“Money doesn’t win. Pre-primary polls don’t win,” said Jason Edwards. “Votes win, and we have the people to go out and get them.”

Edwards was speaking on December 16 outside the Ohio Secretary of State’s office as nearly 6,000 petition signatures were delivered to put presidential candidate Bernie Sanders on the Ohio ballot for the May primary.

Sanders’ prospects for winning the Democratic primary in Ohio are “very good,” said Edwards, a member of Central Ohio Grassroots for Bernie Sanders and a delegate for the national campaign. For the general election, “We’ve got a lot of work to do as volunteers,” he said. “As long as we keep up our grass-roots effort around the country, we’re going to be fine.”

 “I’m very confident that Bernie would win the general election,” said Bianca Davis, a graduate student in physics at Ohio State. “We need his policies. We need universal health care, we need maternity and paternity leave, we need infrastructure, and we need to address climate change. At the first Democratic debate, Bernie was the only one who said that climate change is the biggest security threat.”

In response to the growing intolerance against Islam expressed in Donald Trump’s call for a ban on all Muslims entering the U.S., Jewish activists in 15 cities are celebrating Chanukah by holding vigils against Islamophobia and racial profiling.

Members of Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) gathered at the Ohio State University on December 12. They held eight signs representing the candles of the menorah, each with a statement opposing a different form of racism or religious intolerance.

“Islamophobia is a frightening and terrible thing,” said JVP member Charlene Fix. “I don’t want any people to be hurt that way my people were hurt.”

Thanks to Glenn Greenwald for pointing out that the U.S. media is acting as though Donald Trump just invented bigotry this week (one of those ugly details I'm happy to miss by never watching television). But not only is explicit bigotry toward Muslims not new, implicit bigotry toward Muslims has been the foundation of the largest public project in the United States for the past quarter century.

BANGKOK, Thailand -- U.S. officials announced the arrest of Roger
Clark in Thailand for extradition to New York for alleged narcotics
and money laundering conspiracies when he worked at Silk Road, "a
secret online marketplace for illegal drugs, hacking services, and a
whole host of other criminal activity."

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Internal Revenue Service
(IRS) along with the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), Department
of Homeland Security (DHS) and others led Thai police to arrest Clark
on December 3.

They nabbed Clark where he was residing on Thailand's touristy
tropical island of Koh Chang near the Cambodian border, according to
the Justice Department's announcement on December 4 which included
investigators' statements.

"Clark may have thought residing in Thailand would keep him out of
reach of U.S. authorities, but our international partnerships have
proven him wrong," FBI Assistant Director Diego Rodriguez said.

Clark, a Canadian, was being held in Thailand pending extradition to

We’ve seen so much horrendous death recently; the annual year-end listings seem insignificant. My favorite thing about the year was watching the human spirit have superior attributes over negative entities.
  After watching the Black Lives matter movement, the pro-choice rallies, legalization of gay marriage, socialized health-care and other displays of enlightenment, I thought there was a sure sign of a majority social enlightenment backed by expansive resilience in the face of adversity.
  Power to the People.

  But now people are getting shot at protests and pretty much everywhere.  It’s weird watching people actually try to induce the apocalypse.
  I would like to explain to ISIS, distraught white men and murderous police that killing random people will not cause Armageddon.
  It will kill innocent people, while the powers that be will leverage this for profit, or limitation of our rights.
  You aren’t even going to war profiteer. The guy selling you weapons will.