Latest articles
by Peter Koenig / September 19th, 2018
This essay is inspired by Professor James Petras’ article, describing that the US never wins wars despite trillions of investments in her war budget and obvious military superiority. Professor Petras is, of course, right, the United States is currently engaged in seven bloody wars around the globe (Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Syria, Yemen, Somalia, Libya) and has not been winning one, including WWII. The question is: Why is that?
To these wars, you may want to add the totally destructive and human rights adverse war that literally slaughters unarmed civilians, including thousands of children, in an open-air prison, Gaza, the US …
by Ramzy Baroud / September 19th, 2018
Like vultures, Israeli soldiers descended on Khan Al-Ahmar, on September 14, recreating a menacing scene with which the residents of this small Palestinian village, located East of Jerusalem, are all-too familiar.
The strategic location of Khan Al-Ahmar makes the story behind the imminent Israeli demolition of the peaceful village unique amid the ongoing destruction of Palestinian homes and lives throughout besieged Gaza and Occupied West Bank.
Throughout the years, Khan Al-Ahmar, once part of an uninterrupted Palestinian physical landscape has grown increasingly isolated. Decades of Israeli colonization of East Jerusalem and the West Bank left Khan Al-Ahmar trapped between massive and …
However ineffectual international institutions have proved, the US, like Israel, still prefers to be without them altogether
by Jonathan Cook / September 19th, 2018
Washington’s decision to intensify swingeing aid cuts to the Palestinians – the latest targets include cancer patients and peace groups – reveals more than a simple determination to strong-arm the Palestinian leadership to the negotiating table.
Under cover of a supposed peace effort, or “deal of the century”, the Trump administration hopes to solve problems closer to home. It wants finally to shake off the burden of international humanitarian law, and the potential for war crimes trials, that have overshadowed US actions in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria – and may yet prove treacherous in dealings with Iran.
The Palestinians have been …
by Binoy Kampmark / September 19th, 2018
The flexibility of English, and thriving sign that it is not a dead language, permits repeated atrocities to be committed in the name of new terms. We are told that what is new is supposedly good, a sign of evolution. More accurately, such terms simply describe an old phenomenon, giving the false impression that the novel has appeared before the old.
The term “deplatforming” is de rigueur at the moment, a creature of the social media age and lecture circuit. Invitations to writers’ festivals can be withdrawn at a moment’s notice because the invitee has either not observed the current fashion, …
by Peter Koenig / September 18th, 2018
No doubt, anti-Iran propaganda out of Washington abounds. There are numerous Zionist-run think-tanks (sic) that make US Foreign Policy and are ratcheting up anti-Iran anger in the US, but targeting especially the Iranian population at home, in Iran. The notorious chief-villain of these agencies, by the way, highly subsidized by the US State Department, and perhaps even more important, by the powerful US military-security complex, is the Foundation for the Defense of Democracy (FDD). More than fifty years ago, then President Dwight Eisenhower already warned the world about the invasive, abusive and greed-driven powers of this ever-growing war industry.
Nobody really …
by Yves Engler / September 18th, 2018
While climate disturbances wreak growing havoc across the planet, Canadian cities continue to mandate pro-car measures that drive-up housing costs and contribute to global warming. Even the most walkable, bike-able and mass transit oriented neighbourhoods still require parking spots to be built in new residences. Finally, last week downtown Montréal eliminated parking requirements for new residential projects. Going forward developers in the Ville-Marie borough will no longer be forced to build a certain number of parking spots per new unit.
Across the country zoning laws require residential and commercial buildings to secure a certain number of spots based upon the number …
Real Clear Politics Reports
by John V. Walsh / September 18th, 2018
Bob Woodward’s book Fear has been a sensation in many respects. But one aspect has barely been mentioned. After two years of exhaustive research for his book, Woodward says that he has found no evidence of collusion between Putin’s government and Donald Trump’s campaign in 2016. Zilch, nada, zero. And Woodward strained very hard looking for it.
