For Real Peace He Must Bang Heads together at the United Nations to Finish Their Unfinished Business
by Stuart Littlewood / September 2nd, 2010 ()
On the eve of the silliest peace talks in history, the big question is this. What makes Obama’s envoy George Mitchell, a negotiator of high repute, say there is “no role” for Hamas?
The talks are silly because they seek to overturn what the United Nations has already decided for resolving the Israel-Palestine conflict and drive a bulldozer through the building blocks of justice.
It might be music to Zionist ears, but to people of good will it’s a cruel, futile and immensely damaging ploy.
The talks are also silly because they bring together two people who by no stretch of the imagination …
by James Keye / September 2nd, 2010 ()
No one can go through life without believing in some general principles, even if most of us act on those principles regularly without giving them much, if any, thought. But, if you stop a moment in your daily hunt for living your life with some success and dignity; just stop a moment, lift your head up from that ‘walking into a strong wind’ position and widen out that tunnel vision to see more broadly than a specific ambition, job or encounter, then you just might begin to see what humanity is up against.
People are presented with millions of …
by Stephen Lendman / September 2nd, 2010 ()
August 29, 2005, a day of infamy remembered less for the storm, catastrophic floods and destruction, and more as a metaphor for disaster capitalism, exploiting security threats, “terror” attacks, economic meltdowns, and “natural” disasters like Katrina.
It turned this aging senior into a writer and radio host, furious over federal, state and local authorities using it to reward business at the expense of New Orleans’ poor Blacks. Five years later, their lives remain in disarray through no fault of their own.
Levies protecting their neighborhoods were left weak, vulnerable to fail as they did, then Congressman Richard Baker (R. LA) saying, “We …
by James Petras / September 1st, 2010 ()
Any serious effort to understand the extraordinary influence of the Zionist power configuration over US foreign policy must examine the presence of key operatives in strategic positions in the government and the activities of local Zionist organizations affiliated with mainstream Jewish organizations and religious orders.
There are at least 52 major American Jewish organizations actively engaged in promoting Israel’s foreign policy, economic and technological agenda in the US (see the appendix). The grassroots membership ranges from several hundred thousand militants in the Jewish Federations of North America (JFNA) to one hundred thousand wealthy contributors, activists and power brokers in the …
The Anti-Empire Report
by William Blum / September 1st, 2010 ()
Things which don’t go away. Things the American government and media don’t let go of.
And neither do I.
Iraq
“They’re leaving as heroes. I want them to walk home with pride in their hearts,” declared Col. John Norris, the head of a US Army brigade in Iraq.
It’s enough to bring tears to the eyes of an American, enough to make him choke up.
Enough to make him forget.
But no American should be allowed to forget that the nation of Iraq, the society of Iraq, have been destroyed, ruined, a failed state. The Americans, beginning 1991, bombed for …
by Jim McCluskey / September 1st, 2010 ()
Many citizens in Britain are puzzled. Why do we always seem to be at war? How can this come about? What does it mean? At the same time we seem to think of ourselves as a peaceful nation. In seeking answers let us list a few notable characteristics of our current wars.
Our wars are fought by of our young men; those who enlist. The rest of us (including most of our young men) are essentially out of it – not affected – not involved – focussed elsewhere.
Most of the young men in the armed forces are from relatively poor families …
by Alan Hart / September 1st, 2010 ()
Short answer. Iran’s President Ahmadinejad did NOT call for Israeli Jews to be annihilated. Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, the spiritual leader of Israel’s Shas party, HAS called, more than once, for the Palestinians (and, in fact, all Arabs) to be exterminated.
As reported by the mainstream Western media, Ahmadinejad called for Israel to be “wiped off the map”. What that meant, it was asserted, was the destruction, the driving into the sea, of Israel’s Jews.
What Ahmadinejad actually called for was the de-Zionization of Palestine. His actual words were to the effect that he wanted the Zionist state to disappear as the Soviet …
by Roberto Rodriguez / September 1st, 2010 ()
In Arizona, we know that the eyes of the world are upon us.
Perhaps this is why many of us hold vigils and forums, why we march, protest, rally, get arrested… and run.
In the past several years, the Sonora desert has become a super magnet for the forces of hate, bigotry, ignorance, false patriotism, censorship demagoguery and especially, scapegoatery – or the art of blaming Mexicans for everything. So too has it become a magnet for those who struggle for peace, dignity, justice and human rights.
