Latest articles
by Binoy Kampmark / July 19th, 2014
You have to give him some credit. The soul of the prison warder who inhabits the public school boy is not always easy to contain. Unrestrained, and lacking sound judgment, he is bound to spring out, however democratic, or liberal, a system can be. Prime Minister David Cameron, on the issue of jamming through bills connected with increased surveillance powers, has just about gotten what he wants. The rule in his playbook here: call anything you don’t want looked at a matter of emergency.
For Cameron, “No government introduces fast track legislation lightly. But the consequences of not acting …
by Scott Thomas Outlar / July 18th, 2014
The end. Of everything.
What else is there to say? After the final annihilation of consciousness. After the Big Bang in reverse. After the last hint of freedom is snuffed out. After the lights go down. Does it all start over again? Is existence an eternally recurring cycle? Do we get second chances on such a large scale as that of universal rebirth? Or does it all stay dead?
Find out the answers to these questions as well as many others on the next episode of Existential Pondering on the Status of God’s Whereabouts. A daily television show broadcast directly into the …
They want war? Then launch a full-blown BDS assault on Israel and its supporters
by Stuart Littlewood / July 18th, 2014
There was never a better moment for the BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) movement to mass-mobilise for a mega-campaign to not only impact more heavily on the lawless Israeli state but also unmask those in business and public life who shamelessly support the criminal programme that was embedded in its DNA while on the Zionists’ drawing board.
This could include politicians, businesspeople, entertainers, sports stars, churchmen and the many organisations and fan clubs that nourish the thuggish vanity and horrendous cruelty of the Zionist regime. Zero tolerance is needed. Those who fund or support the inhuman behaviour we have witnessed, not …
by David Swanson / July 18th, 2014
I was not sure I would like a book called Worth Fighting For by a former soldier who walked across the United States to raise money for the Pat Tillman Foundation. The website of that foundation celebrates military “service” and the “higher calling” for which Tillman left professional football, namely participation in the U.S. war on the people of Afghanistan and Iraq. Rather than funding efforts to put an end to war, as Tillman actually might have wished by the end of his life, the foundation hypes war participation, funds veterans, and to this day presents Tillman’s death …
by John V. Walsh / July 18th, 2014
Ever more antiwar voices are clamoring for a Stop Hillary Clinton movement in the Democratic primaries – and with very good reason. There are many alarming, indeed frightening, indictments of her tenures as one-half president in the 90s and then as Senator and Secretary of State. Her estranged relationship with truth, her callousness toward human life and her love for every imperial military adventure and regime change scheme are beyond worrisome. They are downright scary.
But the most damning indictment yet of the Clintons on the world stage comes in the book Superpower Illusions by former Ambassador …
by Paul Craig Roberts / July 18th, 2014
The unilateral US sanctions announced by Obama on July 16 blocking Russian weapons and energy companies access to US bank loans demonstrate Washington’s impotence. The rest of the world, including America’s two largest business organizations, turned their backs on Obama. The US Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers placed ads in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post protesting US sanctions. NAM said that the manufacturer’s association is “disappointed that the US is extending sanctions in increasingly unilateral ways that will undermine US commercial engagement.” Bloomberg reported that “meeting in Brussels, leaders of the …
by Gilad Atzmon / July 18th, 2014
The IDF launched a vast ground operation in Gaza last night. Until now, Israel has failed to articulate its military objectives. No one in Israel is willing to commit to a definition of what a victory would look like. I am afraid that the military objective is obvious: saving Netanyahu’s political career.
Prime Minister Netanyahu and his defense minister Moshe Ya’alon have no other options. The two have tried to avoid a ground operation. Like most IDF leaders, Netanyahu and Ya’alon know that the Israeli army lacks the capability to counter Gaza’s ballistic defiance. Israel lost its power of deterrence a …
by Robert Hunziker / July 18th, 2014
According to the Assessment of Southwest Climate Change (Arizona Institute of the Environment), the five decades from 1950 to 2000 were the warmest in over 600 years. The report predicts that reduced snowfall and increased evaporation from global warming will lead to more droughts over the next 90 years.
Droughts are a natural part of the climate cycle. As a matter of fact, studies of tree rings going back 1,000 years show mega droughts lasting for decades. Then, nature alone was the culprit, but what happens now when global warming/climate change is superimposed onto nature’s handiwork?
