Latest articles
by Herb Dyer / July 21st, 2015
You know, I tried to talk about good roads and good schools and all these things that have been part of my career, and nobody listened. And then I began talking about niggers, and they stomped the floor.
– George Wallace, after winning Alabama’s governor’s office in 1962
After losing his first run for governor in 1958, George Wallace famously told his campaign finance chief Seymore Trammell that he had been “out-niggered” by his opponent. There was no viable Republican Party in Alabama in the 1960s. Thus, winning the Democratic Party primary – any Democratic primary — was tantamount to …
by Matt Peppe / July 21st, 2015
A recent New York Times profile of Marco Rubio accurately describes the junior Senator from Florida, and member of the three-ring circus that is the Republican Presidential primary field, as Cuba’s “least favorite son.” The piece quoted a Havana resident as saying Rubio is “against Cuba in every possible way… Rubio and these Republicans, they are still stuck in 1959.” Presumably this view was representative of others that Times writer Jason Horowitz encountered while conducting his research in Cuba. This should not come as a surprise. Rubio is a reactionary fanatic who demagogues incessantly about the evils of the Cuban …
by Peter Phillips / July 20th, 2015
July 18th 2015 was the first day of this year’s summer camp for the world’s business and political aristocracy and their invited guests. 2,000 to 3,000 men, mostly from the wealthiest global one percent, gather at Bohemian Grove, 70 miles north of San Francisco in California’s Sonoma County—to sit around the campfire and chew the fat—off-the-record—with ex-presidents, corporate leaders and global financiers.
Speakers this year giving “Lakeside Chats” include past Secretary of Defense and the CIA Leon Panetta, Paul Volcker Jr. former Federal Reserve Chairman, retired Admiral Mike Mullen former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, NYU Law Professor Bryan …
by Shepherd Bliss / July 20th, 2015
Sonoma County Winegrowers bought an expensive, full-page, color ad, using tax dollars, in the July 12 daily Santa Rosa Press Democrat and in various weeklies, such as the North Bay Bohemian and Sonoma West. The ad ignited a firestorm of protest with angry letters to editors and online comments from the community storming local publications that ran the ad.
As someone who practices, writes about, and teaches college students at Sonoma State and Dominican Universities about what “sustainable” really means, the ad offends me. It is blatant propaganda of false advertising to hoodwink readers.
Winegrowers received a $377,282 federal grant in 2014 …
by Robert Hunziker / July 19th, 2015
Year-over-year, America sets new prison records. No other nation on Earth comes close to America’s “lock’em up” ethos.
Therefore, assuming that imprisonment records are accurate, the U.S. is one of the most dangerous countries in the world. How else explain the enormous “lock’em up” numbers? What’s going on? Is America riddled with criminals? Jeez, it’s a wonder that tourists come to America with so many criminals on every street corner.
Not to worry! Tourists feel safe because the jails are bulging, overflowing, thus, criminals must be off every street corner and already locked up. That’s what they presume to be true. Why …
by John R. Hall / July 19th, 2015
Somewhere in Washington, D.C. in the labyrinth of congressional offices there lurks a nearly unknown congressman. Unknown because he carefully avoids high profile or controversial issues. A veritable deaf-mute when it comes to voicing his opinion on vital matters. Considering the herd of loud-mouth miscreants with whom he shares those hallowed halls, you might even call him a breath of fresh air. And his name shall remain unspoken here, for this isn’t about him. When it all comes down to dust this public servant who appears to possess few personal opinions will be remembered for one sentence. A sentence so insightful and thought provoking that it will likely …
Government orders TV channel closed for links to Palestinian Authority, while Israel’s culture minister vows to "censor" critics
by Jonathan Cook / July 19th, 2015
The Israeli government has declared war on a Palestinian TV channel that launched last month from a mobile studio-truck near the city of Nazareth in Israel.
The station, which broadcasts six hours a day to Israel’s 1.5 million Palestinian Arab citizens, focuses on news, arts, food and celebrities, as well as offering children’s programmes and quiz shows.
Despite the channel’s modest budget and ambitions, however, Israel’s public security minister, Gilad Erdan, ordered its closure last week, describing its operations as a “breach of Israel’s sovereignty”.
