Latest articles
by David Swanson / January 5th, 2015
A former Governor of Virginia is expected to be sentenced to a long stay in prison. The same fate has befallen governors in states across the United States, including in nearby Maryland, Tennessee, and West Virginia. A former governor of Illinois is in prison. Governors have been convicted of corruption in Rhode Island, Louisiana, Oklahoma, North Dakota, Connecticut, and (in a trumped-up partisan scam) in Alabama. The statewide trauma suffered by the people of states that have locked up their governors has been … well, nonexistent and unimaginable.
Locking U.S. presidents up for their crimes is a different story. Former President …
by Matt Peppe / January 5th, 2015
Journalist Jorge Ramos recently leveled some serious accusations against former Cuban President Fidel Castro, accusing him of amassing a fortune stolen from Cuban taxpayers and engaging in widespread drug trafficking. Ramos, a hugely popular news personality on the Spanish language network Univision and new sister cable network Fusion, eagerly parrots the hearsay of a former Castro bodyguard who is — coincidentally — promoting a new book. With the U.S. government still bent on regime change in Cuba despite the recent announcement of the normalization of relations between the two countries, they must be pleased. The narrative Ramos creates could help lay the groundwork …
by Scott Thomas Outlar / January 5th, 2015
When tired, breathe, be thankful, smile, and recover with the swiftness of grace-inspired divine light and energy – that was the original title on this free-flowing, existential, apocalyptic, prose-fusion piece, but it’s a new year, so out with the old, and in with the…
Here comes the radical shift in perspective we’ve all been waiting for. Here comes the anarchic ideology based on evolution and enlightenment. Here comes the utopian future seen in the midst of today’s chaos. Here comes a new wave upon the old tide brought …
What happened in Vermont where a so-called single payer proposal died?
by Margaret Flowers / January 5th, 2015
For decades healthcare advocates in the state of Maryland worked with state senator Paul Pinsky who introduced a state health bill each year calling for a universal healthcare system that is publicly financed, a single payer system. Even when advocates educated lawmakers, gathered co-sponsors and testified in committees about the dire need for a health system that would solve the current healthcare crisis, one based on solid evidence, the bill fell flat. The closest we came was one vote short of getting it passed in one committee. We had all of the facts on our side, but no political muscle …
Waking up in the Fog of War
by Nozomi Hayase / January 4th, 2015
In late 2010, political activist John Perry Barlow tweeted: “The first serious info-war is now engaged. The field of battle is WikiLeaks. You are the troops.” In the last four years, new insurgencies have arisen from cyberspace to participate in the battle against government corruption and secrecy. From Snowden’s disclosure of NSA mass surveillance to the release of the CIA torture report evidencing war crimes and murder of innocent people, a crisis of legitimacy and moral depravity of authority are becoming increasingly undeniable. All of this reveals an invisible force of governance working to control the thought and perceptions …
by RT / January 4th, 2015
Gilad Aztmon is a lightning rod for controversy. He is fervently anti-Zionist, and because of the Zionist crimes committed by Jews, he has disavowed himself of being a Jew. It is not surprising, therefore, that he even gets attacked even by those who profess to be progressives. ((See Kim Petersen, “Independent News as Vehicle for Character Assassination,” Dissident Voice, 23 August 2013 and “TRNN and Intellectual Integrity,” Dissident Voice, 6 September 2013.)) For Gilad Atzmon, dissent and a media soapbox are verboten. But not for RT, hosted by another lightning rod for controversy, George Galloway.
They engage in …
by Abayomi Azikiwe / January 4th, 2015
Mrs. Simone Gbagbo, the former first lady of Ivory Coast, made an appearance in court inside the country on December 26. She is charged with alleged crimes in connection with the tenure of her husband, the ousted President Laurent Gbagbo, who is now under the custody of the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague.
President Gbagbo was targeted by the former colonial power France and the United States for removal beginning in late 2010. French forces eventually put Gbagbo under siege and raided his hold-up residence in April 2011, taking him, his wife and other leading officials of the Ivorian …
American ghosts in Tehran
by Eric Walberg / January 3rd, 2015
The highlight to any trip to Tehran—if you can manage it—is a visit to the scene of the most spectacular hostage-taking in recent history, the US embassy, which Iranian students stormed in November 1979, holding 52 Americans hostage for 444 days, and dumping US diplomatic correspondence on the street in a spectacular premodern WikiLeak.
