The Full Belmonte, 12/4/2022
Iran Abolishes Morality Police, Considers Changing Hijab Laws, Official Says
Move is aimed at trying to quiet protests that have taken place across the country, analysts say
Iran has been rocked by protests for months.PHOTO: WANA NEWS AGENCY/VIA REUTERS
Dec. 4, 2022 9:46 am ET
“Iran’s attorney general said the country had disbanded its so-called morality police and is considering altering the requirement that women cover their heads in public, a move that analysts said was aimed at peeling away support for antigovernment protests.
Mohammad-Jafar Montezari outlined the steps Saturday, saying the law requiring veils, known as hijabs, was under review by Iran’s Parliament and judiciary, and that the morality police had been abolished, according to government-run news agencies.
President Ebrahim Raisi echoed his remarks in a televised speech Saturday, saying Iran’s Islamic system was enshrined in its constitution but added, ‘There are methods of implementing the constitution that can be flexible.’
It is unclear if such comments reflect a high level decision by Iran’s rulers to make significant changes in the system of enforcing the hijab law or if they are temporary overtures aimed at helping to suppress the protests, analysts said.
‘I think that they are just trying to show that they can be flexible, but what they are not doing is making meaningful compromises,’ said Sanam Vakil, deputy director of the Middle East and North Africa Program at Chatham House, a London-based think tank.
Mr. Montazeri said that recommendations for changes in the hijab law would be made later this month. ‘We are working on the issue of hijab quickly and trying to employ a wise solution,’ he said.
He said the disbanding of the morality police, a force established in 2005, had been made by a committee of government officials but provided no other details. He said that the country’s Islamic courts would continue to monitor public behavior, according to media accounts of his remarks.
The laws around women’s head coverings sparked the nationwide protest movement that began after the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, who died in custody after being arrested by the morality police for improperly wearing her hijab. Her death touched a nerve among many Iranian families whose female members have been targeted by officers tasked with enforcing the country’s strict Islamic codes for clothing and behavior. Among those protesting are conservative women and men, joining throngs of young secular people who say the enforcement of rules have often been capricious.
Some women have burned their hijabs and shunned wearing them in public since the protests started. Many young protesters say they are seeking not only elimination of the hijab but to bring down Iran’s theocratic government.
The regime appears to be testing if such concessions might peel away broader support for the demonstrations among other Iranians, analysts say.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
Iowa caucuses, built on myth, lose place at head of the line
By THOMAS BEAUMONT
“DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — The Hy-Vee Hall ballroom in Des Moines erupted in cheers in 2008 when the youthful Illinois senator hinted at the improbable possibility of the feat ahead: ‘Our time for change has come!’
That Iowa, an overwhelmingly white state, would propel Barack Obama’s rise to become America’s first Black president seemed to ratify its first-in-the-nation position in the presidential nominating process.
But in the half-century arc of the state’s quirky caucuses, Obama’s victory proved to be an outlier. All other Democratic winners turned out to be also-rans.
The caucuses and their outsize importance were largely an exercise in myth-making, that candidates could earn a path to the White House by meeting voters in person where they live, and earnest, civic-minded Midwesterners would brave the winter cold to stand sometimes for hours to discuss issues and literally stand for their candidate.
As the caucuses have played out, the flaws have become glaring. First among them: The state’s Democrats botched the count in 2020, leaving an embarrassing muddle. But there were more. Since 2008, the state’s political makeup has changed dramatically, from a reliable swing state to solidly Republican. And with the Democratic Party increasingly becoming a party of diversity, Iowa’s lack of it left the state without much of a rationale for leading the way.
‘We’ve been headed this way for a while,’ said Joe Trippi, who managed Missouri Rep. Dick Gephardt’s winning Iowa campaign in 1988, adding ‘2020 broke the camel’s back.’
The Democratic National Committee’s rulemaking arm voted Friday to remove Iowa as the leadoff state in the presidential nominating order and replace it with South Carolina starting in 2024, a dramatic shakeup championed by President Joe Biden to better reflect the party’s deeply diverse electorate.
The caucuses were once a novel effort to expand local participation in national party decision-making, but this vestige of 19th century Midwestern civic engagement has simply been been unable to keep pace with the demands of 21st century national politics.
‘The times have changed and maybe it’s time for this nominating process to change,’ said Emily Parcell, Obama’s 2008 Iowa political director.” Read more at AP News
Non-religious voters wield clout, tilt heavily Democratic
By PETER SMITH
“When members of the small Pennsylvania chapter of Secular Democrats of America log on for their monthly meetings, they’re not there for a virtual happy hour.
