Latest articles
by Brenda Heard / November 16th, 2015
On 15 November, the New York Times published an article entitled “Beirut, Also the Site of Deadly Attacks, Feels Forgotten.” It highlights the disparity between the global solidarity expressed for Paris following the deadly 13 November attacks and the lack thereof expressed for Beirut after it too was attacked the day prior. But the headline suggests a petulant attitude from Lebanese who “feel forgotten,” as though they were a bratty child or a snivelling spouse.
Granted the Times expresses a degree of compassion for Beirut’s victims, who like those in Paris “were killed at random, in a bustling urban area, …
This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things
by Anne Meador / November 16th, 2015
At the first debate for left-leaning candidates for U.S. Senate to represent Maryland, there’s no place on the stage for the most progressive candidate on the ballot.
Dr. Margaret Flowers, the Green Party candidate, claims she’s been forced out because one of the Democratic contenders vying for the Senate seat objects to her presence. She’s blazing mad and vows to attend with or without the host’s blessing.
“I told them I am serious about this campaign. I want to win,” she said. “I’m going to fight to be heard in order to be elected. I’m going to show up there whether or …
by Denis Rancourt / November 15th, 2015
The US and its allies murdered one million civilians in Iraq, using indefinite sanctions and war, destroyed all public infrastructure, and gutted all institutions. Do you think that would cause some people to be pissed off and desperate?
These “leaders of the free world” went on to inflict the same such “humanitarian” medicine on Afghanistan, Libya, and now Syria (by proxy) and Yemen. And these “leaders” condone the regular genocidal slaughters perpetrated by Israel as part of its brutal occupation and program of land seizures.
Do you think some people are starting to grasp the meaning of US “freedom and democracy”?
These wars …
by Pedro Aibéo / November 14th, 2015
People who posted their profile pictures in social media with the French flag as a background and also those who projected its colors into buildings all over the world are either lazy or ignorant. I guess both!
France has a long history of aggression, killings and acts of terrorism against civilians around the world in its former colonies, including an extensive record of economic extortion and political destabilization.
Paris has been attacked many times before: in the 1950s by the Algerian Liberation Front, in the 70s and 80s by the Popular Front of the Liberation of Palestine, and by the Armenian group …
by Andrey Fomine / November 14th, 2015
Yesterday night things changed in an instant in Paris. The available evidence suggest that the assaults were carried out by a professional killer group who used live bombs among other weapons Today’s post by Pepe Escobar on his Facebook page sheds some light on symbolism and timimg of the massacre:
Scouring a ton of reports, I found a Danish citizen describing one of the attackers to a Paris café; ultra-pro, black-clad head to toe, AK-47, very well trained. These are not your usual al-Zawahiri underwear bombers; these are precision killers. This one left the scene undisturbed, and …
by Eve Mykytyn / November 14th, 2015
Read Part 1.
On November 12th the jury found Mr. Topham guilty of ‘inciting hate.’ This leads to a few questions.
First, the jury found Mr. Topham guilty on Count 1 but not guilty on Count 2. Ordinarily, this is a result we are comfortable with since the state (the Crown) may have proved ‘beyond a reasonable doubt’ that a defendant committed an assault but not have shown sufficient evidence of battery. Mr. Topham’s case is different. He was charged with two virtually identical counts, both relating to his website but covering different periods of time, that is, count 1 …
by Jonathan Cook / November 14th, 2015
An article in the Australian publication New Matilda gets to the real point about last night’s attacks in Paris – one that no one wants to talk about. What westerners feel right now is a powerful and very selective outrage that identifies with the suffering of people “like us”. We mourn the deaths in Paris while not even noticing those killed in Lebanon a day earlier and almost certainly by the same fanatics that launched the attacks in France.
Lots of westerners like to dismiss such observations as “whataboutery”. It is natural, they say, to care more about people we know and …
by Press TV / November 14th, 2015
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has condemned the string of coordinated terrorist attacks that killed at least 127 people in and around the French capital of Paris.
“What France suffered from – savage terror – is what the Syrian people have been enduring for over five years,” he said on Saturday, hours after the attacks in France.