For Canadians and Brits, getting there is not easy. Neither country has diplomatic relations with Iran at present. Canadians must mail their passports to the Pakistani Embassy in Washington, DC, Brits must apply to the Omani Embassy in London. (Britain and Iran have only recently agreed to …
by James Petras / January 3rd, 2015
The balance sheet for 2014 and the prospects for 2015 provide us with a complex panorama of negative and positive outcomes. In most cases the advances, are not earth-shattering but open possibilities for further progress. The negative developments, however, have greater and more threatening systemic outcomes.
We will proceed in a telegraphic fashion to outline the positive and negative developments in 2014 and their real and potential symbolic and substantive impacts. In the second part of the essay we will sketch out some of the most …
The Year Starts With the Potential of a Major Victory of the People Over Corporate Power, but We Must Unite to Win It
by Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers / January 2nd, 2015
The major task for the social movement: 2015 the Year We Build Power Together.
In 2014 we saw tremendous growth of the movement across numerous fronts of struggle – worker rights and the wages, racism and policing, climate, the environment and extreme energy extraction, building a new economy and so much more. We also saw how uniting and working in solidarity is essential for success.
“Building power together” means working together as a movement of movements to build on the progress of 2014 when people created a larger and bolder movement. We build together because our issues are all connected and unified power is when we …
by The Real News Network (TRNN) / January 2nd, 2015
Last week’s much-hailed normalization of relations with Cuba was followed by sanctions against Venezuela the very next day, says Alex Main of the Center for Economic and Policy Research.
http://youtu.be/qu8dspy_mrY
Fighting Fascism
by Andre Vltchek / January 2nd, 2015
One more step, one more explosion of insanity, and all that humanity fought for, what it labored for and has been aiming at for years, centuries and millennia, may disappear in a monstrous series of blasts. Our planet might break into pieces, or it may get poisoned and become uninhabitable, forever.
Hyperbolic? Not at all, given the track record of the Empire: war after war, invasion after invasion, with hundreds of destabilized countries, murdered leaders, and overthrown governments.
The storyline may be similar to that of the famous novella by Gabriel Garcia Marquez: Chronicle of a Death Foretold. We can foresee what …
by Matt Peppe / January 2nd, 2015
When the U.N. Security Council resolution to end the Israeli military occupation of the occupied territories and establish a Palestinian state by 2017 was defeated, not a single human with a pulse was surprised. The resolution received eight votes in favor, with the United States and Australia against and five countries abstaining. Even though the measure was one vote shy of adoption, the United States decided to exercise its veto power anyway just to make its rejectionist stance abundantly clear. But the bill would not have lead to a fair settlement anyway. If it led to a settlement at all …
by William Hanna / January 2nd, 2015
A stinging defeat for Abbas, but no great victory for Israel … Netanyahu persuaded Nigeria to abstain as UN Security Council rejected Palestinian statehood, but could only muster US and Australian opposition, and the French let Israel down.
— Times of Israel
Had the UN Security Council voted for Palestinian statehood it would still have made no difference because the resolution would have been vetoed by Israel’s superpower lapdog — that principled and supreme upholder of democracy and international law — the United States of America. But even before this latest amoral rejection, the Palestinian people had already been forewarned that …
by 12345 / January 2nd, 2015
Nothing is more central to the American Dream than equality of opportunity. In today’s world, that usually means a college education—and, for most families, the challenge of paying for it. Congress could help meet that challenge. It could pass a financial transaction tax (FTT), and dedicate the proceeds to providing equal opportunity for college.
The midterms showed a country in a sour mood. They also showed a country hungry for a sense of purpose. In 1961, heralding a New Frontier, President Kennedy called on the nation to send a man to the moon. In 2015, pointing to The Dream, President Obama …
by Uri Avnery / January 2nd, 2015
(Keynote speech at the Kinneret College conference on “the Rock of our Existence – the connection between Archeology and Ideology”.)