‘We don’t sit around at our meetings patting ourselves on the back for not believing in God together,’ said David Brown, a founder from the Philadelphia suburb of Ardmore.
The group, mostly consisting of atheists and agnostics, mobilizes to knock on doors and make phone calls on behalf of Democratic candidates ‘who are pro-science, pro-democracy, whether or not they are actually self-identified secular people,’ he said. ‘We are trying to keep church and state separate. That encompasses LGBTQIA+, COVID science, bodily autonomy and reproductive rights.’
Brown describes his group as ‘small but mighty,’ yet they’re riding a big wave.
Voters with no religious affiliation supported Democratic candidates and abortion rights by staggering percentages in the 2022 midterm elections.
And they’re voting in large numbers. In 2022, some 22% of voters claimed no religious affiliation, according to AP VoteCast, an expansive survey of more than 94,000 voters nationwide. They contributed to voting coalitions that gave Democrats victories in battleground states such as Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Arizona.
ABORTION
The unaffiliated — often nicknamed the “nones” — voted for Democratic House candidates nationwide over Republicans by more than a 2-1 margin (65% to 31%), according to VoteCast. That echoes the 2020 president election, when Democrat Joe Biden took 72% of voters with no religious affiliation, while Republican Donald Trump took 25%, according to VoteCast.
For all the talk of the overwhelmingly Republican voting by white evangelical Christians in recent elections, the unaffiliated are making their presence felt.
Among all U.S. adults, 29% are nones — those who identify as atheist, agnostic or ‘nothing in particular’ — according a 2021 report by the Pew Research Center. That’s up 10 percentage points from a decade earlier, according to Pew. And the younger the adults, the more likely they are to be unaffiliated, according to a 2019 Pew analysis, further signaling the growing clout of the nones.
‘People talk about how engaged white evangelicals are, but you don’t know the half of it,’ said Ryan Burge, a professor of political science at Eastern Illinois University who focuses on the interaction of religious and political behavior.
Atheists and agnostics form only a subset of nones and are less numerous than evangelicals. But they are more likely than evangelicals to make a campaign donation, attend a political meeting or join a protest, Burge said, citing the Harvard-affiliated Cooperative Election Study.
“When you consider how involved they are in political activity, you realize how important they are at the ballot box,” he said.
The nones equaled Catholics at 22% of the electorate, though they were barely half the figure for Protestants and other Christians (43%), according to VoteCast. Other religious groups totaled 13%, including 3% Jewish and 1% Muslim.” Read more at AP News
Flood of sexual abuse lawsuits expected in New York as new law takes effect
Adult survivors of sexual abuse can now file lawsuits even if the statute of limitations on their claims had already run out
Sun 4 Dec 2022 05.00 EST
“A trickle of high-profile sexual abuse lawsuits passing through New York’s civil courts is likely to become a flood in the coming months because of a new, one-year window for time-expired claims.
Already, some bold-faced names from the worlds of arts, finance and politics have become involved, including Donald Trump and banker Leon Black.
A broad legislative sweep, the New York Adult Survivors Act, allows for adult survivors to file lawsuits and for the alleged abusers or their estates, as well as businesses and institutions that enabled the conduct by ignoring or encouraging an environment that allowed the assaults to occur, to be held financially liable.
The number of claims that will be filed is unknown. But under a previous window allowing claims beyond the statute of limitations to be brought by survivors who were minors at the time of the alleged incidents, as many as 11,000 claims were filed over the course of two years.
Since the look-back bill was introduced on Thanksgiving Day, several notable claims have already been filed.
Leon Black, the billionaire co-founder of private equity firm Apollo, was accused by Cheri Pierson of raping her two decades ago in the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein’s Manhattan mansion. Epstein’s estate is named as a defendant. That case comes on top of a separate civil claim by Guzel Ganieva who accused Black of falsely claiming she tried to extort him after she accused him of rape.
In another claim filed this week, a former talent scout at Atlantic Records sued the label and the estate of its founder, the late Ahmed Ertegun, for sexual assault. Jan Roeg alleges that Atlantic knew and took a ‘laissez-faire’ approach about Ertegun’s misconduct.
In a new, upgraded lawsuit against Donald Trump, former Elle columnist E Jean Carroll maintains the former president committed battery ‘when he forcibly raped and groped her’ – and that he defamed her when he denied raping her last month.
‘Trump’s underlying sexual assault severely injured Carroll, causing significant pain and suffering, lasting psychological harms, loss of dignity, and invasion of her privacy,’ the suit alleges.
Carroll’s attorney, Roberta Kaplan, said at a court hearing that her client ‘intends to hold Donald Trump accountable not only for defaming her, but also for sexually assaulting her, which he did years ago in a dressing room at Bergdorf Goodman’.
