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Exclusively in the New Print Issue of CounterPunch

"Ending US-Sponsored Torture Forever"

Joann Wypijewski  reports on the growth of the U.S. torture archipelago and on the church-led campaign led by the National Religious Campaign Against Torture (NRCAT) which is striking  a spark amid the darkness. Also in this latest newsletter, Diana Johnstone explores the one of the sinister monuments of the Clinton years: Kosovo, whose gangster premier runs a criminal  enterprise which has murdered Serbian prisoners in order to sell their vital organs on the world market. Subscribe now! If you find our site useful please: Click here to make a donation. CounterPunch books and t-shirts make great presents. Order CounterPunch By Email For Only $35 a Year!

Today's Stories

January 21 - 23, 2011

Laura Carlsen
The Murdered Women of Juarez

January 20, 2011

Cecilia Zarate-Laun
Gold v. Water: Greystar's Threat to Colombia

Vicente Navarro
Was Picasso Apolitical?

José Pertierra
A Voice From the Past in El Paso

Patrick Cockburn
Catastrophes on Camera

Russell Mokhiber
Insurance Execs Target William Hsiao

Denis O'Hearn
A Welcome Prison Victory at Youngstown

Ira Chernus
Why Are We Still in Afghanistan?

Mark Weisbrot
Aristide Should be Allowed to Return to Haiti

Dave Lindorff
In Praise of Incivility in Politics

Sam Smith
Building Little Republics in a Collapsing Empire

Website of the Day
Loyalty Oaths at the United Way?

January 19, 2011

Kathleen Christison
Wikileaks Cables on Israel's Gaza Onslaught

Esam Al-Amin
The Fall of the West's Little Dictator

José Pertierra
El Paso Diary: Notes From the Trial of Luis Posada Carriles

Dean Baker
The Economists Forgive Themselves

John Walsh
An Anti-Interventionist Looks at China

Laura Flanders
Cutting Taxes is Killing the Economy

Joe Mowrey
Imperial Shooting Sprees

Stewart J. Lawrence
Ganja Yoga: Posturing for Pot Legalization?

Mickey Z.
Downsize or Modify? A Conversation With Noam Chomsky

Carl Finamore
Hyatt Sues Hotel Workers Union

Website of the Day
Sarah Palin Battle Theme (Disco Edit)

January 18, 2011

Michael Hudson
Jeffrey Sommers
The Death of "Social Europe"

Mark Rudd
From Terrorism to Nonviolence: an Ex-Weather Underground Radical on the Tucson Shootings

Sasan Fayazmanesh
Who Killed the Iranian Physics Professors?

Gareth Porter
50 Years After Ike's Speech: From Military-Industrial Complex to Permanent War State

Jonathan Cook
The Death of the Israeli Left

Ralph Nader
Recharging the UAW

Russell Mokhiber
Auto Safety and the Supreme Court

Mike Whitney
The Special Tribunal for Lebanon

Steve Breyman
The Gipper at 100: Reagan, Reagan Jr and Alzheimer's

Clancy Sigal
Left Till the End

Website of the Day
Born in the Backwoods: the History of Boogie-Woogie

January 17, 2011

Frank Bardacke
Farewell to the Utterly Unique John Ross

Andrew Cockburn
Pentagon Ecstatic Over New Chinese "Threat"

Jason Hribal
A Message From Tatiana: When Zoo Animals Resist

Bill Quigley
MLK Injustice Index 2011: Racism, Materialism and Militarism in the US

Max Ajl
Winter Break in Gaza

William Loren Katz
Devastating Hope: the Pentagon and the King Legacy

Andrew Levine Monica Lewinsky, Where Are You Now That We Need You ... Again?

Max Kantar
Race and America's Criminal Justice System

Yvonne Ridley
The People's Revolution in Tunisia

B. R. Gowani
The Blasphemy Law: Islamic Fundament-alism in Pakistan

Alan Farago
Skin Tight at the Golden Globes

Website of the Day
A CableGate Browser

January 14 -16, 2011

Alexander Cockburn
The Tucson Memorial: Politics is Everywhere

Petra Bartosiewicz
The Accidental Terrorist: How Rebecca Rubin Became a "Most Wanted" Woman

Jeffrey St. Clair
How Green Became the Color of Money: Clintonian Environmentalism

Walden Bello
The Triumph of Austerity

Yvonne Ridley
Tonight We Are All Tunisians

Thomas H. Naylor
China Plays the Euro Card

Rannie Amiri
The Well-Deserved Collapse of Lebanon's Government

Jennifer Van Bergen
Watch the Watchers

Jonathan Feldman
Investing in Fox News: the Political Economy of Character Assassination

Alison Weir
Shot in the Head

Conn Hallinan
Killing Peace in Afghanistan

Saul Landau
Something is Rotten in the State of a Bank

Fawzia Afzal-Khan Dead in My Tracks: Salmaan Taseer, the Mullah of Bourbon St and Freud's Uncanny

Beatrice Lindstrom
Haiti: Beyond the Blue Helmets

Stewart J. Lawrence
Is a Deal on Immigration Possible Before 2012?

Christopher Brauchli
The World According to Rep. Steve King

Sheldon Richman
Government Spying on Americans

Richard Ward
Losing Our Uncivil Liberties

Ann Jones
Can Women Make Peace?