First of all, let me thank you for inviting me to address this important conference. I am neither a professor nor a doctor. Indeed, the highest academic title I ever achieved was SEC (Seventh Elementary Class).
But like many members of my generation, from early youth I took a profound interest in archeology.
I shall try to explain why.
When asking themselves about my connection with archeology, some of you will think about Moshe Dayan.
After the June 1967 war, Dayan was a …
Praying will definitely not improve anything!
by Andre Vltchek / January 2nd, 2015
For many years and decades and in the most vulgar manner, plane crashes have been exploited by mass media. As if lives lost at 30.000 feet above the ground or the surface of oceans were more valuable than those that were interrupted ‘on the surface’ by calamities, misery, hunger or preventable diseases, especially in the poor neighborhoods and in the slums.
Air Asia flight QZ-8501, lost en route from Indonesia’s second largest city, Surabaya, to Singapore, brought unprecedented outpouring of sorrow in all corners of this sprawling and socially collapsed archipelago.
Like in a soap opera, even those who could never afford …
by Tar / January 1st, 2015
We bid Farewell to 2014 and Welcome the New Year with a different kind of festive mood. All videos have been shot by @kinimatini and Tar in Athens, during December 2014, except the “flying” Santa at the end, that has been shot by AgitPropULA.
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We bid farewell to the year 2014 with flashbacks of collective resistance, imprinted in our memories and engraved in the story of this world, to be reminded of our past, so that we keep on fighting in the future, to turn our dreams of a self-organized society without rulers, from Utopia to Reality.
Wherever you …
by Ramzy Baroud / January 1st, 2015
Writing and reporting about the Middle East is not an easy task, especially during these years of turmoil and upheaval. Following and reporting on these constant changes without a deep and compassionate understanding of the region will achieve little but predictable and lackluster content that offers nothing original, but recycled old ideas and stereotypes.
From my humble experience in the region, I share these “dos” and “don’ts” as to how the Middle East should be approached in writing and reporting.
Question Terminology
To start with, the term “Middle East” is itself highly questionable. It is arbitrary, and can only be …
The President of Israel
by Gilad Atzmon / January 1st, 2015
Jonathan Freedland, the Guardian’s prime Hasbara mouthpiece, praised Israeli President Reuven ‘Ruvi’ Rivlin yesterday. Freedland wrote that that in spite of being a “lifelong member of Israel’s Likud party, and on the right of that rightwing bloc… ever since his elevation to Israel’s largely ceremonial presidency in June he (President Rivlin) has acted as something like his country’s conscience.”
Let’s examine how Freedland justifies his dubious choice for 2014’s hero.
In November the Israeli cabinet backed a Jewish state bill that would enshrine discrimination against Israel’s 1.7 million Arab citizens, denying them the full rights of citizenship accorded to Jews. …
by Jack A. Smith / December 31st, 2014
Militarily, the U.S. is entering 2015 with its hands full.
1. The U.S. war in Afghanistan is supposed to have ended after 13 years on December 31, 2014, but it’s still going on and thousands of American troops are continuing the fight.
2. The U.S. war against Iraq ended officially December 31, 2011, but it has now metamorphosed into Washington’s air war against the Islamic State (IS) in Iraq and Syria. There are increasing hints U.S. ground troops may be sent in this year. (3,000 American military advisers are already there and 1,500 allied troops are expected soon.)
3. The U.S., …
by Daniel Borgström / December 31st, 2014
Practicing freedom of assembly is an ongoing struggle, and it can get scary, as was our experience in Oakland on Saturday, December 13th, on the evening of which six or seven hundred of us gathered at the Oscar Grant Plaza for a march, setting out shortly before dark. Notebook in hand, I jotted down that it was 4:59 p.m. and joined in, scribbling a timeline as we marched out on 14th, then south on Jackson towards the freeway, chanting “Black lives matter!” and “Shut it down! Shut it down!” Arriving at the on ramp, we found that the police …
An Open Letter to Obama, Holder, and Chris Christie
by Herb Dyer / December 31st, 2014
I am a 20th century escaped slave. Because of government persecution, I was left with no other choice than to flee from the political repression, racism and violence that dominate the US government’s policy towards people of color.
