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by The Ministry of Information of the Communist Bloc. . 26 reads.

Daily News of The Communist Bloc - January 21st, 2021

Good morning, comrades! Here is today's news:

Executive Affairs

  • The First Minister debate has been completed. A full transcript of the debate will be posted later today.

  • The standing period for the Executive Election has started! It will last until tomorrow, and then voting will begin. Here are the current sign ups and their campaigns:

  • The RMB Representative has Linkresigned in order to run for Ministry of World Assembly Affairs

  • The Law Archive is finished and has been released! This is an easy way to navigate and keep track of all our laws. This document will be updated as new laws get passed.

  • The Revolutionary Endorsement Program has launched. If you want some more endorsements, this is an easy way to get them! (If you were having issues with REP recently, it should be working properly now)

Legislative Affairs

  • The Legislative Committee has Linkawarded Kirk Socramander with the Order of the Committee. Congratulations Kirk!

  • The People's Assembly is discussing a corruption Linkamendment to the Criminal Code

General

  • We now have a channel in our Regional Discord dedicated to trading cards! If you've ever wanted to get in to trading cards but didn't know where to start, this is a great place to start learning.

  • Our forums are back online, but unfortunately, we have lost a whole year of data. If you applied for citizenship after January of 2020, make sure to reapply!. You may also have to recreate your account. Apologies for this inconvenience. The government will be working as quickly as possible to re-accept citizenship applications. In order to prevent this from happening again in the future, we will be discussing our options and holding a vote on a potential forum transfer in the near future. Stay tuned!

    This Day in History
    By Theria Han

    Happy Thursday Comrades! When I was on yesterday, I saw the debate, so I decided to not do it (but I should've done it after). Anyway, here's "This Day in History" for January 21!

    On this day in 1977, U.S. President Jimmy Carter grants an unconditional pardon to hundreds of thousands of men who evaded the draft during the Vietnam War. In total, some 100,000 young Americans went abroad in the late 1960s and early '70s to avoid serving in the war. Ninety percent went to Canada, where after some initial controversy they were eventually welcomed as immigrants. Still, others hid inside the United States. In addition to those who avoided the draft, a relatively small number—about 1,000—of deserters from the U.S. armed forces also headed to Canada. While the Canadian government technically reserved the right to prosecute deserters, in practice they left them alone, even instructing border guards not to ask too many questions. For its part, the U.S. government continued to prosecute draft evaders after the Vietnam War ended. A total of 209,517 men were formally accused of violating draft laws, while government officials estimate another 360,000 were never formally accused. If they returned home, those living in Canada or elsewhere faced prison sentences or forced military service. During his 1976 presidential campaign, Jimmy Carter promised to pardon draft dodgers as a way of putting the war and the bitter divisions it caused firmly in the past. After winning the election, Carter wasted no time in making good on his word. Though many transplanted Americans returned home, an estimated 50,000 settled permanently in Canada. Back in the U.S., Carter’s decision generated a good deal of controversy. Heavily criticized by veterans’ groups and others for allowing unpatriotic lawbreakers to get off scot-free, the pardon and companion relief plan came under fire from amnesty groups for not addressing deserters, soldiers who were dishonorably discharged or civilian anti-war demonstrators who had been prosecuted for their resistance. Years later, Vietnam-era draft evasion still carries a powerful stigma. Though no prominent political figures have been found to have broken any draft laws, Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush and Vice Presidents Dan Quayle and Dick Cheney–none of whom saw combat in Vietnam–have all been accused of being draft dodgers at one time or another. President Donald Trump received five draft deferments during the Vietnam War, once for bone spurs in his heels. Although there is not currently a draft in the U.S., desertion and conscientious objection have remained pressing issues among the armed forces during the recent wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. (U.S. History)

    We go back to 1954, where on this day, The United States launches the world's first nuclear submarine, the USS Nautilus. USS Nautilus (SSN-571) was the world's first operational nuclear-powered submarine and the first submarine to complete a submerged transit of the North Pole on 3 August 1958. Her initial commanding officer was Eugene Parks "Dennis" Wilkinson, a widely respected naval officer who set the stage for many of the protocols of today's Nuclear Navy, and who had a storied career during military service and afterward. Sharing a name with Captain Nemo's fictional submarine in Jules Verne's classic 1870 science fiction novel Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea and the USS Nautilus (SS-168) that served with distinction in World War II, the new nuclear-powered Nautilus was authorized in 1951. Construction began in 1952, and the ship launched in January 1954, attended by Mamie Eisenhower, First Lady of the United States, wife of 34th President Dwight D. Eisenhower; it was commissioned the following September into the United States Navy. Nautilus was delivered to the Navy in 1955. Because her nuclear propulsion allowed her to remain submerged far longer than diesel-electric submarines, she broke many records in her first years of operation and traveled to locations previously beyond the limits of submarines. In operation, she revealed a number of limitations in her design and construction. This information was used to improve subsequent submarines. Nautilus was decommissioned in 1980 and designated a National Historic Landmark in 1982. The submarine has been preserved as a museum ship at the Submarine Force Library and Museum in Groton, Connecticut, where the vessel receives around 250,000 visitors per year. (U.S. History/Cold War)