Carmelo Ruiz-Marrero
Organic and Beyond

Alan Farago
SEIU: Off to the Races, Backwards

Jonathan W. Martin
Bankers Laugh, Whilst the Country Wilts

David Macaray
Locked Out in Iowa

Daniel Gross
Union Victory at Starbucks

Kieran Manjarrez
Hate Speech and Free Speech

Laura Flanders
The Violence of the Broken Economy

David Ker Thomson
Weals: Many Nowtopias; One Revolution

Linh Dinh
Martial Cosplay and More

Yves Engler
How Canada Subsidizes Illegal Israeli Settlements

M. Shahid Alam
Pakistan: a Political Murder or War?

Dr. Susan Block
Make Eros, Not Thanatos

Ramzy Baroud
The Failure of Academia

Billy Wharton
Jared Lee Loughner and Single-Payer

Ron Jacobs
Tales of Misery, Love and Hope

Eric Walberg
Ecology and Islam

Charles R. Larson
Only in Latin America

Mark Scaramella
Art Tatum: the Greatest Piano Player Ever

David Yearsley
The LA Phil at the Cineplex

Poets' Basement
Three by Corseri

Website of the Weekend
Assange Accuser's Lawyer Defended CIA Renditions

January 13, 2011

Neve Gordon
Israel's Assault on Human Rights

Franklin Lamb
Why Hezbollah Walked

Linn Washington, Jr.
Grand Theft Constitution

Rob Prince
The Tunisian Intifada

Sasha Kramer
Haiti: Redemption Songs

Joel Olson
What It's Like to Live in Arizona Right Now

Dean Baker
The Market and Inequality

Nicola Nasser
The Plight of Christian Arabs: Why Foreign "Protection" is Counter-Productive

Russell Mokhiber
Jam the Revolving Door

Stephen Lendman
Hard Times in Illinois

Charles R. Larson
Palin's Mouth

Website of the Day
Woz to the FCC: Keep the Internet Free

January 12, 2011

Franklin Spinney
Surging Tit for Tat in Afghanistan

Paul Craig Roberts
A Brief for Animals

Jennifer Loewenstein
The Iranian Threat

Vijay Prashad
Afghan Reality

Tanya Golash-Boza
Why Did We Send Rice, Beans and Sardines to Haiti, When They Needed Cash?

Diane Shammas
Helen Thomas: Freedom of Speech and the Zionist Albatross

Manuel Garcia, Jr.
Gun Freedom

Ralph Nader
Why Won't Obama Meet With the Left?

John V. Walsh
Sarah Palin's Crosshairs ... and Obama's

Niranjan Ramakrishnan
Dreams of My Presidents

Website of the Day
The CIA File on Posada Carriles

January 11, 2011

Alan Nasser /
Kelly Norman
The Student Loan Debt Bubble

William D. Hartung
Is Lockheed Martin Shadowing You?

Mike Whitney
The Unreported War in Mexico

Israel Shamir
The Guardian's Political Censorship of Wikileaks

Anthony DiMaggio
What's Really Behind Conservative Attacks on ObamaCare?

Bill Quigley /
Jeena Shah
Haiti: One Million Homeless and Displaced

Sam Smith
The Blood on Our Floor

Joseph Massad
Sectarianism and Its Discontents

Randall Amster
First Amendment Remedies

Laura Flanders
Three 9-Year Olds--RIP

Bouthaina Shaaban
Less Arab Movie Festivals, More Movies

Website of the Day
Modern Utopians: Communes of the 60s and 70s

January 10, 2011

Alexander Cockburn
How the Republicans' Chickens Came Home to Roost in Tucson

Bill Quigley
Serious Guns and White Terrorism

Paul Craig Roberts
Spinning Unemployment in a Collapsing Empire

Chris Floyd
Silent Surge in Afghanistan

Andrew Levine Shared Delusions: Obama Apologists and Tea Partiers

Lawrence Davidson The New Radicals in Congress: Show Trials for American Muslims?

Dave Lindorff
A Disturbing Meeting at the Gym

Yvonne Ridley
Jack Straw's Attack on the Pakistani Community

Fidel Castro
Afghanistan or Arizona? An Atrocious Act

Paul Hillier
Whose Radical Solution Will It Be?

Carl Finamore
The San Francisco Hotel Dispute

Website of the Day
Rock A While with David Vest

January 7 - 9, 2011

Alexander Cockburn
The American Way of Torture

Jeffrey St. Clair
How Green Became the Color of Money: a Concise History of the Rise and Fall of the Green Establishment

Helen Thomas
Heartless

David Rosen
The Myth of American Primacy

Kevin Alexander Gray
James Brown: the Soul Will Find a Way

Franklin Lamb
Palestinian Refugees and Lebanon's Disgrace

Mike Whitney
Betrayal in Beirut

Will Parrish
The Murder of Mark West Creek: Booze and a G-Sachs Banker

Chase Madar
Italy's New Political Star

Christophe Wargny
Haiti in the Hands of the NGOs

Ron Jacobs
The Iraq War: When Destruction Sickens

Murtaza Razvi
The Demon in Pakistan's Soul

Ramzy Baroud
Declaring Palestine

William Astore
Freedom Fighters for a Fading Empire

Raymond J. Lawrence
Boehner's Ominous Beginning

Saul Landau
Welcome to the 2011 American Dream

Col. Douglas MacGregor
Can We Cut the Defense Budget While We are "At War"?

Firmin DeBrabander
Trimming the Fat Off Fast Food Subsidies?

Missy Beattie
The Chemistry of Empire

David Ker Thomson
Where Feminism Left Me

Fred Gardner
Lillian Hellman, Medical Marijuana User

Devon G. Peña
Environmental Justice and the Derivative Depression

Christopher Brauchli
A Little Wanton Money

Walter Brasch
Frat Boys and Naval Officers

John Blair
Bring Back the Two-Fingered Peace Sign

Paul Hillier
Fifteen Minutes of Capitalist Ideology

Tom H. Hastings
The Boehner Blitz

Gerald E. Scorse
Fairer Tax Reporting, Finally

Carla Blank
Apollo Could be a Bitch: Jennifer Homans' Coffee Table Ballet

Charles R. Larson
No Escape Anywhere

Kim Nicolini
"Enter the Void:" Drugs, Sex and Loss

David Yearsley
Fake Grit

Poets' Basement
Corseri, Orloski and Lee

Website of the Weekend
Stop Skull Fucking Now!

January 6, 2011

James Bovard
Why Tea Partiers Should Despise George W. Bush

Mike Whitney
Printing a Recovery

Dean Baker
How Many Economists Does It Take to See an $8 Trillion Housing Bubble?