This largely ignored blockbuster admission came in a radio interview with Hugh Hewitt reported by Real Clear Politics here, where a recording of the full interview can also be found. Real Clear Politics reports the text of the exchange thus:
In an interview with …
In America Today, the Government Does Whatever It Wants
by John W. Whitehead / September 18th, 2018
That was when they suspended the Constitution. They said it would be temporary. There wasn’t even any rioting in the streets. People stayed home at night, watching television, looking for some direction. There wasn’t even an enemy you could put your finger on.
— Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid’s Tale
We can pretend that the Constitution, which was written to hold the government accountable, is still our governing document.
The reality we must come to terms with, however, is that in the America we live in today, the government does whatever it wants, freedom be damned.
“We the people” have been terrorized, traumatized, and tricked …
by Andre Vltchek / September 18th, 2018
Photo: Andre Vltchek
I’m sitting at the splendid building of the Singapore National Library, in a semi-dark room, microfilm inserted into a high-tech machine. I’m watching and then filming and photographing several old Malaysian newspapers dating back from October 1965.
These reports were published right after the horrible 1965 military coup in Indonesia, which basically overthrew the progressive President Sukarno and liquidated then the third largest Communist party on Earth, PKI (Partai Komunis Indonesia). Between one and three million Indonesian people lost their lives in some of the most …
by Max Parry / September 18th, 2018
This past week the 14th Dalai Lama, Tibet’s 83-year old self-declared spiritual leader in exile, made controversial remarks at a press conference in Malmö recognizing the 80th anniversary of the founding of Individual Humanitarian Aid, a Swedish development and philanthropic assistance program that took in Buddhist refugees after the Chinese annexed Tibet in 1959. [Tibet has been under Chinese rule since the Yuan dynasty which began in 1279 CE — DV Ed] His comments came as he addressed the European migrant crisis and his choice of words immediately sparked criticism because they seemed to express an attitude typically shared by …
Review of Yves Engler's Left, Right
by Kim Petersen / September 17th, 2018
A claim to righteousness in international affairs is fundamental to Canadian exceptionalism, the idea that this country is morally superior to other nations.
— Yves Engler ((Left, Right: Marching to the Beat of Imperial Canada (Black Rose Books, 2018): 151.))
In early August of this year, the Canadian minister of foreign affairs, Chrystia Freeland, tweeted for Saudi Arabia to release human rights activists. This greatly angered the Sauds who issued a series of sanctions that included selling off Saudi assets in Canada, ceasing purchases of Canadian wheat and barley, expelling Canada’s ambassador, suspending all Saudi Arabian Airlines flights to …
by Binoy Kampmark / September 17th, 2018
There is something peculiar doing the rounds in Australian food circles. The land down under, considered something of a nirvana of fruit and vegetable production despite horrendous droughts and calamitous cyclones, is facing a new challenge: human agency, namely in the form of despoliation of strawberries.
The results have knocked Australia’s highly concentrated supermarket chains, with both Coles and Aldi withdrawing all their fruit with a nervousness that has not been seen in years. A spate of incidents involving “contamination”, or pins stuck in the fruit, have manifested across a range of outlets. Strawberry brands including Donnybrook Berries, Love Berry, Delightful …
by Binoy Kampmark / September 17th, 2018
As Australia’s tattered yet new government, led by the increasingly oafish and amateurish Scott Morrison trundled into its post-climate phase, states which see their existence as dependent on the cutting of carbon emissions have been more than a touch concerned. Their reality remains divorced from the paper clip conspiracies of Canberra and the energy cliques obsessed with cutting prices.
Morrison’s ascension to power was yet another, existentially imposed headache in the aftermath of US President Donald J. Trump’s announcement that the United States would be making a dash from any obligations and aspirations associated with the Paris Climate Agreement. Pacific Island …
by James Petras / September 17th, 2018
In a previous article (“US: The Century of Lost Wars“), I recorded the repeated US military defeats over the past two decades. In this discussion I will describe the role of military strategists who bear responsibility for the US defeats, but also for Israeli political successes.
The key to this apparent contradiction is to uncover how and why the destruction of Israeli adversaries prolonged costly US military invasions.
