Conflict reporter/writer/cartoonist Ted Rall and political analyst Jamarl Thomas deprogram you from mainstream media every weekday at 9 AM EST.

Today we discuss:

• Crisis in Cuba: Cuba’s oil reserves have run dry, which will plunge the country into even more frequent, bigger and longer nationwide blackouts. Venezuelan fuel stopped flowing in January, after the US kidnapped Venezuela’s president and stole Venezuela’s oil industry. Later, Trump imposed a blockade barring oil from reaching Cuba, which had also received shipments from Mexico.

• The US is moving to indict former Cuban president Raúl Castro. The charges are related to the Cuban government shooting down two planes operated by a right-wing group in 1996.

• CIA Director John Ratcliffe leads a delegation to Havana to deliver a message from Trump to Cuban officials and Raúl "Raulito" Guillermo Rodriguez Castro, the elder Castro's grandson. Last week, the U.S. State Department ⁠said it had privately offered the $100 million in aid to Cuba, in addition to "free ​and fast satellite internet" on the condition that it agree to “meaningful reforms.”

• The Justice Department accuses Yale School of Medicine of discriminating based on race, by favoring Black and Hispanic applicants over White and Asian ones. The DOJ looked at median grade-point averages and standardized test scores broken down by race, and concluded that “Yale’s use of race resulted in a Black applicant being as much as 29 times higher odds of getting an interview for admission than an equally strong Asian applicant with similar academic credentials.” The investigation did not address other factors, such as essays, transcripts, letters of recommendation and interviews. The median entrance exam score for admitted Black students last year was 518 and for 517 for Hispanic students. The median score was 524 for both White and Asian students. The highest possible score is 528. The median grade point average for Black students was 3.88 and 3.91 for Hispanic students. For White students, it was 3.97 and for Asians 3.98.

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