Yvonne Ridley
US Justice on Trial

Tom Engelhardt
The Urge to Surge

Michael Winship
A Brutal Reckoning Awaits

Russell Mokhiber
Politics v. Sports? No Contest

Laura Flanders
Constitutional Lessons for the New Congress

Website of the Day
One Family in Gaza

January 5, 2011

Richard Neville
Unlocking Uncle Sam's House of Horrors

Patrick Cockburn
Did the US Really Give Saddam Fake OK to Invade Kuwait?

Mike Whitney
The Great Awakening of Vladimir Putin

Israel Shamir
Julian Assange's Deal With the Devil

Steve Breyman
In the Matter of James Cole: Will He Be An Anti-Terror Warrior at the Justice Department?

Ralph Nader
How the Left is Left Out

Farzana Versey
Pakistan vs. Pakistan

Martha Rosenberg
Blackbird Killers Sent to Investigate Blackbird Deaths

Mike Roselle
Raising Hell in the Hollers: Judy Bonds Had My Back

Dave Lindorff
A Profound and Jarring Disconnect

Danny Lucia
Slaves of the Constitution

Website of the Day
Save the Arcadia Woodlands

January 4, 2011

Mike Whitney
Why Washington Hates Hugo Chavez

Ralph Nader
Tweeting Away the Time

Gareth Porter
How Afghanistan Became a War for NATO

Lawrence Wittner After START: Where Does Nuclear Disarmament Go From Here?

Christophe Ventura
Italy's Blood Oranges

Russell Mokhiber
Big is Bad

Ray McGovern
Why Obama Should Read Wikileaks on Afghanistan

David Macaray
The Pentagon and the Ultimate Con Game

Sheldon Richman
The Lies of Diplomats

Michael Simmons
Phil Ochs Lives!

Website of the Day
Scaling the Border Wall

January 3, 2011

Eric Toussaint
The Irish Crisis

Patrick Cockburn
Puncturing the Balloon of "State Secrets"

Ann Robertson /
Bill Leumer
Why Inequality Matters

William Blum
Wikileaks, the US, Sweden and Devil's Island

Jean Casella /
James Ridgeway
Bradley Manning, Solitary Confinement and Selective Outrage

Harry Targ
50 Years Since Ike's Warning

Linn Washington, Jr.
Righting an Ugly Wrong

Fred Gardner
Beverly Hills Shrink

Lawrence Davidson
The Attacks on Susan Abulhawa

Bouthaina Shaaban
Arab TV and the Return of the Mavi Marmara

Website of the Day
Monk's Detroit Dream

December 31, 2010 - January 2, 2011

Alexander Cockburn Goodbye to 2010, Year of the Tiger, Hello to 2011, Year of the Rabbit

Jeffrey St. Clair
How Green Became the Color of Money

Behzad Yaghmaian
A Chinese Migrant's Long March

Thomas Naylor
The Fall of the House of Zeus

Christopher Brauchli
Peter King, Witch Hunter

Robert Bryce
Biofuel Delusions

Joanne Mariner
The Year in Counter-Terrorism

Will Parrish /
Darwin Bond-Graham
The Political Economy of Duckhorn Pinot

Mike Whitney
Khodorkovsky's Trip to the Slammer

Ramzy Baroud
Standing Tall in the Rubble

Rannie Amiri
Right for the Wrong Reasons

Alan Farago
When Progress Didn't Come and the People Didn't Awake

Linh Dinh
Welcome to the Collapse

Martha Rosenberg Drug Industry: Interests in Conflict

Franklin Lamb
The US Congress's Pet Pariah

Ron Jacobs
Framing the Sixties

Brian Tierney
Cutting From the Bottom

Israel Shamir
The Minsk Election in a Wikileaks Mirror

Jess Guh
DADT, a Repeal of Convenience

David Ker Thomson
Abolition: Can We Finish the Job This Time?

Missy Beattie
Resolved: Act Like Bradley Manning

Dan Bacher
Schwarzenegger: The Myth of the "Jolly Green Giant" Exposed

David Macaray
Looking Forward for Labor

Shepherd Bliss
"Be Ye Not Like a Child ... "

Charles R. Larson
Japan, From the Ruins

Dan White
Trains, What Hitler Really Did in the War, Eating in Paris and Other Insights

Joshua Sperber
The Subversive Conservatism of "True Grit"

Poets' Basement
3 by Ann Lefeve

Website of the Weekend
Demolition of the Paris Metro

December 30, 2010

Michael Teitelman
Obama and the Boy in the Metal Box

Jennifer Van Bergen Douglas Valentine
Detention and Torture

Jorge Mariscal
Civil Rights in the Age of Neoliberalism

Denis G. Rancourt
David F. Noble: In Memoriam

Paul Craig Roberts
Our Lickspittle Press

Dave Lindorff
Serfing USA: How Corporate America is Robbing American Workers

Mary Lynn Cramer
Capitalism in Crisis: Get Your Wheelbarrows Ready!

Anthony Papa
Scott Sisters Freed! 19 Years for an $11 Robbery

Website of the Day
The Drums of War in Gaza?

 

December 29, 2010

Bill Quigley
Killer Fires and the Homeless

James Bovard
Peter Hoekstra and the CIA: Congressman Wins Torture Award

Stewart J. Lawrence
Make Believe Counter-Insurgency

Yvonne Ridley
Enough Grandstanding About Khodorkovsky, Ms. Clinton!

David Swanson
A Year of Fall and Decline

John V. Walsh
ObamaCare, Worse Than You Thought

Fidel Castro
The Fight Against Cholera

Julie Hilden
The Case of the "I (Heart) Boobies!" Bracelets

Website of the Day
Obama Supporter v. Progressive

December 28, 2010

P. Sainath
Of Luxury Cars and Lowly Tractors

Jonathan Cook
God-TV Helps Israel Oust Bedouins

Paul Craig Roberts
State Lawlessness on the Rampage

Jennifer Van Bergen
Invoking the Espionage Act Against Assange

Ralph Nader
Drug Industry Fraud

David Macaray
Wal-Mart Strikes Again

Bill Manson
The Absurdity of Hi-Tech Servitude

David Krieger
Ending the Nuclear Age: a Silly Dream?

