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Italy is predominantly Catholic, and it respects religious freedom and welcomes Muslim visitors. According to the latest information, major cities like Rome, Milan, and Venice have mosques and Islamic centers. Some tourist attractions offer prayer rooms, and many Italians are open-minded towards different cultures and religions.
Islam in Italy has a long history dating back to the 9th century when Muslim forces occupied parts of southern Italy. Today, Islam is the second-largest religion in Italy after Christianity. The Muslim population in Italy is estimated to be around two million, making up about 3.5 percent of the total population. Most Muslims in Italy are immigrants or children of immigrants from countries like Morocco, Albania, Tunisia, and Bangladesh. There are also a growing number of Italian converts to Islam.
President Biden left behind an economy that was pretty healthy, conventionally speaking. Unemployment was low and wages were rising, but stubbornly high costs of living opened a door for Donald Trump’s political comeback.
Exactly why has the City of Columbus and the Ohio Department of Transportation (ODOT) removed large areas of tree canopy and brush from Columbus over the past several years? According to some homeowners and activists in Franklinton, ODOT accidentally let the cat out of the bag. Telling them during a meeting it was because “homeless live there.”
Other Franklinton homeowners refute ODOT’s slip-of-the-tongue explanation, saying there is no conspiracy against the unhoused, instead they contend ODOT lied during the meeting to conceal the truth. Which is that ODOT and its private contractors failed to follow their protocols due to incompetence and laziness.
Nevertheless, in April of 2024, ODOT with help from local contractors, removed roughly six acres of trees and brush off the slopes of SR-315 and I-70 within Franklinton. Incidentally, ODOT’s contractors also at that time cut down $30,000 worth of City of Columbus trees planted on a city easement between city and ODOT property. Rosalie Hendon, Columbus’s City Forester, has requested ODOT pay to have them replaced.
2025 Iberian Peninsula Blackout
After an unprecedented power outage hit Spain, Portugal, and parts of France last week, many in the media speculated that the large amounts of renewable energy in the Iberian system was to blame for the blackout.
The exact cause of the grid collapse is not yet known, but at 12:33 p.m. on April 28, electricity generation in Spain dropped rapidly from around 27 gigawatts to just over 12 gigawatts. The sudden drop in grid load destabilized electricity flows, resulting in a peninsula wide power outage.
At the time of the incident, Spain and Portugal were sourcing about 80 percent of their electricity from wind and solar, leading to the speculation that the grid could have been overloaded with renewable energy.
While renewables are well known for being more intermittent than generation from fossil fuels, the consensus amongst grid experts is that the generation source had nothing to do with this week's blackout.
New York City political and literary imprint Seven Stories Press acquired Columbus, Ohio’s 2 Dollar Radio.
I looked at Seven Stories Press’ list. I saw Huey Newton, Howard Zinn, Noam Chomsky, Ralph Nader, Angela Davis, Amnesty International, Phil Jackson, Kalle Lasn, Lydia Lunch, Karl Marx, Fidel Castro, Free Press’ contributor Greg Palast, Upton Sinclair, Kurt Vonnegut, Gary Webb, The Zapatista’s, Slavoj Zizek, Pacifica Radio’s Sonali Kolhalkar and The Weathermen.
I determined that Upton Sinclair and The Weathermen wouldn’t ruin the vegan food at Two Dollar Radio’s German Village location.
IF you like radio – Rising Up With Sonali airs from 92.7/ 98.3 wcrsfm.org weekdays 9-10am.
Seven Stories publishes Weather Underground’s Sing A Battle Song 1970-1974.
Weather Underground were a political community which used writings, speeches, and various explosions as opposition of oppressions of Black people, the Vietnam War, and the CIA’s dismantling of Democratic governments in Latin America which were empirical colonialist experiences of our government killing people.
This Wednesday, May 7th at 9am, the Ohio House of Representatives Natural Resources Committee is hearing Opponent Testimony on HB 170, to "Establish process to regulate carbon capture, storage technology."
Please join us in urging the committee members to VOTE NO by submitting written testimony and, if you can, speaking at the hearing, and by calling the committee members and telling them that you are a concerned Ohioan and you want them to vote no!
Want to submit testimony? Here's how!
If you would like to speak at the hearing, you must submit your testimony in writing ahead of time. All testimony must be submitted in writing by noon on Tuesday, May 6th.
On Wednesday, May 7th, requests will be sent out by Representatives Michele Grim and Tristan Rader, to all Ohio House representatives asking them to co-sponsor 'The Ohio Healthcare Plan', the bill which would establish a universal, publicly funded healthcare finance system in Ohio.
Please call your Ohio representative and ask him/her to co-sponsor and support the bill.
Don't know who your Ohio rep is?
Go to 'Find My State Legislators', then it will ask for your address to find your rep. and his/her phone number.
Here's what to say:
I am ______, your constituent in ______County.
Ohioans have suffered from lack of access to good health care for too long. We have worse health outcomes than most other states.
This is due to being uninsured or having insurance that has such high deductibles that we hesitate too long before seeking care.
It's time you realize that a large majority of Ohioans favor a universal system of healthcare financing.
I ask that you co-sponsor and implement 'The Ohio Health Care Plan'.
Saturday, May 3 and Sunday, May 4, 7pm, First Unitarian Universalist Church, 93 W. Weisheimer Rd.
We’re turning up the volume on 35 years of harmony, strength, and song!
Join the Columbus Women’s Chorus for our spring concert, “It’s All About the Music: 35 Years of Singing Together,” two nights only, May 3 and 4 at 7pm.
Come celebrate our legacy of feminist music-making and community through powerful performances that honor where we’ve been and where we’re going.
RSVP for this event by using this link.
https://www.colswomenschorus.org/buy-tickets
Doors open at 6:30pm. Parking may be limited and the concerts will start promptly at 7pm, so allow extra time!
Hosted by Columbus Women’s Chorus.
In commemoration of the May 4, 1970 killings of students on the Kent State University campus this is an encore presentation of a Free Press article written on May 6, 2007.
The 1970 killings by National Guardsmen of four students during a peaceful anti-war demonstration at Kent State University have now been shown to be cold-blooded, premeditated official murder. But the definitive proof of this monumental historic reality is not, apparently, worthy of significant analysis or comment in today’s mainstream media.
After 37 years of official denial and cover-up, tape-recorded evidence, that has existed for decades and has been in the possession of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), has finally been made public.
It proves what “conspiracy theorists” have argued since 1970—that there was a direct military order leading to the unprovoked assassination of unarmed students. Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) documents show collusion between Ohio Governor James A. Rhodes and the FBI that aimed to terrorize anti-war demonstrators and their protests that were raging throughout the nation.
May 6, 2007
The 1970 killings by National Guardsmen of four students during a peaceful anti-war demonstration at Kent State University have now been shown to be cold-blooded, premeditated official murder. But the definitive proof of this monumental historic reality is not, apparently, worthy of significant analysis or comment in today’s mainstream media.
After 37 years of official denial and cover-up, tape-recorded evidence, that has existed for decades and has been in the possession of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), has finally been made public.
It proves what “conspiracy theorists” have argued since 1970—that there was a direct military order leading to the unprovoked assassination of unarmed students. Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) documents show collusion between Ohio Governor James A. Rhodes and the FBI that aimed to terrorize anti-war demonstrators and their protests that were raging throughout the nation.