Is an intensified mega drought in …
And History and Legality be Damned!
by Felicity Arbuthnot / July 18th, 2014
The concept of a “Greater Israel”, according to the founding father of Zionism Theodore Herzl, is a Jewish State stretching: “From the Brook of Egypt to the Euphrates.” Rabbi Fischmann, of the Jewish Agency for Palestine, stated to the UN Special Committee on 9th July 1947 that: “The Promised Land extends from the River of Egypt up to the Euphrates, it includes parts of Syria and Lebanon”, wrote Michel Chossudovsky. Thus “from the Nile to the Euphrates.” Herzl’s detailed thesis was written in 1904.
Quoted in the same article is Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya on The Yinon Plan (1982) “ … …
by Gareth Porter / July 17th, 2014
WASHINGTON, July 17 2014 (IPS) — As the negotiations on the Iranian nuclear programme approach the July 20 deadline, both U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif have signaled through their carefully worded statements that they are now moving toward toward agreement on the two most crucial issues in the talks: the level of Iranian enrichment capability to be allowed and the duration of the agreement.
Their statements after two days of meetings Sunday and Monday suggest that both Kerry and Zarif now see a basis for an agreement that would freeze Iran’s enrichment …
by Andrey Fomine / July 17th, 2014
On July 17, 2014 the madness of a three-month-long Ukrainian military conflict in the East has brought the first shocking international consequence. At 3.20PM GMT the Malaysian Airlines Boeing 777-200 jet flight #MH-17 en route from Amsterdam to Kuala-Lumpur disappeared inside the Ukrainian airspace right above the area of intense military combat in the Donetsk region and crushed near Grabovo village, around 60 km to the east from Donetsk. All 285 passengers and 15 crew members have reportedly died.
According to data available the airliner “was moving at the altitude of 10,600 meters on the 350th flight level”. This flight level was …
by Press TV / July 17th, 2014
A well-known Israeli politician and parliament member has branded Palestinians as terrorists, saying mothers of all Palestinians should also be killed during the ongoing Israeli assault on the besieged Gaza Strip.
Ayelet Shaked of the ultra-nationalist Jewish Home party called for the slaughter of Palestinian mothers who give birth to “little snakes.”
They have to die and their houses should be demolished so that they cannot bear any more terrorists,” Shaked said.
She added, “They are all our enemies and their blood should be on our hands. This also applies to the mothers of the dead terrorists.”
The remarks are considered as a …
by Jonathan Cook / July 17th, 2014
There’s something deeply ugly, verging on mendacious, about this eye-witness account of the strike against four children on Gaza’s beach by William Booth in the Washington Post. It begins with what appears to be context but is, in fact, simply an effort to deflect criticism from Israel and blame the victims.
He starts with this: “It is not unusual for militants to launch rockets from sites near my hotel.”
So had rockets been launched from the spot where the children were killed? Here’s the account of veteran Guardian/Observer correspondent Peter Beaumont:
The building that was hit was just a shipping container next …
Not If Your Life Is On The Line
by William A. Blunden / July 16th, 2014
In the wake of Ed Snowden’s revelations there’s been a litany of calls for the widespread adoption of online anonymity tools. One such technology is Tor, which employs a network of Internet relays to hinder the process of attribution. Though advocates openly claim that “Tor still works” ((Cooper Quintin, “7 Things You Should Know About Tor” Electronic Frontier Foundation, July 1, 2014.)) skepticism is warranted. In fact, anyone risking incarceration in the face of a leveraged intelligence outfit like the NSA would be ill-advised to put all of their eggs in the Tor basket. This is a reality which …
Big Banks Hit with Monster $250 Billion Lawsuit in Housing Crisis
by Ellen Brown / July 16th, 2014
For years, homeowners have been battling Wall Street in an attempt to recover some portion of their massive losses from the housing Ponzi scheme. But progress has been slow, as they have been outgunned and out-spent by the banking titans.
In June, however, the banks may have met their match, as some equally powerful titans strode onto the stage. Investors led by BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, and PIMCO, the world’s largest bond-fund manager, have sued some of the world’s largest banks for breach of fiduciary duty as trustees of their investment funds. The investors are seeking damages for …
by Adam W. Parsons / July 16th, 2014
TTIP is the latest bid to capture policymaking by the profit-making interests of the 1%, with dire implications for anyone who upholds a vision of a more equitable and sustainable economic order. But campaign groups and activists are working hard to expose this trade agreement for what it is, and to build an overarching global movement that can prevent this massive transfer of power to transnational corporations.