Stephanie Van Hook / Michael Nagler
Making the Imperial Army More Diverse

Mitchel Cohen
What a Glorious Blizzard

Website of the Day
An Interview with Ron Jacobs

December 27, 2010

Bill Hatch
Out Here in the Sticks

Uri Avnery
"The Darkness to Expel!"

Lawrence Davidson
The National Image and Its Contradictions

Allen Mendenhall
The Latest Happy Face of the Ruling Class

Fred Gardner
Going After Dr. Frankel

Mark Weisbrot
Why Washington Won't Allow Democracy in Haiti

Sherwood Ross
Get Assange

David Michael Green
Learning From Lame Ducks

Eric Patton
Who Will Act to Free Bradley Manning?

Mark Scaramella
Top Secret

Website of the Day
Legalize Pot? Pat Robertson, Yes; Joe Biden, No Way

December 24-26, 2010

Alexander Cockburn
Making the Rich Happy

Chellis Glendinning
The Techno-Fantasies of Evo Morales

Eugene Coyle
The Best Way to Create Jobs: Cut the Work Week

Will Parrish
Who Really Rules California's Wine Country?

Joanne Mariner
Civil Society and Counter-Terrorism

William Loren Katz
The Women Who Gave Us Christmas (and Exposed America's Greatest Crime)

Brian M. Downing
Staying the Course in Afghanistan: Come What May

Michael Leonardi
Covering Up the Murder of Nicola Calipari: What the Wikileaks Cable Reveals

Ramzy Baroud
Whitewashing Defeat

Saul Landau
The Wikileaks Cookbook

Linn Washington Jr.
Dividing the Races to Benefit the Rich

Christopher Brauchli
Merry Christmas, You're Fired

Rannie Amiri
The People of the Year in the Middle East

Ronnie Cummins
Coexistence With Monsanto? Hell No!

Missy Beattie
A Better Time? When?

Linh Dinh
Lawless Police State

Rev. William E. Alberts
Wikileaks' Christmas Message

Harvey Wasserman
Another No Nukes Victory

Chris Genovali /
Misty MacDuffee
Smooth Sailing for Oil Tankers?

David Ker Thomson
Trafficking With the Enemy

Robert Roth
Celebrating the Rebel Jesus

Ron Jacobs
Jes Grew Report

Myles Hoenig
A Christmas Prayer From a Born Again Atheist

Charles R. Larson
Intimate Journeys, Thwarted Desire

David Yearsley
Kristmas Kitsch

Poets' Basement
Clifford, Taylor and Springate

Website of the Weekend
Dan's Record Shop: a Story

December 23, 2010

Bill Quigley /
Vince Warren
Obama's Liberty Problem

Peter Lee
The Most Dangerous Man in Korea is Not Kim Jung Il

Gareth Porter
High-Risk Raids Into Pakistan: More Than Psywar

Dean Baker
After the Tax Cuts: the Economy and the GOP

Hayden Janssen
The Problem with Stewardship

Yves Engler
Mining Peru: Canada's New Territory?

Laura Flanders
What We Mean When We Talk About States' Rights

David Macaray
Negotiating With a Forked Tongue

Farzana Versey
Demasculinizing Meat: Lady Gaga's Flesh Impact

Website of the Day
Revolve

December 22, 2010

Joe Mangano
Baby Tooth Science: New Clues to Cancer Risks From Atom Bomb Tests

Uri Avnery
Ship of Fools 2

Jennifer Van Bergen
Predicting Torture

Lawrence Wittner
The Voyage of the Golden Rule

John V. Whitbeck
The Shape of Palestinian Statehood

Stewart J. Lawrence
Here Comes Jeb

Linh Dinh
Bloody Trophies

Rebecca Solnit
Iceberg Economies and Shadow Selves

Franklin Lamb
Australia Rejects Israeli-Ordered Media Censorship

Sherwood Ross
PFC Bradley Manning, Patriot

Website of the Day
The 12 Days of Wikileaks

 

December 21, 2010

Ralph Nader
Wikileaks and the First Amendment

Larry Portis
The French State Prepares for Class War

Sasan Fayazmanesh
Waiting for a New Economic Theory

Sam Smith
Secrets of the Ruling Class

Sheldon Richman
The Stampede of the Bombers

Alice Slater
Beyond START

Julie Hilden
The Case of the Abused Cheerleader

Willie L. Pelote, Sr.
From Golden State to Third World Nation

Binoy Kampmark
Brutality and Poultry

Laura Flanders
Ask, Tell, Don't Kill

Website of the Day
Strict Creationism and the American Mind

 

December 20, 2010

Pam Martens
The Tax-Payers' Tab: a Cool $9 Trillion

Patrick Cockburn
Reprising US Fantasies in Vietnam

Bill Quigley
Cover-Ups, Coups and Drones

Bruce Jackson
"They Say He's Queer"

Max Blumenthal
The Great Fear

Mike Whitney
Korea Steps Back From the Brink

Carl Finamore
Hotel Workers Dig In

Greg Moses
Time to Set Hector Lopez Free

Fidel Castro
Bill Clinton's Lies

Paul Craig Roberts
Reaganomics: a Defense

John Severino
Evo's Highway

Sama Adnan
What H. Res 1765 Tells Us About the Peace Camp

Website of the Day
Dark Light: the Art of Blind Photographers

December 17 - 19, 2010

Alexander Cockburn
Nowhere to Go But Up

Ismael Hossein-Zadeh
The Globalization of Militarism

Franklin Spinney
Obama's March to Folly:the Myth of Liberal Interventionism

Gareth Porter
The Brutal Price of Progress

Clarence Lusane
Slavery, Jim Crow and the White House

Eric Stoner
Afghanistan: You Call This Progress?

John Carroll, MD
Cholera in Haiti: Treating Magda

Nick Dearden /
Tim Jones
Lessons for Ireland: Private Debt, Public Pain

Robert Alvarez
Poisoning the Yakama

Saul Landau
Wikileaks and the Free Press

Rannie Amiri
Mottaki: First Casualty of Wikileaks?