    Also, a happy birthday to Itō Noe, born on this day in 1895. Noe was a Japanese anarchist, social critic, author, and feminist. She was the editor-in-chief of the feminist magazine "Seitō", although the magazine eventually folded due to lack of funds because the government would not let distributors carry it. Beginning in 1916, Itō lived and worked with her partner and fellow anarchist Sakae Ōsugi, and continued to gain prominence as a feminist and anarchist writer. She was highly critical of the existing political system in Japan, which led her to call for anarchism to exist in "everyday practice", namely that people should in various small ways seek routinely to undermine the kokutai (a sense of national body politic). Itō also translated anarchist writings into Japanese, including the works of Emma Goldman. On September 16th, 1923, Itō, Ōsugi, and his 6-year-old nephew Munekazu were arrested, strangled to death, and thrown into an abandoned well by a squad of military police known as the "Kenpeitai". The killing of such high-profile anarchists, together with a young child, became a national controversy known as the "Amakasu Incident" (named after the leader of the squad). Lt. Amakasu was arrested and sentenced to ten years in prison for the murders, however, he was released after serving only three years. (Birthdays)

    But also on this day in 1921, Vladimir Lenin dies of a stroke in Gorki, at the age of 53. A Russian revolutionary, politician, and political theorist, Lenin served as the head of government of Soviet Russia from 1917 to 1924 and of the Soviet Union from 1922 to 1924. Under his administration, Russia, and later the Soviet Union, became a one-party Marxist–Leninist state governed by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Ideologically a Marxist, he developed a variant of it known as Leninism. Born to a moderately prosperous middle-class family in Simbirsk, Lenin embraced revolutionary socialist politics following his brother's 1887 execution. Expelled from Kazan Imperial University for participating in protests against the Russian Empire's Tsarist government, he devoted the following years to a law degree. He moved to Saint Petersburg in 1893 and became a senior Marxist activist. In 1897, he was arrested for sedition and exiled to Shushenskoye for three years, where he married Nadezhda Krupskaya. After his exile, he moved to Western Europe, where he became a prominent theorist in the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP). In 1903, he took a key role in the RSDLP ideological split, leading the Bolshevik faction against Julius Martov's Mensheviks. Following Russia's failed Revolution of 1905, he campaigned for the First World War to be transformed into a Europe-wide proletarian revolution, which as a Marxist he believed would cause the overthrow of capitalism and its replacement with socialism. After the 1917 February Revolution ousted the Tsar and established a Provisional Government, he returned to Russia to play a leading role in the October Revolution in which the Bolsheviks overthrew the new regime. Lenin's Bolshevik government initially shared power with the Left Socialist Revolutionaries, elected soviets, and a multi-party Constituent Assembly, although by 1918 it had centralised power in the new Communist Party. Lenin's administration redistributed land among the peasantry and nationalized banks and large-scale industry. It withdrew from the First World War by signing a treaty conceding territory to the Central Powers and promoted world revolution through the Communist International. Opponents were suppressed in the Red Terror, a violent campaign administered by the state security services; tens of thousands were killed or interned in concentration camps. His administration defeated right and left-wing anti-Bolshevik armies in the Russian Civil War from 1917 to 1922 and oversaw the Polish-Soviet War of 1919–1921. Responding to wartime devastation, famine, and popular uprisings, in 1921 Lenin encouraged economic growth through the market-oriented New Economic Policy. Several non-Russian nations had secured independence from the Russian Empire after 1917, but three were re-united into the new Soviet Union in 1922. His health failing, Lenin died in Gorki, with Joseph Stalin succeeding him as the pre-eminent figure in the Soviet government. May he rest in peace. (Deaths)

    While run by the Ministry of Information, the Daily News does not necessarily reflect the stance of the current administration. Please contact the Minister of Information Pajonia on NationStates or Ant(Pajonia) in the Regional Discord for any corrections, suggestions, questions, comments, or concerns.

    This article was authored by Pajonia

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