The satellite channel – called Palestine ’48 – is the first to serve Israel’s Palestinian minority that is …
Free Kindle Book Download
by Dissident Voice Communications / July 19th, 2015
DV contributor Gary Brumback’s newest book, Corporate Reckoning Ahead, is available to DV readers as a free Kindle download from 20 July to 24 July.
Palestinian groups and individuals in the occupied homeland, refugee camps and the diaspora are speaking out
by Syria Support Movement / July 19th, 2015
We are Palestinians and Palestinian organizations that declare our solidarity with the Syrian people in their historic struggle for survival, now in its fifth year. We are in a unique position to understand and appreciate the challenges facing our Syrian brothers and sisters, because we face the same challenges.
We understand what it means to have our lands and our property taken by foreign usurpers. We understand what it means for millions of our people to be driven out of their homes and to be unable to return. We understand what it means for our interests and our national rights to …
by Andre Vltchek / July 18th, 2015
One of the mightiest South American waterways – Rio Paraguay – is forming a national frontier between Argentina and Paraguay, two countries with similar cultures but diametrically different political systems.
Argentina is socialist, with free medical care and mostly free education. It has a progressive government. It sent its creditors, the World Bank and IMF, packing. It defaulted its debt, which was accumulated during the right-wing and pro-Western governments (Greece should study and follow Argentina’s model). It is increasingly close to other socialist Latin American countries, and also to non-Western powers like Russia and China.
Paraguay is a divided country. Even …
It's Time for a Real Investigation
by Jack Balkwill / July 18th, 2015
There appears to be a bigger lie than “weapons of mass destruction.” It’s not simply that the illegal invasion of Iraq was based on lies, but that the entire “war on terrorism” is likely based on lies.
We were told by our government that Afghanistan was invaded for giving shelter to Osama bin Laden, who was responsible for the 9/11 attacks. Mainstream press have pushed this so repeatedly that “9/11” and “Osama bin Laden” have become interchangeable.
While working on this piece I asked the first three people I ran into at my local grocery store “Who was responsible for the 9/11 …
by Ralph Nader / July 18th, 2015
When I co-founded the Public Citizen Health Research Group with Dr. Sidney M. Wolfe in 1971, he declared that this was his “last job.” The drug industry might have been advised to quiver. For through his Worst Pills, Best Pills books, newsletters and spectacular outreach via the Phil Donahue show, he has exposed by brand names hundreds of drugs with harmful side effects (worst pills) compared to drugs without such an unfavorable risk-benefit profile (best pills). In the nineteen seventies, he and his associates successfully advocated that many totally useless prescription and over-the-counter drugs be taken off the market.
Saving lives and saving …
by Kathy Kelly / July 18th, 2015
Last weekend, about 100 U.S. Veterans for Peace gathered in Red Wing, Minnesota, for a statewide annual meeting. In my experience, Veterans for Peace chapters hold “no-nonsense” events. Whether coming together for local, statewide, regional or national work, the Veterans project a strong sense of purpose. They want to dismantle war economies and work to end all wars. The Minnesotans, many of them old friends, convened in the spacious loft of a rural barn. After organizers extended friendly welcomes, participants settled in to tackle this year’s theme: “The War on Our Climate.”
They invited Dr. James Hansen, an …
by Paul Craig Roberts / July 17th, 2015
Greece’s debt can now only be made sustainable through debt relief measures that go far beyond what Europe has been willing to consider so far.
— International Monetary Fund
Greece’s lesson for Russia, and for China and Iran, is to avoid all financial relationships with the West. The West simply cannot be trusted. Washington is committed to economic and political hegemony over every other country and uses the Western financial system for asset freezes, confiscations, and sanctions. Countries that have independent foreign policies and also have assets in the West cannot expect Washington to respect their property rights or their ownership. Washington …
by Gilad Atzmon / July 17th, 2015
I would like to congratulate The US Campaign to End Israeli Occupation (EOIO) for confirming the substance of my argument that Jewish domination of the solidarity movement has had a corrosive effect on the movement. My argument is detailed in my recent book, The Wandering Who.