Ramzy Baroud
Insisting on Humanity

Chuck Collins
Concentrating the Wealth

Ron Jacobs
The Drug War That Never Ends

Charlotte Dennett
Wikileaks: Where's the Oil?

John Blair
The Duke Energy Scandal

David Ker Thomson
Rez

Sherry Wolf
Letter to a Discouraged Progressive

David Macaray
American Exceptionalism

Jennifer Van Bergen
Why Julian Assange is My Hero

Martha Rosenberg
The Year in Pills

Sam Smith
When Green Matters

Missy Beattie
Object Not Found

Harvey Wasserman
Our Gay Commander-in-Chief

Laura Flanders
Odd Man Out: Forgetting Bradley Manning

Randall Amster
Support the Dominant Paradigm

Ron Ridenour
Stop Fascism; Support Wikileaks

Dr. Suzy Block
Hot Wet Holiday Sex: From Wikileaky Condoms to Yucky Zuckerburg

Charles R. Larson
The Two Best Reads of 2010

David Yearsley
Christoph Graupner Lives!

Poets' Basement
Three by Farzana Ahmad

Website of the Day
The Myth of the Clinton Surplus

December 16, 2010

Alan Farago
Skullduggery in Ghost Town

Dean Baker
Peter Orzag Goes to Citigroup

Peter Lee
Is Your Portfolio Ready for the End of the World?

Jospeh Nevins
Coming to Terms with Holbrooke

Norman Girvan
The Caribbean Narco-Triangle: the US-Cuba-Jamaica Connection

Michael Winship
The President on the Ropes

Robert Jensen
"All That We Share" Isn't Enough

Binoy Kampmark
Death on Christmas Island

Website of the Day
Swedish TV Video on Wikileaks

December 15, 2010

Diana Johnstone
Holbrooke or Milosevic: Who is the Greater Murderer?

James Bovard
Why Bill of Rights Day Should be Anti-Politician Day

Conn Hallinan
Israel, Obama and the Bomb

Vijay Prashad
Empire Unmasked

Robert Weissman
Big Profits, Bigger Crimes

Stephan Salisbury
Terrorama

Fred Gardner
Pot Legalizers Look to 2012

Joshua Frank
The Legacy of First Blood Dick: Remembering Holbrooke

Anthony Papa
Madoff: The Price of Suicide

Steven Higgs
Autism Waiver Cuts Spell Catastrophe

Afghan Youth Peace Volunteers / Afghans for Peace
We Want You Out

Website of the Day
Risks of Coal Ash Understated

 

December 14, 2010

Norm Kent
You are Right to Remain Silent

Mike Whitney
Post Mortem for the World's Reserve Currency

Maximilian Forte
The Wikileaks Revolution: Notes From the Insurrection

Franklin C. Spinney
Who is the Wise General in Afghanistan?

Ralph Nader
Majority of One

David Macaray
Two American Labor Unions Shift Gears: the S. Korea Trade Deal

Ali Khan /
Jasmine Abou-Kassem
Pakistan's Cruel and Unusual Blasphemy Statute

Lawrence Davidson
Real Estate and Israeli Rabbis

Stewart J. Lawrence
José Cuervo for President?

Cecil Brown
Jay Z and the Colonizing of Hip Hop

 

December 13, 2010

Patrick Cockburn
Billions Down the Drain in Useless US Afghan Aid

Tariq Ali
Does Liu Xiaobo Really Deserve the Peace Prize?

Jonathan Cook Israel's War on Children

Uri Avnery
Racism, Political Incompetence and the Mount Carmel Fire

Russell Mokhiber
Single Payer and Professor Hsiao

Patrick Bond
Climate Capitalism Wins in Cancun

David Smith-Ferri The December Review: Rubbish on Afghanistan

Bob Sirois
The Untold Story of Discrimination in Professional Hockey Against French-Speaking Players

Danny Muller
Listening to Haiti

Randall Amster
The Blog of War

Website of the Day
10 Infamous Cases of Wrongful Execution

 

December 10 - 12, 2010

Alexander Cockburn
The Greater Traitor

Peter Linebaugh
Passing the Torch

Mike Whitney
The Korean War, Round Two

Thomas Volscho
The Rise of the Wall Street Ruling Class

Joe Bageant
Ignorance and Courage in the Age of Lady Gaga

John Barth, Jr.
Why Judicial Corruption is Invisible

Jeffrey Sommers
Latvia: "Mind the Gap!"

Jonathan Cook
Israel's Racist Rabbis

Robert Alvarez
The Nuclear War Reserve

Rannie Amiri
The Story of Elias Murr, Saboteur

Franklin Lamb
So Who Exactly is Sowing Strife in Lebanon?

Dean Baker
Fixating on Tax Cuts; Ignoring Real Problems

Afghan Youth Peace Volunteers
"We are Afghans and We Ask the World to Listen"

Aurel / Pierre Daum
Protest Fractures in Athens

Ramzy Baroud
Leaking the Obvious?

Michael Winship
Premature Capitulation

David Ker Thomson
The Apparatus of Prostration

Ron Jacobs
Pyongyang: the Perennial Enemy

Christopher Brauchli
The Executioner's Drugs

Missy Beattie
The Bankster Merry-Go-Round

Dennis Loo
Who You Gonna Believe? Us or Your Lying Eyes?

Harvey Wasserman
A $7 Billion New Nuke Attack

Ingmar Lee
The Stephen Harper Vision of Canada

Thomas H. Naylor
A War on Death

Farzana Versey
The Nobel Dissonance

Ronnie Cummins
The Long March

Sherwood Ross
Greens Defending Assange

Don Monkerud
American Exceptionalism Revisited

Stephen Martin
The Hand That Would Rock the Cradle

Charles R. Larson
Waiting for King Lear

David Yearsley
The Charlottenburg Organ Reborn

CP Newswire
An Open Letter to the Left Establishment: Protest Obama

Poets' Basement Randall and Hahn

Website of the Weekend
Wanking Bankers

December 9, 2010

Pam Martens
Fears Mount on TSA Body Scanners

Wajahat Ali
FBI Spying on Muslims

Sasha Kramer
Burning Tires in the Time of Cholera

Fatima Bhutto
A Flood of Drone Strikes

Jimmy Johnson
The Secret Secret: Of Wikileaks and Literacy

Laura Carlsen
Anti-Climactic in Cancun

Binoy Kampmark
The Curious Case of Rudd and Assange

Anthony Papa
Bridget Brennan Drug Bust

Website of the Day
Anon Ops: a Manifesto

December 8, 2010

Michael Hudson
Obama's Sellout on Taxes

Patrick Cockburn
The Russians Did Better ... So Why Did They Lose?