Trump has denied the allegations against him.
Claims have also been brought against JPMorgan and Deutsche Bank by lawyers acting for unnamed individuals who accuse the banks of turning a blind eye to alleged sex trafficking by the disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein in order to ‘churn profits’. A Deutsche Bank spokesperson said the claim “lacks merit”.
According to Bradley Edwards, a Florida lawyer who has featured prominently in exposing Epstein’s conduct, ‘Epstein and his co-conspirators could not have victimized without assistance from wealthy individuals and financial institutions’.
Also anticipated are lawsuits on the behalf of about 40 women, who claim they were subjected to unlawful sexual abuse by former Columbia University gynaecologist Dr Robert Hadden. About 150 claims against the gynaecologist have already been settled.
Hundreds more lawsuits may now also be forthcoming, including individuals who claim they were assaulted by co-workers, prison guards or medical providers, in part because it allows an institution like a hospital or jail to be held responsible.
Opening the adult window for claims precludes cases involving minors that were covered by a previous law incentivized by a backlog of claims against the Catholic church. Under that law, hundreds of others came through, including claims again Boy Scouts of America, Kevin Spacey and Britain’s Prince Andrew.” Read more at The Guardian
OPEC keeps oil targets amid uncertainty on Russian sanctions
By DAVID McHUGH and CATHY BUSSEWITZ
“FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) — The Saudi-led OPEC oil cartel and allied producers including Russia did not change their targets for shipping oil to the global economy amid uncertainty about the impact of new Western sanctions against Russia that could take significant amounts of oil off the market.
The decision at a meeting of oil ministers Sunday comes a day ahead of the planned start of two measures aimed at hitting Russia’s oil earnings in response to its invasion of Ukraine. Those are: a European Union boycott of most Russian oil and a price cap of $60 per barrel on Russian exports imposed by the EU and the Group of Seven democracies.
It is not yet clear how much Russian oil the two sanctions measures could take off the global market, which would tighten supply and drive up prices. The world’s No. 2 oil producer has been able to reroute much, but not all, of its former Europe shipments to customers in India, China and Turkey. The impact of the price cap is also up in the air because Russia has said it could simply halt deliveries to countries that observe the limit but would likely also find ways to evade the cap for some shipments.” Read more at AP News
Survivors of Brussels suicide attacks seek closure at trial
By SAMUEL PETREQUIN
“BRUSSELS (AP) — Jaana Mettala was six months pregnant and on her way to work when the bomb exploded in the heart of Brussels’ European Union quarter. She suffered severe burns, but Mettala and her baby survived — 32 other people did not.
It’s now more than six years since the deadliest peacetime attacks on Belgian soil. And Mettala yearns for closure as the trial of 10 men accused over the suicide bombings at Brussels airport and an underground metro station starts in earnest Monday.
‘I hope that the trial ends with a fair result and we can put this behind us,’ Mettala said. ‘Even if there are after-effects that we will keep forever.’
She is going to testify at the trial — which will be the biggest in Belgium’s judicial history with hundreds of plaintiffs. It is expected to last between six and nine months.
The 10 defendants face charges including murder, attempted murder and membership, or participation in the acts of a terrorist group, over the morning rush hour attacks at Belgium’s main airport and on the central commuter line on March, 22, 2016.” Read more at AP News
3 Chinese astronauts return to Earth after 6-month mission
“BEIJING (AP) — Three Chinese astronauts landed in a northern desert on Sunday after six months working to complete construction of the Tiangong station, a symbol of the country’s ambitious space program, state TV reported.
A capsule carrying commander Chen Dong and astronauts Liu Yang and Cai Xuzhe touched down at a landing site in the Gobi Desert in northern China at approximately 8:10 p.m. (1210 GMT), China Central Television reported.
The three astronauts were part of the Shenzhou-14 mission, which launched in June.
The Tiangong is part of official Chinese plans for a permanent human presence in orbit.
China in 2003 became the third government to send an astronaut into orbit on its own after the former Soviet Union and the United States.
The government has landed robot probes on the little-explored far side of the moon and on Mars. In 2020, a probe returned lunar rocks to Earth for the first time since the 1970s.
A crew of three Chinese astronauts blasted off Tuesday for Tiangong’s final construction stage. The station’s third and final module docked with the station this month.” Read more at AP News
US intel chief thinking ‘optimistically’ for Ukraine forces
By JAMEY KEATEN and NOMAAN MERCHANT
“KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — The head of U.S. intelligence says fighting in Russia’s war in Ukraine is running at a ‘reduced tempo’ and suggests Ukrainian forces could have brighter prospects in coming months.