I am a newcomer to the desert and as such, I marvel at the amount of …
by Rand Clifford / September 1st, 2010 ()
In the 1933 Paramount motion picture Tillie and Gus, W.C. Fields said:
“There comes a time in the affairs of men, when we must take the bull by the tail, and face the situation.”
The term “motion pictures” is rather archaic nowadays, but there’s nothing archaic about W.C.’s insightful wisdom—almost 80 years ago spinning a clear image of precisely where we are in 2010. Indeed, ours is a confusing time of wars over fossil energy, imperialism, secrecy, disinformation, massive upward transfer of wealth, economic collapse, environmental devastation and, well, bullshit. We’ve actually been deep in the stuff since even before Woodrow Wilson, …
Hiroshima/Nagasaki and Iraq/Afghanistan/Pakistan
by Ed Kinane / September 1st, 2010 ()
Even though August 6th and 9th are past, the lessons of Hiroshima and Nagasaki belong always before us. The agony of those two cities must remain our dark beacon.
Hiroshima/Nagasaki wasn’t so much about targets as about audiences. We sacrificed a couple hundred thousand harmless, unarmed, undefended human beings to make a point. That spectacle wasn’t so much for Japan as for the Soviet Union and the world at large.
Thanks to the U.S. head start on nuclear technology – vividly showcased at Hiroshima/Nagasaki – for 65 years the U.S. has been able to hold …
by Stephen Lendman / August 31st, 2010 ()
Palestine is belligerently occupied. Threats continue against Iran and Syria as well as Lebanon, specifically Hezbollah, elected partner in the nation’s unity government, bogusly designated a US State Department Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO), what Israel also calls it, repeating veiled and overt warnings, suggesting violence or an impending attack.
Why not, after so many earlier in 1978, 1982, 1993, 1996, and 2006. Also numerous incidents besides:
– refusing to comply with UN Security Council Resolution 425 by occupying South Lebanon belligerently and illegally for 18 years until mostly, but not entirely, withdrawing in May 2000 – still holding Sheba Farms, the 14-square …
by Linda Ford / August 31st, 2010 ()
We rarely hear about the prisoners of Abu Ghraib and Bagram and Guantanamo. And what we generally hear is unlikely to confront US culpability for the full horrors experienced by the prisoners of American wars of empire and occupation. And what of American political prisoners at home? The ever-suspect Muslims, the anti-war and anti-globalization and pro-environmentalists—the aging Black Panthers and Weather Underground and Native-American activists—some of them tortured, kept in solitary confinement for years. How many of us know the long history of political prisoners in America, of whom we …
by Myles Hoenig / August 31st, 2010 ()
My high school principal has just announced that our state (Maryland) is now one of 10 winners of RTTT. Our county will be getting $22 million for Professional Development, assessment and evaluation. Fantastic! More NGO’s, 501c3’s, and burnt out teacher-administrators will get a good chunk of change for their latest schemes to make the world safe for democracy, or is it to teach and reach all children and graduate them into the ranks of the army, the reserve army of labor (the massive unemployed) or McDonald’s?
What this means is that teachers will be stressed out even more with testing, evaluating …
by Anthony Alessandrini / August 31st, 2010 ()
Alongside the unfolding of attacks upon the proposed Park51 community center in Lower Manhattan, as well as the attacks on other proposed Muslim community centers and mosques throughout the U.S. in recent months, comes the news that a growing number of Americans (especially conservative Republicans) believe that President Barack Obama is a “secret Muslim.”
In the face of all this, it is hard not to conclude that, as Alex Pareene has recently put it, for many Americans, “Muslim” has come to mean “someone they dislike.”
In this frightening and depressing context, the only dim ray of hope has come from …
by Jack Random / August 31st, 2010 ()
In the beginning it was a simple concept: majority rule. Whether it claims root in ancient Athens or some unknown tribal community, it has survived the millennia as the democratic ideal and remains today a powerful force in the governance of nations.
Modern democracy emerged in the eighteenth century as an alternative to monarchy, aristocracy, dictatorship and other forms of tyranny. The founding of the American nation, with all its flaws and inequities, was civilization’s first marriage of the nation state to the democratic ideal.
Right-wing cynics will point out that America is not and has …