– Assata Shakur
It was forty-one years ago, when a 25-year-old Joanne Deborah Chesimard (nee’ Assata Shakur) allegedly shot and killed New Jersey state trooper Werner Foerster on the shoulder of the New Jersey Turnpike. She was later convicted by an all-white New Jersey jury, but escaped from prison in 1979.
In ’84, she escaped again – from this nation-state’s jurisdiction and into Cuba …
A Fantasy Speech on Cuba: A Speech Obama Should Give on Cuba
by Scott D. Morris / December 31st, 2014
THE PRESIDENT: Good afternoon.
Today the United States is changing its relationship with Cuba and the rest of the world, and we are beginning a project to lift the veil on the reality of our brutal and audacious imperial arrogance that has brought so much misery and suffering to Cuba, the hemisphere, and the world.
We have come to recognize that it is not Cuba that is stuck in the past, quite the contrary, Cuba is living and working toward a better and livable future; it is U.S. power that is stuck in the past, a past and present of …
by Maryam Sakeenah / December 31st, 2014
Tragedies like the one in Peshawar are litmus tests for any nation- either bringing out the best, or exposing the bare bones. Pakistan’s response is curiously similar to the U.S response to 9/11. The fact that the U.S.’s counter-terror strategy accounts for the genesis of a much more brutal TTP and ISIS is lost to us. In the same manner as the US filled up prisons contravening law and depriving suspects and inmates of fair judicial process in its paranoia after 9/11, Pakistan is all set to establish special military courts in contravention of constitutional procedure, for swift conviction of …
by John Chuckman / December 31st, 2014
The Palestinians are seeking a vote in the United Nations’ Security Council on a resolution favoring their statehood, unquestionably a reasonable proposal in the minds of most of the world’s people. Of course, the United States, a permanent member of the Security Council, would automatically veto such a resolution, as it vetoes all efforts to restore order to the chaos of the Middle East. And of course, were such a resolution somehow miraculously to pass, Israel would simply ignore it, as it has ignored a long list of binding UN resolutions. But a veto and certain contempt are not enough …
by Ted Glick / December 30th, 2014
O my friends, there are resources in us on which we have not drawn.
— Ralph Waldo Emerson
There is a lot to feel good about as far as the U.S. climate movement and what we did and accomplished in 2014. Without question, we are heading into 2015 with some wind at our back and, to continue the relevant metaphor, the sun to light our way forward.
In the order that I think were most important, here they are:
1) September 21st People’s Climate March: How could anything else be more important than this? Hundreds of thousands of people demonstrated in NYC for …
How one party politics and multiple lesser conspiracies add up to an insidious Master Plan
by Mark Weiser / December 30th, 2014
Historic outcomes of pivotal events often dangled on threads of various possibilities. As they were outnumbered by more than two to one, an early morning fog enabled America’s future first President, George Washington with his command, to escape death or capture by British troops on Long Island, New York in 1776. As the last of 9000 men to board one of the transport boats, it’s unlikely Washington would have safely made the East River crossing without the fog’s appearance. Subsequent U.S. history along with the world’s entire geopolitical scene could be something entirely different than it is today. America went …
by Dana Gabriel / December 30th, 2014
The globalist plan to incrementally merge the U.S., Canada and Mexico into a North American Union has been ongoing for years. While at times, the agenda appears to have seemingly stalled, current efforts to expand the trilateral partnership show that it is alive and once again gaining steam. With NAFTA as the foundation, the renewed push for deeper North American integration continues on many different fronts.
The Canadian Council of Chief Executives (CCCE), recently issued the report, Made in North America: a new agenda to sharpen our competitive edge. The CCCE is one of Canada’s most influential corporate lobby groups, …
by Jonathan Power / December 30th, 2014
The vote last week in the Ukrainian parliament was a seriously disturbing move — it has made reconciliation with Russia near impossible.
The parliament voted to work for Ukraine’s membership of Nato, a red rag to a bear.
The truth is this whole Russian-Ukrainian-Western confrontation could be largely solved if the Ukrainian and Western sides wrote on paper that they don’t want to see Ukraine in Nato.
This is the key issue for Russia. But it must be written down. Moscow no longer trusts verbal understandings that can be broken, as when the Reagan Administration gave President Mikhail Gorbachev the …