The attacks in France were carried out late on Friday, when assailants struck at least six different venues in and around the French capital.
President Assad added in a meeting with a delegation of French lawmakers in the Syrian capital of Damascus that “mistaken policies” adopted by …
by Allen W. Smith / November 14th, 2015
During the past three decades the American people have been kept in the dark about the true status of the Social Security program. Politicians, from both political parties, give out false and conflicting information on a regular basis, and nobody knows who to believe. At the Republican presidential debate, held in Boulder, Colorado, on the night of October 28, 2015, New Jersey governor, Chris Christie, shocked a lot of people when he said, “Let me be honest with the people who are watching at home. The government has lied to you and they have stolen from …
by The Real News Network (TRNN) / November 14th, 2015
Greek port worker and union leader Giorgos Gogos says most of the demonstrations across the country were peaceful and unified against austerity measures imposed by the lenders and accepted by SYRIZA.
https://youtu.be/BrN1U1NAp5c
by Bill Annett / November 14th, 2015
News item: California’s Right to Rest Act would give homeless people the right to use public space without discrimination. It also describes the right to rest in public, to protect oneself from the elements in public, to eat in public and to occupy a legally parked car.
*****
I first became aware of the complex of societal problem related to poverty when — one winter in downtown Toronto — I was confronted by a homeless man. In fact, I had to step over him because he was rolled up …
by Paul Craig Roberts / November 14th, 2015
At 7pm on Friday 13th we do not have much information about the “terrorist attacks” in Paris other than that Paris is closed down like Boston was after the “Boston Marathon Bombing,” also a suspected false flag event.
Possibly believable evidence will be presented that the Paris attacks were real terrorist attacks. However, what do refugees have to gain from making themselves unwelcome with acts of violence committed against the host country, and where do refugees in France obtain automatic weapons and bombs? Indeed, where would the French themselves obtain them?
The millions of refugees from Washington’s wars who are overrunning Europe …
by John R. Hall / November 13th, 2015
Awakening once again to songs of mourning doves and the clanging of numerous church bells, I’m counting my last few precious days here in the heart of Mexico. Ornately painted calacas (skulls), elegantly clad skeletal Catrinas, ten foot tall mojigangas (giant puppets), fireworks and parades of Dia de Los Muertos are finished. Now it’s back to life as usual the streets of San Miguel de Allende, Guanajuato.
My wife and I love this beautiful little city. What’s not to love? Eternal spring weather, picturesque countryside. A World Heritage Site with some of the most painstakingly preserved Spanish Colonial architecture anywhere. And …
The problem with half-measures
by Jason Hirthler / November 13th, 2015
Recently there was a chalk picture drawn on a particular sidewalk in Greenwich Village—a colorful image of Hillary Clinton. Her face was upturned, much like Obama’s starry gaze in 2008. Her cosmetic upgrades this summer—dutifully rendered in finely contoured jowls—returned to her cheeks a faint glow of youth. Her shut-lipped grin, a poor man’s Mona Lisa, gave her face a humble cast, almost grandmotherly in its saintliness. The picture got its point across: here was someone we could believe in. Had there been a companion portrait of Bernie Sanders gazing up at Hillary, it would have only been appropriate.
Like this …
by Ralph Nader / November 13th, 2015
Fact: Tens of millions of Americans do not have a bank account. As a result, many of these Americans spend a reported $89 billion annually in interest and fees by using predatory services such as payday loan and check cashing services. It’s a perpetuating cycle of poverty in which the poor get poorer just by accessing their own money. Fortunately, there is an ideal solution staring us in the face. An important voice driving the conversation is Professor Mehrsa Baradaran of the University of Georgia Law School. Her excellent new book, …
by Andre Vltchek / November 13th, 2015
Saudi Prince Abdulmohsen bin Walid bin Abdulmohsen bin Abdulaziz Al Saud was obviously not fully satisfied with his life. A private jet, several luxury cars and a mansion were not enough to make him feel a truly fulfilled and respected member of the Gulf ruling “elites”. Others had more, like those double-decker Airbus 380’s, or tremendous duplexes overlooking Karbala.