Ten days ago, we learned that the Israeli Government has actually recruited left organisations to cleanse the Solidarity movement of its ‘radicals’ – those who dare to tell the truth about the Jewish State and the culture and ideology that drive its politics. EOIO seems to be exceedingly enthusiastic about its role as …
by Michael Freed / July 17th, 2015
If you could make a change, a single change to society that could illuminate its most pressing issues, bring them to the forefront and propose new solutions to many of society’s oldest problems, you would do it, wouldn’t you? If this change could help many, even if none of the people helped were you, yet no one could be harmed, you would quite probably wish for this change to occur, would you not? Perhaps even take action to help enact it? Vote on it? Sign a petition?
I want to propose such a change. One change, that in itself would address …
by Binoy Kampmark / July 16th, 2015
Stone age politics continues its creaky, inscrutable way in Canberra, with the Australian Prime Minister keen to show his acute lack of understanding about the renewable energy sector. One wonders whether he believes in its existence at all. On this occasion, Tony Abbott decided that even his energy minister, Greg Hunt, wasn’t to feature in his decision on whether the Clean Energy Finance Corporation should continue to fund wind-related projects.
To date, the CEFC has been responsible for providing $300 million to wind energy projects, with its investment portfolio being 33 percent solar, 30 percent energy efficiency, 21 percent wind and …
by Andrew Gavin Marshall / July 16th, 2015
In the early hours of Thursday morning, July 16, the Greek Parliament passed a host of austerity measures in order to begin talks on a potential third bailout of 86 billion euros. The austerity measures were pushed onto the Parliament by Greece’s six-month-old leftist government of Syriza, elected in late January with a single mandate to oppose austerity. So what exactly happened over the past six months that the first anti-austerity government elected in Europe has now passed a law implementing further austerity measures?
One cannot properly assess the political gymnastics being exercised within Greece’s ruling Syriza party without placing …
by John R. Hall / July 15th, 2015
The Shawshank Redemption is a movie I could watch a thousand times. By the time the last scene plays, my heart is once again filled with hope. In one prison scene Red tells Andy that hope is a dangerous thing and that it can drive a man insane. Andy, the optimist, believes that hope is the best of things, and that no good thing ever dies. To be clear, I’m not in prison and never have been, but as a citizen of Empire I find it increasingly difficult to keep hope in my heart.
Here in the belly of the beast social progress takes a step forward …
by Christy Rodgers / July 15th, 2015
Every morning I wake to sunshine and birdsong (sometimes a little bit of morning fog). I rise to take my morning coffee. (There is always coffee. And my pantry is always full of good food. Make a note of that.)
Then I begin my work. I do this work on behalf of all of you, although I’ve never spoken of it before. But lately I’ve heard people wondering: why is it we are not more upset by the things that are going on in the world? In our own country, our own town? Why is there no generalized rage at the …
by William O. Beeman / July 15th, 2015
No one can claim that President Obama was not transparent in this masterful press conference. He answered every question, and even extended the press conference to answer more. It may take a sledgehammer to get the Republicans to take their fingers out of their ears and hear the clear facts the President laid out in the plainest terms.
The Vienna accords were not about freeing prisoners, saying bad things about Israel, worrying about how Iranians were going to spend their own money which the sanctions sequestered, supporting Assad or the Houthis. Or tellingly about the Bush/Cheney-era neo-conservative plan to bring about …
The Logic of Life and Death in Gaza
by Ramzy Baroud / July 15th, 2015
Another row is brewing between Israel and the Palestinian Resistance Movement, Hamas, over the release of Avraham Mengitsu, an Israeli citizen who, according to Israeli military sources, ‘slipped into Gaza’ on September 7, 2014.
The circumstances of Mengitsu’s entry into Gaza remain unclear, especially since Hamas’ political leader, Khaled Mashaal, denied that the military wing of Hamas is holding the Israeli citizen.
According to Israel’s Defense Ministry, another Israeli is also being held in Gaza. A gag order on Mengitsu’s disappearance was just lifted, but another remains in effect regarding the other, allegedly, detained Israeli.
Indirect negotiations for their release are …
by Tony Kashani / July 14th, 2015
One of the most salient features of our culture is that there is so much bullshit. Everyone knows this. Each of us contributes his share. But we tend to take the situation for granted.