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As the next round of negotiations for the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) take place in Brussels this week, civil society groups are continuing to mobilise against this ongoing free trade …
by Ramzy Baroud / July 16th, 2014
When the bodies of three Israeli settlers – Aftali Frenkel and Gilad Shaar, both 16, and Eyal Yifrach, 19 – were found on June 30 near Hebron in the southern West Bank, Israel went into a state of mourning and a wave of sympathy flowed in from around the world. The three had disappeared 18 days earlier in circumstances that remain unclear.
The entire episode, particularly after its grim ending, seemed to traumatize Israelis into ignoring harsh truths about the settlers and the militarization of their society. Amid a portrayal of the three as hapless youths, although one was a …
by Luke Eastwood / July 15th, 2014
To much trumpeting the IMF have kindly agreed to help out desperate and war torn Ukraine. How wonderful they are we are all meant to think, but the truth couldn’t be more opposite.
The International Monetary Fund was set up in 1945, describing itself as an “organization of 188 countries, working to foster global monetary cooperation, secure financial stability, facilitate international trade, promote high employment and sustainable economic growth, and reduce poverty around the world.”
This all sounds very laudable, but in reality the IMF has a very different purpose from that which is stated. If you look at the history of …
by Matt Reichel / July 15th, 2014
It has been 10 years of dormancy for the peace movement: a full decade since the thriving demonstrations of the early Bush years gave way to liberal demands that the focus shift to defeating the president at the ballot box. This fixation remained through the two ensuing presidential elections, which have demonstrated, beyond a reasonable doubt, the futility of this approach to altering American foreign policy. The vibrant and young foot soldiers of Obama’s first election are now seven years older, jaded and frustrated. Most of them are underemployed, over-indebted, and increasingly hopeless about their lot in life. Meanwhile, the …
Another U.S. Foreign Policy Debacle
by William Boardman / July 15th, 2014
Seeing through the tear-jerking to the guilty U.S. Government
The pictures of thousands of children huddled in shelters are upsetting, and the tales some tell are horrifying, and that is all a real but sentimental distraction from the entrenched American power that created these conditions. American power uses these children and their families and their countries for its own ends. American power is not likely to make any meaningful changes to solve what is essentially a permanent crisis. Whatever official alleviation there is will be just enough to get those heart-rending images off the front pages so that the …
Is this the end of “badger bashing”?
by Lesley Docksey / July 15th, 2014
Prime Minister David Cameron has just carried out a sweeping and fairly vicious Cabinet reshuffle. So many of the old guard gone, some resigning and some sacked, swept aside to make room for young women, or “Cameron’s cuties” as they are known. With an election just a year away it looks like he’s panicking, and is hoping that a youthful government will appeal to the younger voter.
A pity he didn’t reshuffle himself in his “night of the long knives”, but at least we can be glad of one removal. All those working to protect our precious (and valuable) environment, …
by Linh Dinh / July 15th, 2014
Oil made this America-dominated, futuristic world, and with its increasing scarcity, will unravel it. Most pampered yet most disappointed, we’re living in the age of peak oil, water, gold, copper, wheat, rice, cabbage, porn, greed and banking shenanigans, etc., for with more mouths than ever going after a shrinking donut hole, the ugliness is just getting started, and let us not forget, this age of oil has also been an era of mass carnage, a century of resource wars that have wiped out hundreds of millions, but for the survivors, us grubby schmucks, what a cool ride, eh?
But wait, wait, …
by Ron Jacobs / July 15th, 2014
Recently, the US House of Representatives voiced unanimous support for the Israeli onslaught on the people of Gaza. Many opponents of Israel’s continued occupation and oppression of the Palestinians pointed, like they always do, to the disproportionate influence the so-called Israeli Lobby has in Congress. While this is an established and verifiable fact, I would argue that the Lobby is just a manifestation of a less obvious but essential reason for the never-ending support Israel receives from Washington and its apologists in the US media.