Perhaps that was the reason why he tried so hard to catch up, by smuggling from Beirut, Lebanon to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia (KSA), some 40 suitcases and boxes neatly packed with Captagon pills, with some cocaine thrown in for good measure.
I say …
by Andrey Fomine / November 13th, 2015
In December of last year we published an intriguing article by Dmitry Kalinichenko, “Grandmaster Putin’s Trap,” which has drawn far more attention from readers than we ever expected. It continues to be cited by many international political and economic experts. That article addressed Russia’s latent strategy to get rid of US bonds and use its petrodollars to buy monetary gold. It seemed for a while that the ruble’s nosedive late last year, coupled with the Kremlin’s reduced fiscal space, has left Moscow unable to pursue its plan to permanently diversify the international financial system. Nevertheless, taking …
by Robert Hunziker / November 13th, 2015
The 2015 Paris Climate Conference scheduled for November 30th – December 11th looks to be a humongous event, a big win with extremely significant world-changing implications for economic behavior and planetary health for decades and centuries to come.
If the hints and statements by Christiana Figueres, Executive Secretary of the UN Framework on Climate Change (“UNFCCC’) prove correct, the world is about to change in a very positive way.
Expectations are rising by the month, and now by the week, that COP21 will not be a cop-out, rather, for the first time in over 20 years of intransigency, a legally binding universal …
What Will We Do When One Third of Us are 65 or Older?
Village to Village Movement Tackles the Needs of Living at Home As Long As Possible
by Paul Haeder / November 12th, 2015
Roots
I remember ageism striking me right between the eyes, in Oaxaca, while I was climbing a pyramid at Monte Alban. Running, really. A silly sight from afar, trying to beat the veronica of the sun so I could get the “perfect” dusk shot with my Nikon.
Two elderly ladies on the side of the steps were selling beautiful weavings, something for which the Zapotec Indians of that region are known.
I got all huffy and puffy about their goods spread out on the steps. One of the 80-year-old women said to me in heavily accented Spanish, “ Calmate, joven. Despacio. En la …
by Graham Peebles / November 12th, 2015
The worlds we inhabit are noisy places. The external environment, particularly cities, where over half the population now live, suffocates under a cacophony of competing sounds, from road and air traffic, to power tools, car alarms and neon lights: and, for most of us, the internal, mental space in which we live is equally chaotic and cluttered. Contradictory thought patterns rise up one after another, jostling for attention, demanding to be heard and acted upon. Conditioned, and therefore partial thoughts, move us away from the present – where exists peace – and into conflict.
This endless stream of space invaders is …
by Rostislav Ischenko / November 12th, 2015
The paradox of the current global crisis is that for the last five years, all relatively responsible and independent nations have made tremendous efforts to save the United States from the financial, economic, military, and political disaster that looms ahead. And this is all despite Washington’s equally systematic moves to destabilize the world order, rightly known as the Pax Americana (“American peace”).
Since policy is not a zero-sum game; i.e., one participant’s loss does not necessarily entail a gain for another, this paradox has a logical explanation. A crisis erupts within any system when there is a discrepancy between its internal …
by Colin Jenkins / November 12th, 2015
In 1885, the Knights of Labor organized a successful strike against Jay Gould’s Missouri Pacific Railroad. In response to the strike, Gould famously growled, “I can hire half the working class to kill the other half.”
Gould was right. In any hierarchical arrangement, where power and wealth become concentrated in the hands of a few, this tactic becomes available to those wielding this power over a vast majority. Among the masses of workers, slaves, and impoverished, there will inevitably be many willing to “police their own” in order to be in the masters’ good graces. History is rife with these examples.
In …
by Kim Petersen / November 11th, 2015
As I write, highly civilized human beings are flying overhead trying to kill me.
They do not feel any enmity against me as an individual, nor I against them. They are only doing their duty, as the saying goes. Most of them, I have no doubt, are kind-hearted law-abiding men who would never dream of committing murder in private life. On the other hand, if one of them succeeds in blowing me to pieces with a well-placed bomb, he will never sleep any worse for it. He is serving his country, which has the power to absolve him from evil.