Eric Walberg
Julian Quixote: Wikileaks vs. the Empire

Mike Roselle
Fighting for the Fate of the Appalachians

Greg Moses
Calling From a Migrant Lockup in Arizona

Diane Christian
Condom Morality

Fidel Castro
Cholera in Haiti

Linn Washington
The US Criticized for Human Rights Abuses

James McEnteer
Obama, Can This Really be the End?

Website of the Day
10 Things Charter Schools Won't Tell You

December 7, 2010

Chris Floyd
Truth in Chains: the Arrest of Julian Assange

Gareth Porter /
Jim Lobe
Actual Wiki Cables Belie NYT's Version of Saudi / Gulf States' Stance on Iran

Dean Baker
Tales of Economic Apocalypse

Gregory Elich
Menacing North Korea: How S. Korea is Raising the Risk of War

Ralph Nader
GOP Wackopedia

M. Shahid Alam
Unvarnished Truths About the US and Israel

Dave Lindorff Information Terrorists?

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Detroit on Strike

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The Hipster Librarian

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Purple Passion Pearl Harbor

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A New Low for Todd Gitlin

December 6, 2010

Michael Hudson
Deficit Commission Follies

Paul Craig Roberts The US Government's Frontal Assault on Freedom

Mike Whitney
How Ireland Can Strike a Blow Against the Imperial Bankers

Sasan Fayazmanesh
Iran and the Leaks of Wikileaks

Steve Breyman
The Return of Debtors' Prisons

Davey D
The Copyright Police: First They Came for the Hip Hop Sites ...

Neve Gordon
Uprooting the Bedouins of Israel

Greg Moses
Shall American Teenagers Dream Free?

Mark Weisbrot
The Drive to Cut Social Security is Based on Deception

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Animating "Howl": the Subversive Art of Eric Drooker

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December 3 -5, 2010

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Julian Assange: Wanted by the Empire, Dead or Alive

Darwin Bond-Graham
Nuking the Social Contract

Andy Kroll
The New American Oligarchy

William Blum
Anti-Empire Report: From Wikileaks to TSA

Rannie Amiri
All Eyes on Lebanon

Ray McGovern
No Evidence? No Problem: NYT Still Stalking Iran

Saul Landau /
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Leaked Cuba Memo to Raise Eyebrows

Ramzy Baroud
Turkey Must Reveal Its Cards

P. Sainath
India's Lobbying Scandal

John Carroll, M.D.
Dying in Haiti

David Rosen
Culture Wars Redux: Sex and the Tea Party Congress

Steven Colatrella
How Shall We Pray? Give Us Bread; Forgive Our Debts

Thomas I. Palley
Why Obama is Failing

Francis Shor
Wikileaks and the Spanish Prosecutors

Russell Mokhiber Bank Power

Mark Weisbrot
A Setback for Haiti

John V. Whitbeck
New Language for Middle East Peace

Sherry Wolf
I am a Rent-aholic

Ronnie Cummins
The Road to Cancun

Michael Winship
Bad Buzz From the Capital Hive

Ron Jacobs
Black Liberation in an Occupied Land

Nilofar Suhrawardy
Pampering India's Nuclear Ego

Missy Beattie
Friend or Foe?

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The Merchants of Fear

Linh Dinh
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5 Myths About Depression Treatments

John Grant
Wikileaks is Good for America

David Macaray
Should Show Biz Celebrities Be Muzzled?

Yves Engler /
Bianca Mugyenyi
Cars and the Tea Party

Charles R. Larson
Literary Hijinks Made Fatal

Scott Borchert
In the Ruins of the Perfect Future

Harry Clark
The Fever Chart

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The Organ-Building of Munetaka Yokota

Poets' Basement
Ford, Yankevich and Orloski

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Closing a Deadly Gateway

December 2, 2010

Michael W. Hudson
The Borrower and the Billionaire

Paul Craig Roberts
What the Wiki-Saga Teaches Us

Franklin C. Spinney
Staying the Course in Afghanistan

Benjamin Dangl
Wikileaks and Bolivia: the Ambassador Has No Clothes

Uri Avnery
The Original Sin of the Israeli State

Mike Whitney
If the US Wants Peace in North Korea, It Should Keep Its Word

Russell Mokhiber
Obama's Kleptocracy Initiative: What About Wall Street?

David Macaray
The Family and Medical Leave Act Revisited

Ed Moloney
The Hypocrisy of Peter King

Brian McKenna
Wild West Journalism

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Right 2 Survive

 

December 1, 2010

Gareth Porter Wikileaks Exposes Complicity of the Press

Paul Craig Roberts
Hillary's Blame Game

Russ Wellen
The Frontlines of Disarmament

Nikolas Kozloff
Wikileaks Comes to Latin America

Conn Hallinan
The Future of Kashmir

Sheldon Richman
Afghanistan: No Hurry to Leave

Rich Broderick
The Free Market Puts Ireland on a Starvation Diet ... Again

David Solnit
11 Years After the WTO Uprising

Farzana Versey
No Looking "Backwards"

Charles M. Young
Whole Lotta Lies

Charles R. Larson
Six Ways to Eliminate the Deficit

Website of the Day
John Lennon: Bull in Search of a China Shop

November 30, 2010

Ralph Nader
Missing the Mark on Deficits

Paul Craig Roberts
Fabricating Terror: the Portland "Bomb" Plot

Bill Quigley
Why Wikileaks is Good for Democracy

Jonathan Cook
Wikileaks and the New Global Order

Dean Baker
When the Bubble Burst

James McEnteer
Indian Givers: South Africa is More Than Black and White

Tom Engelhardt
The National Security State Cops a Feel

Sherwood Ross
Holder v. Assange

Gina Ulysse
Haiti's Fouled-Up Election

Bill Manson
The Long Run to the Bottom

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Act Now to Save the Galapagos!