Avril Haines alluded to past allegations by some that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s advisers could be shielding him from bad news — for Russia — about war developments, and said he ‘is becoming more informed of the challenges that the military faces in Russia.’
‘But it’s still not clear to us that he has a full picture of at this stage of just how challenged they are,’ the U.S. director of national intelligence said Saturday at the Reagan National Defense Forum in Simi Valley, California.
Looking ahead, Haines said, ‘honestly we’re seeing a kind of a reduced tempo already of the conflict’ and her team expects that both sides will look to refit, resupply, and reconstitute for a possible Ukrainian counter-offensive in the spring.” Read more at AP News
Applying to College, and Trying to Appear ‘Less Asian’
The affirmative action lawsuit against Harvard seemed to confirm advice given for years to Asian Americans: Don’t play chess, don’t check the box declaring race.
By Amy Qin
Dec. 2, 2022
“When it came time to fill out his college application form, Max Li chose not to declare his race. Even though he knew his last name sounded Chinese, he selected ‘prefer not to say.’
Clara Chen was advised to avoid the Advanced Placement exam for Chinese because college admissions officers might assume, based on her last name, that she already spoke the language, which could undermine the value of her score. She took the test for Advanced Placement French instead.
When Marissa Li was growing up, she loved playing competitive chess, and spent hours studying the matches of some of her favorite players, like Bobby Fischer. But on her college application, she barely mentioned her interest in the game because she was afraid that it might come across as too stereotypically Asian.
‘It is a little sad now that I think about it,’ Ms. Li, 20, said in a recent interview. ‘I wasn’t really able to talk about the activities that meant the most to me.’
In October, the Supreme Court heard arguments in a lawsuit brought by Students for Fair Admissions that accused Harvard of systematically discriminating against Asian American applicants.
Students for Fair Admissions said that, compared with other racial groups, applicants of Asian descent consistently received a lower ‘personal rating’ — a subjective score for traits like self-confidence, likability and kindness.
In 2019, a federal appeals court judge found that the university met the strict constitutional standard for considering race in its admissions process. Even so, that lawsuit seems to have confirmed what many Asian American teenagers have quietly thought for years, as they downplayed aspects of their identity or changed their hobbies or interests as part of an effort to appear, as students, parents and college admissions counselors said, ‘less Asian.’
Asian Americans are a hugely diverse, complicated group, and students don’t fit into cookie-cutter stereotypes. But in the high-stakes competition for spots at elite colleges, in which so much of an applicant’s life must be boiled down to 500 or so words, many Asian American students are acutely aware of what not to be.
While it’s difficult to measure how widespread this phenomenon is, the rumor that students can appear ‘too Asian’ has hardened into a kind of received wisdom within many Asian American communities, along with the idea that Asian American students must meet a higher bar academically than other racial groups to get into the same schools.
Students for Fair Admissions noted in its brief that ‘an entire industry exists to help them appear ‘less Asian’ on their college applications.’ The group pointed to a popular test-prep guide published in 2004 by the Princeton Review, which advised students of Asian descent to try to conceal their racial identity.
Many families still seek out professional advice. In interviews, college admissions consultants spoke about trying to steer their Asian American clients away from so-called typically Asian activities such as Chinese language school, piano and Indian classical instruments like the venu flute.
They had other tips, too: Writing about your family’s immigrant hardship story is too basic. And don’t bother checking the race box on the common application unless you’re Latino or Black — doing so may not hurt your chances of getting in, but it won’t help you either.
Harvard and supporters of affirmative action have argued that there is no such thing as a penalty for Asians and that race is, in fact, one factor among many used to evaluate applicants. The university says that, in shaping a class, it strives for diversity in not just race but also academic interests, geography, politics and socioeconomic background. Supporters have noted that the number of admitted Asian American applicants had steadily increased for decades. They made up about 28 percent of those admitted this year, up from nearly 20 percent in 2013. By comparison, Asians make up about 7 percent of the country’s population. (About 15 percent of admitted students this year were Black; 13 percent were Latino; and 3 percent were Native American.)
But Harvard’s arguments have done little to dispel the suspicions of many Asian Americans. Consultants say that, if anything, concerns among students about appearing too Asian are only growing….
In its brief, Students for Fair Admissions drew a parallel between Harvard’s approach to Asian American applicants and the efforts by Ivy League schools, including Harvard, to limit the number of Jewish students in the 1920s.
Others see parallels as well. ‘The same stereotypes used to grade down Jewish applicants in the 1920s — that they were nerds or grinds, that they would spend too much time studying to be ‘well rounded’ — are being used against Asian American applicants today,’ said Mark Oppenheimer, the host of ‘Gatecrashers,’ a podcast about the history of Jews in the Ivy League.