— …
by Syria Support Movement / November 11th, 2015
Elite Syrian army units have broken the siege of Kweires airbase, following weeks of intense fighting against Islamic State and other jihadist forces. The base, which opens up routes for offensives against Raqqa and Aleppo, had been encircled for nearly two years.
“We, the heroes of Kweires, are now celebrating this victory with our brothers,” a soldier told Syrian state television. “We dedicate this victory to President Bashar Assad and we promise him we will continue fighting until all of Syria is liberated. We will not kneel to Daesh” [Islamic State].
The advancing Tiger Forces, the name for the commando units in …
by Jonathan Cook / November 11th, 2015
Behind the headline news of clashes between Palestinian youths and armed Israeli soldiers, Israel has – as ever – been quietly tightening its grip on Palestinians’ lives in the occupied territories.Last week in Hebron, a current flashpoint, 50 embattled families still living in the Tel Rumeida neighbourhood, faced a new restriction on movement designed to help free up the area for intensified Jewish settlement.
Some of Tel Rumeida’s residents could be seen silently queuing at the local checkpoint to register their ID cards. Anyone not from the neighbourhood and not on the military’s list will be barred from entering.
Their response differed …
by Frank Scott / November 11th, 2015
The annual experience of pontificating politicians and their media stenographers extolling the virtues of the brave, heroic, selfless and dedicated heroes these draft dodgers and service avoiders laud for doing what they would never dream of doing is becoming ever more sickening. Especially as so many veterans are reduced to poverty, unemployment, living in their cars or on the street or wasting away in VA hospitals where budget cuts administered by free market fanatics of the right, center and what passes for a liberal left strengthen market forces at the expense of these quickly forgotten “patriots” who make life safe …
The Terrible Cost of Avoiding the Dangers of Kabul
by Brian Terrell / November 11th, 2015
When I arrived at the Kabul International Airport on November 4, I was unaware that the same day the New York Times published an article, “Life Pulls Back in Afghan Capital, as Danger Rises and Troops Recede.” My friends Abdulhai and Ali, 17 years old, young men I have known since my first visit five years ago, greeted me with smiles and hugs and took my bags. Disregarded by soldiers and police armed with automatic weapons, we caught up on old times as we walked past concrete blast walls, sand bag fortifications, check points and razor wire to the …
by Ramzy Baroud / November 11th, 2015
US Secretary of State, John Kerry, is often perceived as one of the ‘good ones’ – the less hawkish of top American officials, who does not simply promote and defend his country’s military adventurism but reaches out to others, beyond polarizing rhetoric.
His unremitting efforts culminated partly in the Iran nuclear framework agreement in April, followed by a final deal a few months later. Now, he is reportedly hard at work again to find some sort of consensus on a way out of the Syria war, a multi-party conflict that has killed over 300,000 people. His admirers see him as …
by Isaac Saney / November 11th, 2015
The Cuban people hold a special place in the hearts of the peoples of Africa. The Cuban internationalists have made a contribution to African independence, freedom and justice, unparalleled for its principled and selfless character…Cubans came to our region as doctors, teachers, soldiers, agricultural experts, but never as colonizers. They have shared the same trenches with us in the struggle against colonialism, underdevelopment, and apartheid.
— Nelson Mandela, Address to the Cuban People, July 26, 1991
November 5, 2015 marked the 40th anniversary of Operación Carlota, Cuba’s 15-year mission to defend Angola’s independence, which played a decisive role in southern African …
by James Hoover / November 10th, 2015
Ben Carson is the quiet, almost somnolent, version of Donald Trump. He is, like Trump, a political outsider, but a crafty politician all the same, without the reality TV persona of Donald Trump. Carson seems to share other attributes with “the Donald” though not commonly discussed in the media.
In an era of celebrity when we are encouraged, in fact, marketed to placate and coddle ourselves, flaws in the character of public images are usually deflected in the glow of spotlight. The image is often falsely projected and the best of it amplified for effect. Motivations and flaws are hidden behind …