— From On Bullshit by Harry G. Frankfurt
President Obama sings Amazing Grace at the funeral of state Sen. and Rev. Clementa Pinckney, one of nine people shot at Emanuel AME church in Charleston, S.C. and it is hailed as a healing moment for the nation. Obama supporters can go on pretending that we live in a post-racial society, affordable care act is our solution to the …
by Ellen Brown / July 14th, 2015
The crushing Greek debt could be canceled the way it was made – by sleight of hand. But saving the Greek people and their economy is evidently not in the game plan of the Eurocrats.
Greece’s creditors have finally brought the country to its knees, forcing President Alexis Tsipras to agree to austerity and privatization measures more severe than those overwhelmingly rejected by popular vote a week earlier. No write-down of Greece’s debt was included in the deal, although the IMF has warned that the current debt is unsustainable.
Former Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis calls the deal “a new …
by William O. Beeman / July 14th, 2015
Iran has won the diplomatic struggle over its nuclear program in Vienna. Its success was not due to United States negotiators’ fecklessness as Republican critics and Prime Minister Netanyahu have been quick to assert. Iran was able to win because it was very easy for it to bluff, by giving up activities in which it had never engaged and never intended to engage.
On the other side of the negotiating table, the United States had already abandoned its Bush-era goal of effecting regime change in Iran, making its negotiating position considerably weaker. Moreover, the talks were tightly constrained by the 1968 …
by John R. Hall / July 14th, 2015
All right, I know it may be just a tad presumptuous for an unknown writer with little formal education to tackle a job like penning what just might be the most important document in the history of mankind, but somebody needs to do it. Given the likelihood that humans are on the verge of extinction, either by way of World War III or greed-induced climate catastrophe, it is high time for a human from the slave class (99%) to step up to the plate, take the bull by the horns, and make hay while the sun shines. So to speak. Frankly I’ve got nothing better to do, and I’m a little …
by Adnan Al-Daini / July 14th, 2015
Yanis Varoufakis, the former Greek finance minister, in an article in the Guardian entitled “Germany won’t spare Greek pain – it has an interest in breaking us”, frames the Greek tragedy in clear terms thus:
In 2010, the Greek state became insolvent. Two options consistent with continuing membership of the eurozone presented themselves: the sensible one, that any decent banker would recommend – restructuring the debt and reforming the economy; and the toxic option – extending new loans to a bankrupt entity while pretending that it remains solvent. Official Europe chose the second option, putting the bailing out of French and German …
by Ike Nahem / July 13th, 2015
From April 28 – May 5, 2015 representatives of the July 26 Coalition of New York-New Jersey organized a people-to-people program to Cuba with a dozen travelers.
Our delegation included doctors and other health care providers, teachers, trade unionists, and activists against the decades-long U.S. government policy aimed at destroying the Cuban Revolution which triumphed in 1959.
That unchanging anti-Cuba policy – which has included, over the decades, mercenary invasion, economic and travel sanctions, state-sponsored terrorism, sabotage, and even biological warfare, as well as all forms of covert action and subversion – ultimately resulted in the utter and embarrassing isolation of the …
by John Pilger / July 13th, 2015
A historic betrayal has consumed Greece. Having set aside the mandate of the Greek electorate, the Syriza government has willfully ignored last week’s landslide “No” vote and secretly agreed a raft of repressive, impoverishing measures in return for a “bailout” that means sinister foreign control and a warning to the world.
Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras has pushed through parliament a proposal to cut at least 13 billion euros from the public purse – 4 billion euros more than the “austerity” figure rejected overwhelmingly by the majority of the Greek population in a referendum on 5 July.These reportedly include a 50 per …
Families are angered by the promotion of Israeli officer accused of killing protesters to post of national police chief
by Jonathan Cook / July 13th, 2015
Fifteen years after Israeli police shot her 19-year-old son Ahmed in the eye, killing him instantly, Hadiya Jabareen has yet to lay his ghost to rest.
Instead, the mother of six has watched Bentzi Sau, the commander who oversaw the police operation in which Ahmed and 12 other demonstrators died, rise rapidly through the ranks.
His success has come despite a judicial-led inquiry into the killings in 2000 that harshly criticised Sau and recommended that he be barred from promotion for at least four years.
The inquiry found he had used – for the first time inside Israel – an anti-terror sniper unit, …