Supporters of Harvard say that the historical comparison is flawed and that there is no evidence that Harvard’s current admissions policies are driven by animus toward Asian Americans or that they are designed to suppress the number of Asian Americans admitted to the school.
Students for Fair Admissions has also argued that, among Asian American students, the perception of bias has contributed to ‘unusually high’ levels of anxiety and suicide. Even some of the most outspoken supporters of race-conscious admissions have acknowledged the negative impact of that perception on students’ mental health.
Sally Chen is the education equity program manager at Chinese for Affirmative Action, a San Francisco-based advocacy organization. As a child of working-class Chinese immigrants, she said that she had benefited from affirmative action when she had applied to Harvard and that there was no evidence of discrimination against Asians in the school’s admissions process.
At the same time, she added, “I know through talking to other Asian American students and families how harmful it can be for students to think that their experiences or their background are not compelling or not valuable.”
In interviews with about a dozen or so former and current Asian American students at Harvard, most said that they were disturbed by some of the lawsuit’s revelations but also that they supported the university’s efforts to foster a diverse student body, even more so after having experienced the diversity of the campus firsthand.” Read more at New York Times
CFP Agents of Chaos
Happy Selection Sunday
Photo by Joe Robbins / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images
“Something something best-laid plans, huh? Going into the weekend, the College Football Playoff setup seemed all but certain — practically daring the football gods to shake things up. Here's where we stand now:
The certainties
Georgia and Michigan remain no-doubt No. 1 and No. 2 seeds, as the SEC and Big Ten champions rolled their competition and will sail smoothly into the Playoff.
TCU, however, saw its magic run dry in overtime as Kansas State notched its third top-10 win of the season. The Horned Frogs’ resume should still earn the committee’s approval.
The fight for No. 4
Ohio State loved its weekend off, gleefully watching USC fall on its face. If the Buckeyes leapfrog to No. 3, a Michigan rematch would be the most-hyped Playoff game ever.
Alabama also had a weekend at home, but likely needed even more chaos to get in with its two-loss ‘letdown’ season.
The disappointed outsiders
USC picked a bad night to slump. After Caleb Williams seemed on his way to padding his Heisman resume, a 44-7 Utah run dashed the Trojans’ dream season.
Clemson made the quarterback change fans had been clamoring for, and Cade Klubnik proved them very, very right. If only Dabo Swinney made the call one week earlier.
The Buckeyes have the clear edge for the final Playoff spot if precedent matters; in 2017, the committee sided with the one-loss Crimson Tide over the two-loss Buckeyes. Revenge is a dish best served five years late.” Read more at The Athletic
World Cupdate
Fun while it lasted
Photo by Visionhaus / Getty Images
“The USMNT is out of the World Cup after a 3-1 round of 16 loss Saturday to a Netherlands team that controlled most of the game and capitalized swiftly on American mistakes.
Three takeaways:
The U.S. is in desperate need of an elite No. 9. Starter Jesus Ferreira was a disaster yesterday and American strikers as a whole were massively unproductive (sorry to Haji Wright, but there was no way that goal was intentional) over the last four games.
We know everyone is saying it and it doesn’t help the pain but … with the majority of core players aged 24 or younger, things are looking bright for the U.S. men. Getting out of the group is now the baseline for 2026.
Dutch coach Louis van Gaal is putting on a masterclass. Is it weird if we root for the Netherlands going forward?
The USMNT went to Qatar with the stated goal of changing the way the world views American men’s soccer. If you don’t think this tournament was an overall positive one in that regard, you’re wrong, Paul Tenorio writes.
What else is going on this weekend? Lionel Messi scored as Argentina ousted Australia, moving one round closer to winning his first World Cup. Today: a couple of must-watch matches in France-Poland (10 a.m. ET) and England-Senegal (2 p.m. ET).” Read more at The Athletic
THE WEEK AHEAD
What to Watch For
“The Supreme Court will hear arguments tomorrow in a case about whether a Colorado web designer can refuse working with same-sex couples.” Read more at New York Times
“Georgia holds its runoff election for the U.S. Senate on Tuesday between the Democratic incumbent Raphael Warnock and his Republican challenger, Herschel Walker.” Read more at New York Times
“Wednesday is the 81st anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor.” Read more at New York Times
“Trevor Noah will host his final episode of ‘The Daily Show’ on Thursday, ending a seven-year run.” Read more at New York Times
The Heisman Trophy, awarded to the most outstanding player in college football, will be announced on Saturday.” Read more at New York Times