 

November 29, 2010

Paul Craig Roberts
The Stench of US Economic Decay Grows Stronger

Israel Shamir
Assange in the Entrails of Empire

Mike Whitney
Hammering Ireland

Lawrence Davidson
Glenn Beck, Julian Assange and the Battle of Ideas

Winslow Wheeler /
Sanford Gottlieb Memo to Tea Party Senators: Cutting the Defense Budget

John Carroll, MD
The Road to Vote in Haiti

P. Sainath
Obama's Indian Outing

Carl Finamore
Pilot Protests Underscore Passenger Safety

David Macaray
Why Not Declare Class War and be Done With It

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The Yahoos are in Charge

Website of the Day
Mark Ruffalo Put on Terror Watch List for Screening Anti-Natural Gas Film

 

November 26 - 28, 2010

Alexander Cockburn
Run, Russ, Run

Winslow T. Wheeler
The Defense Budget and the Deficit: How the Plans Compare

Ramzy Baroud
Obama Surrenders Palestinian Rights

Harry Browne
Ireland and the House of Cards

Bill Quigley /
Nicole Phillips
Haiti's Sham Elections

Saul Landau
Bombing the Senses: Ads to the Brain

Brian Cloughley
Thanksgiving of the Drones

Fidel Castro
The Lights of Rebellion: Evo Answers NATO

Francis Shor
Normalizing Blowback

Steve Heilig
How (Not) to Legalize Pot

Terrence Paupp
Obama's Fading Empire

Brenda Norrell
The Women of AIM: Watching for the Men in Shiny Shoes

Missy Beattie
The Greedy and the Needy

Linh Dinh
Power Grabs at the Airport

Christopher Brauchli
Gouged While Flying

Eric Walberg
Russia and NATO

Ellen Taylor
The Navy's Toxic Tentacles

Ron Jacobs
Zizek and the End Times

Bill Manson
Manufactured Hysteria and Relative Risks

Harvey Wasserman
Terror! Oil!! Opium!!!

Walter Brasch
Fairness and the Bristol Stomp

Michael Dickinson
World Strike Day 2012

Ingmar Lee
The Appalling BC Tar Sands Pipeline

Gwyneth Leech
Staying, Not Going:
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David Ker Thomson
Asking For Whom the Bell Tolls

Charles R. Larson
Lynd Ward: America's First Graphic Novelist

Poets' Basement
Dennison, Chaet and Clark

Website of the Weekend
Don't Touch My Junk

November 25, 2010

Michael Hudson
A "Flat Tax" for the Rich?

Mike Whitney
Memo to Ireland: "Tell the EU and IMF to Shove It!"

Gareth Porter
Why Gen. Petraeus was Snookered by the "Taliban" Imposter

Sarah Anderson
Food Should Not be a Poker Chip

Karl Grossman
The Skin of Our Teeth: Avoiding Nuclear Destruction

David Ker Thomson
Canadian Thanksgiving: If We Didn't Have It, We'd Have to Invent It

Rajesh Makwana / Adam Parsons
Rethinking the Global Economy: the Case for Sharing

Charles R. Larson
Palintology 101 (Part One)

Website of the Day
"We didn't land on Plymouth Rock, Plymouth Rock landed on us"

 

November 24, 2010

Jeffrey St. Clair
BP's Inside Game

Paul Craig Roberts
TSA's Gestapo Empire

James Ridgeway Invasion of the Body Scanners: Is TSA Spreading Cancer?

Michael Scott
First a Hand on Your Crotch, Next a Boot in Your Face

Nick Dearden
The Climate Loan Crisis: Making Poor Countries Pay Twice

Russell Mokhiber
Private Insurance Induced Stress Disorder?

Daniel Moss
Tear Down the Dam; Restore the Commons

Farzana Versey
The Media as Middle Man

Yasin Gaber
The Marvels of Exile: Judith Butler on Edward Said

Dan Beaton
A Tale of Two Elections: Burma and Haiti

Website of the Day
Useless Gobshites!

November 23, 2010

Pam Martens
Ten Ideas to Starve the Wall Street Beast

Patrick Cockburn
The Dangers of Embedded Journalism

Ben Rosenfeld /
Lauren Regan
When the Constitution is No Obastacle for the FBI: Legal Lessons From the Green Scare

Franklin C. Spinney
Another Free Ride for the Pentagon?

Dean Baker
Sinking Ireland

Ralph Nader
Obamabush: Semper Fi, Barack

Ray McGovern
Bush the Warmonger in His Own Words

George Wuerthner
Livestock and Predators: How to Stop the Killing

Don Monkerud
America's New Entertainment

Clare Bayard
Healing From Empire

Website of the Day
The American Galapagos

 

November 22, 2010

Michael Hudson
Why Paul Krugman Waves the Flag for Uncle Sam

James Abourezk
Honoring Helen Thomas

Paul Craig Roberts
Insouciant Americans

Sasan Fayazmanesh
When Sanctions Are Not Enough

Richard Forno
TSA and the New "Americanism"

Gary Leupp
Ignorance There ... and Here

Martha Rosenberg
Seven Ways Medical Conflicts of Interest are Disguised

Lawrence Davidson
Obama Plays the Fox

Patrick Bond
"Leave the Oil in the Soil!"

Michael Dickinson
Kiss My Ring: the Vatican Versus Jesus

Website of the Day
Globeistan

November 19 - 21, 2010

Alexander Cockburn
Time for a Real Mutiny

Jeffrey St. Clair
Let Them Eat Oil

Mike Whitney
Tying Bernanke's Hands

Joanne Mariner
The Banalization of Torture

Gareth Porter
The Fatal Flaw in the Iran Missile Docs

Karen Greenberg
Guilty Until Proven Guilty

Thomas Christie, Pierre Sprey, Franklin Spinney et al.
How to Cut the Defense Budget

Rannie Amiri
Way Beyond Chutzpah: Cantor Crosses the Line

Dr. Jim Morgan Haiti's New Normal: Dispatch from Cite Soleil

Lawrence Swaim
Israel's War Against the Dead

Ramzy Baroud
Education at Gunpoint

Ron Jacobs
No Alternative in Afghanistan?

