings to explain the legal and policy justifications for military operations

                                                           iv.      never use active duty soldiers as political props

                                                             v.      never send military forces to suppress Americans exercising their constitutional rights

3.       Mobilizing the World to Address Transnational Challenges

a.       Global Health and Pandemics

                                                               i.      expand Global Health Security Agenda

                                                             ii.      restore the White House National Security Council Directorate for Global Health Security and Biodefense

                                                           iii.      establish a Global Health Emergency Board to harmonize crisis response for vulnerable communities

                                                           iv.      fully resource the WHO

                                                             v.      help the world eradicate tuberculosis, malaria, polio, and other preventable maternal and childhood deaths

b.       Climate Change

                                                               i.      fully integrate climate change into foreign policy and national security strategies

                                                             ii.      restore US global climate leadership

                                                           iii.      recommit to the Green Climate Fund

                                                           iv.      protect our oceans

                                                             v.      support protection of species and wildlife habitats

c.       Technology

                                                               i.      recommit to net neutrality

                                                             ii.      algorithms and platforms should empower people instead of the surveillance state

                                                           iii.      expect tech companies and social media platforms to do more to preserve the openness of democratic societies and identify foreign disinformation

                                                           iv.      prevent the use of new technologies to facilitate repression, spread hate, or incite violence

                                                             v.      develop secure 5G networks

                                                           vi.      remain committed to the international prohibition on the development or use of biological weapons.

d.       Nonproliferation

                                                               i.      prevent the spread of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons, eventually secure their elimination

                                                             ii.      Trump has made it so the nuclear dangers Americans face are greater than they have been in decades

                                                           iii.      the sole purpose of our nuclear arsenal should be to deter a nuclear attack

1.       We should reduce our overreliance and excessive expenditure on nuclear weapons

                                                           iv.      push for ratification of the UN Arms Trade Treaty and Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty

e.       Terrorism

                                                               i.      sustain global effort to defeat ISIS, al-Qaeda, and their affiliates

                                                             ii.      committed to dealing with the underlying conditions that allowed violent extremism to flourish in the first place

                                                           iii.      always work to avoid civilian casualties

                                                           iv.      not weaponize counterterrorism for anti-immigrant purposes

                                                             v.      close detention center at Guantanamo Bay

f.        Democracy and Human Rights

                                                               i.      make gender equality a key foreign policy priority

                                                             ii.      implement the Women, Peace, and Security Act

                                                           iii.      incorporate more women into peace processes

                                                           iv.      ratify the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women

                                                             v.      pass the GLOBE Act and appoint senior leaders directly responsible for driving and coordinating LGBTQ+ issues at the Sate Department, USAID, and the National Security Council

                                                           vi.      amplify the voices of LGBTQ+ persons around the world and counter violence and discrimination against LGBTQ+ persons wherever it appears

                                                          vii.      defend freedom of the press

                                                        viii.      fight human trafficking

1.       increase visas for victims of human trafficking

                                                            ix.      improve labor standards around the world

                                                             x.      never use protection of freedom of religion as a cover for discrimination

1.       yes. We do this. And we need to stop it.

                                                            xi.      we have an obligation to help alleviate suffering around the world, will contribute more aid, and better aid

                                                          xii.      END TRUMP ADMINISTRATION’S EFFORTS TO CLOSE DOORS TO REFUGEES!!!!

1.       significantly raise the annual global refugee admissions target

2.       “Admitting refugees is not only the right thing to do – it’s the smart thing to do”

3.       This is extremely important to me and one of my biggest reasons for voting Democrat this election. I am thrilled to see this in the platform.

                                                        xiii.      torture is immoral and ineffective

4.       Advancing American Interests

a.       Global Economy and Trade

                                                               i.      no new trade deals before first investing in American competitiveness at home

                                                             ii.      insist on strong and enforceable standards for labor, human rights, and the environment

                                                           iii.      stand up to China with trade

                                                           iv.      anti-corruption will be a priority in foreign policy

                                                             v.      ban anonymous shell companies

                                                           vi.      guard against improper application of economic and financial sanctions

b.       Africa

                                                               i.      recommit to National Strategy for Combating Wildlife Trafficking

                                                             ii.      ban importation to the US of hunting trophies

                                                           iii.      There’s lots more but this is not a huge issue for me so I’m leaving it there

c.       Americas

                                                               i.      work with regional and international partners to address the root causes of migration – violence and insecurity, weak rule of law, lack of educational and economic opportunity, pervasive corruption and environmental degradation

                                                             ii.      protect the Amazon from deforestation

                                                           iii.      help Venezuela, grant Temporary Protected Status to Venezuelans in the US

1.       use smart pressure and effective diplomacy, not threats

d.       Asia-Pacific

                                                               i.      protect American workers from unfair trade practices by the Chines govt

                                                             ii.      resist Chines military’s intimidation in the South China Sea

                                                           iii.      committed to the Taiwan Relations Act

                                                           iv.      fully enforce Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act

                                                             v.      condemn the internment of more than one million Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities in concentration camps in China

                                                           vi.      North Korea – build a campaign to advance the goal of denuclearization, support humanitarian aid, pressure regime to cease its gross human rights abuses

e.       Europe

                                                               i.      Trump has damaged our ties with Europe and we will fix them

                                                             ii.      stand up to Russia

                                                           iii.      reaffirm commitment to NATO

f.        Middle East

                                                               i.      move away from military intervention and towards pragmatic diplomacy

                                                             ii.      we should not impose regime change on other countries

                                                           iii.      Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action is the best way to cut off Iran’s pathways to a nuclear bomb

1.       Trump withdrew from this plan

                                                           iv.      help find a political resolution to the war in Syria

                                                             v.      concerned about Lebanon, will work with them to promote economic and political reform

                                                           vi.      commit to Israel’s security, it’s military edge and it’s right to defend itself

                                                          vii.      work to help end the Israel/Palestine conflict

1.       two-state solution

2.       Jerusalem should stay the capital of Israel

3.       oppose any effort to delegitimize Israel