The two outcomes are …
by Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers / September 17th, 2018
Photo by Oli Scarff for Getty Images
There has been a spate of articles recently on the ten year anniversary of the financial collapse. We wrote about this anniversary two weeks ago, describing the cause of the collapse and the reasons why we are still at risk for another one. Now, we look at how the aftermath of the collapse is shaping current politics, people’s views on the economic system and the conflict that lies ahead to create an economy for the 21st Century….
by Chris Wright / September 16th, 2018
I realize how callous the title of this article sounds. The decline of the middle class, which in recent years has been the subject of innumerable articles, books, and movies, entails a terrible increase in human suffering. The descent of millions of families into relative poverty is beyond appalling, not something to be celebrated. However, the perverse Marxist in me feels obliged to complicate the narrative of unmitigated catastrophe that dominates all journalism and scholarship on the subject. The fact is that “progress,” like God, works in mysterious ways, paradoxical, inhuman, “dialectically contradictory” ways. And the contemporary decline of …
by Edward Curtin / September 16th, 2018
On September 10, 2018, I published a laudatory review of the new book, 9/11 Unmasked: An International Review Panel Investigation by David Ray Griffin and Elizabeth Woodworth. The review also appeared at many sites. It is the definitive book on the defining event of the 21st century. The book concludes that the official version(s) of the attacks of 11 September 2001 are false. The review was subsequently reposted at many publications. There was great reader response and interest in the book, which was due for official release the next day, 11 September. My review provided a link to the …
by Jonathan Cook / September 16th, 2018
I rarely use this blog to tell readers what they should believe. Rather I try to indicate why it might be wise to distrust, at least without very good evidence, what those in power tell us we should believe.
We have well-known sayings about power: “Knowledge is power”, and “Power corrupts, while absolute power corrupts absolutely.” These aphorisms resonate because they say something true about how we experience the world. People who have power – even very limited power they hold on licence from someone else – tend to abuse it, sometimes subtly and unconsciously, and sometimes overtly and wilfully.
If we …
by Peter Koenig / September 15th, 2018
Spain’s President, socialist Pedro Sanchez, canceled a week ago the sale of 400 laser-guided missiles to the Saudis for humanitarian reasons (value of the missile contract € 9.2 million – US$ 10.7 million). A couple of days ago, he reversed that noble decision, reinstating the sale, because the Saudis threatened cancelling their contract for 5 “Corvette” warships to be built by Navantia over the next few years, for a value of € 1.8 billion (US$ 2.1 billion), providing work for some 6000 shipyard workers in one of the economically worst hit areas of Spain, Cadiz Province of Andalusia.
>So, to save …
Part two on the smear campaign against Dimitri Lascaris
by Yves Engler / September 15th, 2018
Read Part 1.
Dimitri Lascaris (Photo by Dave Chidley)Like British Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, Canadian lawyer Dimitri Lascaris is the victim of a “Big Lie” slander campaign. Defenders of the most aggressive ongoing European settler colonialism have once again smeared a “proud, anti-racist advocate for human rights.”
In this article I offer some important context regarding the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs’ (CIJA) and B’nai B’rith’s (BB) absurd “anti-Semitism” accusations against Lascaris, which were echoed by the leaders of the four …
by Mairead Maguire / September 15th, 2018
In examining the future, we must look to the past.
As we watch the media today, we are spoon fed more and more propaganda and fear of the unknown, that we should be afraid of the unknown and have full faith that our government is keeping us safe from the unknown. But by looking at media today, those of us who are old enough will be reminded of the era of Cold War news articles, hysteria of how the Russians would invade and how we should duck and cover under tables in our kitchens for the ensuing nuclear war. Under this …
by Andrew M. Johnson / September 15th, 2018
The story broke of former Cosby Show actor Geoffrey Owens working at Trader Joe’s, despite the fact that Mr. Owens himself was more than happy to move on, the story spread as people suddenly discovered that actors have to pay the bills like everyone else. The actress Tamara Braun summed it up on her Instagram:
What I also know is that being an actor, musician, writer, dancer, photographer or artist/creative of ANY kind is REALLY HARD. Most have other types of jobs while pursuing their craft. Unless you come from family money it is practically impossible not to. I have …
by RT / September 15th, 2018
File Photo. © Ammar Safarjalani / Global Look Press
Militants in Syria’s Idlib have transported several canisters containing chlorine to the village of Bsanqul, apparently preparing to stage a false flag chemical attack, the Russian Defense Ministry has said.