As a resident of the United States one hears repeatedly of an illusion many fellow residents …
by Gilad Atzmon / July 15th, 2014
As the Israeli Cabinet announced earlier today that it accepted the Egyptian cease-fire offer, Palestinian freedom fighters in Gaza continued firing rockets targeting the whole of Israel.
The situation is clear. Israel is desperate for a break in the violence. In spite of its endless ‘bravado,’ and military might, Israel lacks the military capacity and the courage to encounter Palestinian resistance on the ground. The Israeli elite recognizes that the military can’t resolve the problem, if anything, its extensive use would diminish Israeli manoeuvrability on the international front.
Hamas, on the other hand, has won its biggest military, political and ideological victory …
West Bank Palestinians DO NOT fire rockets, yet there is no sign of an end to their misery and oppression.
by Stuart Littlewood / July 15th, 2014
The slaughter of civilians is necessary to stop Gaza rocket-fire. That’s what Israel says. “This isn’t about rockets from Gaza,” says Unite.
The union Unite is to be congratulated on its no-nonsense analysis and statement expressing solidarity with the Palestinian people. Especially at this horrific time. Unite is the biggest union in the UK and Ireland, with nearly 1.5 million members. Its mission is to strive for a society that places equality, dignity and respect above all else.
The statement on Palestine is an easy-to-digest description of the Holy Land situation in blunt language. Here is a key passage:
There will be no …
"Minimal Risk" says U.S.
by Felicity Arbuthnot / July 14th, 2014
America and Britain destroyed Iraq for them, lynched the country’s President for them, created five million orphans, five million displaced, over a million widows and now upper figures of over one and a half million dead for them. They created mass graves on an industrial scale for them, with people’s beloveds buried in car parks, gardens, patios and football pitches – but now that they are in the hands of ISIS (the self proclaimed Islamic State of Iraq and Syria) they pose barely a “minimal risk” say US government spokespeople. We are talking, of course, chemical weapons.
The currently sanguine view …
by Kim Petersen / July 14th, 2014
When I was asked to review Eric Larsen’s The Decline and Fall of the American Nation (New York: Olivers Arts & Open Press, 2013), I was intrigued by the title. Now I am firmly of the conviction never to apperceive the contents of a book by its title.
So what did I expect? I expected something like a dystopia from economic collapse caused by the offshoring of much of its manufacturing base, by the ever increasing spending on a military and its wars, and a world that had abandoned the US currency. And maybe this was the case, but …
Defy Friends & Critics Alike – Show Yourself, Never Give Up
by Robert S. Becker / July 14th, 2014
One reluctantly knocks the political wizardry of HBO’s Bill Maher. And yet, how rude: telling his party’s heir apparent, Hillary Clinton, to take a hike, in fact, a year off from publicity: “Just go away.” Uh oh, here’s a hugely visible Democratic donor scolding the era’s ultimate career politician — though the chance of Hillary (HC) abandoning her paid PR campaign/celebrity book-tour, let alone her White House run, hovers above absolute zero. Her entire schtick is perseverance personified.
Is Maher aware he’s messing with the substratum of the plutocratic universe, as dramatized by the movie, Network, disturbing the “ecological balance” of the “primal …
Take your case to the ICC
by Stuart Littlewood / July 14th, 2014
As I write, the Israelis have slaughtered 160 Palestinians in their latest mad-dog military adventure, the vast majority being civilians including 35 children. 934 others have been wounded, including 280 children.
And still the mighty international community shuffles and mumbles.
The Israeli onslaught has brought a flurry of press releases from the Palestinian authorities. One gave detailed prisoner figures highlighting that the huge number of Palestinians arrested in this latest blitz included 12 MPs, bringing the number of Palestinian parliamentarians in Israeli jails to 23. This shocking statistic shows the lengths to which the regime will go in order to deny Palestinians …
Neil Young's Concert in Israel is Cancelled Due to Safety Concerns
by Angie Tibbs / July 13th, 2014
Neil Young’s July 17th, 2014, concert in Israel has been cancelled, not because Young had a change of heart but, as promoter Shuki Weiss productions (who booked Young while on his ‘Honour the Treaties’ tour of Canada) claimed in part: “It is with deep regret that we are forced to announce the cancelation (sic) of the Neil Young and Crazy Horse show… in light of the missile attacks in recent days and the fear for the audience’s safety at an event with so many participants”…
Neil Young later issued a statement saying:
It …