The chlorine-filled canisters were delivered by the Al-Qaeda-affiliated militants of Tahrir al Sham, formerly known as Al-Nusra Front, a spokesman of the Russian Center for Reconciliation in Syria, Lieutenant General Vladimir Savchenko, said in a statement Saturday. He added that the latest developments showed that the militants are preparing for …
by Michael K. Smith / September 15th, 2018
As the establishment’s coup d’etat against the democratically elected government of Donald Trump gathers momentum, readers are invited to read Ann Coulter’s latest book (Resistance Is Futile: How The Trump-Hating Left Lost Its Collective Mind), which the author says is a “self-help book for liberals,” though their hysteria about Trump will insure that few of them read it.
Psychologists have been treating “Trump anxiety” for some time now, and judging by the reaction of liberals to Coulter, they may soon have to treat Trump Tantrum Disorder as well. As Coulter points out, liberals have grown furiously unhinged by isolating themselves in …
by Steve Church / September 15th, 2018
I read an article a while ago somewhere on the web entitled something like “What Happened to My Country?” (referring to the US, but the same question could be asked by pretty much anyone anywhere the US has managed to colonise in one way or another) and while I agreed that there might be more than a few others asking themselves that same question, I had to admit that any reasonable appraisal of what our country might have been has been answered by any number of researchers and historical figures who have pointed out that the United States, in spite …
by Binoy Kampmark / September 15th, 2018
Sweden’s elections are normally dull affairs. The same political arrangements have been in place for decades, featuring mild oscillations around the centre between the green-red bloc (Social Democrats, the Greens and the Left Party) and the conservative Alliance (the Moderates, Christian Democrats and the Centre and Liberal Parties).
The favoured line for political watchers of Sweden is standard. Few monumental disagreements have registered since Sweden became a model free-education welfare state with impeccable health services funded by high taxes. But Europe has caught a rash, and it has become something of a contagion. The symptoms are clear enough: consternation at Brussels …
by Don Monkerud / September 15th, 2018
Washington—Republicans accused Fox News of biased reporting in favor of conservatives on Wednesday, outraging a horde of angry Fox supporters.
Fox defenders, including the President, Koch Enterprises, Wall Street, and the nation’s largest banks, denied the accusations before the Department of Education’s hearing on re-segregating the nation’s schools.
Ted Cruise, a self-appointed Texas “pillar of morality,” accused Republicans of pandering to liberals who seek to end the influence of news that provides them with enemies. Such distortion, Cruise said, would “lead to people seeking the truth instead of relying on their own emotions.”
Despite polls that reveal Fox News watchers know less about …
by Ellen Brown / September 15th, 2018
Central bankers are now aggressively playing the stock market. To say they are buying up the planet may be an exaggeration, but they could. They can create money at will, and they have declared their “independence” from government. They have become rogue players in a game of their own.
Excluding institutions such as Blackrock and Vanguard, which are composed of multiple investors, the largest single players in global equity markets are now thought to be central banks themselves. An estimated 30 to 40 central banks are invested in the stock market, either directly or through their investment vehicles …
Review of Follow the Money: Radio Voices for Peace and Justice by Dennis J. Bernstein
by Roger Stoll / September 15th, 2018
I was just listening to Dennis Bernstein’s Flashpoints, a news and analysis interview program airing every weekday from 5 to 6 PM on Pacifica Radio’s KPFA. Dennis’ guests were three political analysts and academics talking about the Korea summit, including the politics and history of US-Korea relations. South Korean President Moon Jae-in’s political background came up. Tim Beal remarked, “[It’s] as if Dennis Kucinich had become president of the United States.” K. J. Noh countered, “No, it’s as if William Kunstler or Lynne Stewart had become president.” Noh detailed President Moon’s background as a political prisoner, torture victim under the …
by The Saker / September 15th, 2018