Robert Alvarez
Shelving START

Russell Mokhiber
War is a Drug

P. Sainath
India's Great Drain Robbery

David Macaray
194 Years of Scabs

Carl Finamore
Hyatt's Dirty Safety Record

Brian Tierney
Hotel Workers Rising

Franklin Lamb
How the US and Israel Hope to Destroy Hezbollah

Gerald E. Scorse
The Truth About Capital Gains

Joshua Brollier
Natives Without a Nation

Missy Beattie
So Many Messages

Stewart J. Lawrence
Immigration Supporters Win Big Victory in California

Brenda Norrell
On the Border: Where Skin Color is the Dividing Line

Christopher Brauchli
Pot and the Deficit: the Hidden Cost of Prohibition

Carol Polsgrove
The Governor and the Power Plant

David Ker Thomson
Against Jane Jacobs

Dave Lindorff
No News is Not Good News

Jeff Deasy
Here Come the FrankenSalmon

Bill Manson
The Politics of Nice

Clifton Ross
Dancing With Dangl

Charles R. Larson Twain: the Last Word, One Hundred Years Later

Richard Estes
"Carlos:" An Orientalist Masterpiece

David Yearsley
Schumann and the Warm Bath of Memory

Poets' Basement
Springate, Orloski and Cirino

Website of the Weekend
Buy Nothing

November 18, 2010

Diana Johnstone
NATO's True Role in US Grand Strategy

Mike Whitney
Ireland's Suicide Pact with the EU

Behzad Yaghmaian
Facing a Leaderless Globalization

Kenneth E. Hartman
Are They Really Opposed to the Death Penalty?

Norman Solomon
Wooing the Economic Royalists

Michael Winship
Don't Ask, Don't Care

Patrick Bond
Will Zimbabwe Regress Again?

Joel S. Hirschhorn
The Anti-Incumbent Movement Failed

Website of the Day
Free Speech on Trial

November 17, 2010

Vicente Navarro
The Hypocrisies of Mario Vargas Llosa

James Bovard
The Political Slaughterhouse

Jonathan Cook
Obama's Bribe

Dean Baker
Seoul Searching on Trade and Currency

Ralph Nader
Bush at Large

Nick Turse
Off-Base America

Sherry Wolf Alienation 101: the Online Learning Rip Off

Judith Scherr
Why Aristide's Party Won't Vote

Peter Certo
Defense Cuts Go Mainstream

Website of the Day
The Last Outsider Director: an Interview with Jean-Luc Godard

 

November 16, 2010

Pam Martens
How the Fed and the Treasury Stonewalled Mark Pittman to His Dying Breath

Richard Forno
TSA and America's Zero Risk Culture

Gareth Porter
The Unending Occupation of Iraq

Harry Browne
Bruce Springsteen's "Promise" and the Price You Pay

Peter Lee
QE2 as Self-Inflicted Wound

Alan Farago
How Much Gold Does George Bush Own?

Franklin Lamb
Is the American Public About to Toss Israel?

Frank Green
Conspiracy in Theory: Truthers Slog On

Sheldon Richman
Blood on His Hands

Thomas H. Naylor
Shattering the Myth of Vermont

Website of the Day
Peaceful Uprising

November 15, 2010

Michael Hudson
Obama's Greatest Betrayal

Steve Hendricks
More Torture, Please?

Paul Craig Roberts
Eyes Only on Burma

Harvey Wasserman
Accidents in Progress: America's Eggshell Nukes

Lawrence Davidson
Palestine and the Fate of the UN

Clancy Sigal
The Long Disease of War

David Macaray
The War Over Food Stamps

Tom Engelhardt
The Stimulus Package in Kabul

Steven Fake
Liberating Thought

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Whatever ...

November 12 - 14, 2010

Alexander Cockburn
A Very Bitter Woman

Patrick Cockburn
Iraq's Stalemate Ends

Mike Whitney
Erin Go Broke

Ismael Hossein-Zadeh
The Militarization of the World: the Case of Iran

Dean Baker
The Perverse Priorities and Fatal Flaws of the Deficit Commission Report

Gareth Porter
Intel Failure in Yemen

William E. Alberts
Why Are the Feds Targeting Black Officials?

Bill Hatch
Jerry Brown's Parable of the Rocking Boat

Jonathan Cook
Re-Unifying the Palestinian Nation

Patrick Madden Mystifying the Crisis: Deadlock at the G20

Ramzy Baroud
Another Baghdad Massacre

Rannie Amiri
The Quest for Power in Iraq

James Zogby
Whither Obama's Middle East Agenda?

Ron Jacobs
Palestine, a Family's Story

Mark Weisbrot
Why It Could Get Even Worse for the Democrats

Tanya Golash-Boza
Targeting Jamaicans

Paul Wright
The Case Against Stacia A. Hylton

Steve Early
TDU in Chicago: Still Punching

Martha Rosenberg
Vioxx All Over Again?

Celia McAteer
London Calling: Student Militancy a Welcome Surprise

Larry Portis
Imperialist Architecture in Egypt

Michael Winship
Riding the Rails, Looking for Work

Brian McKenna
Anorexia and Capitalism

Gerald E. Scorse
Channeling Reagan on Tax Reform

Christopher Brauchli
Making Oklahoma Safe From Sharia Law

Roberto Rodriguez
Arizona: Where Fear is the Predicate

Dr. Susan Block
My Porn Star Girlfriend

J. T. Cassidy
Unlocking Imagination in Japan

Linh Dinh
Revolution Number 10

Farzana Versey
The Misinterpreters of Kashmir's Maladies

David Ker Thomson
The Elizabethan Era: Life in the Ice Age

Phil Rockstroh
Public Like a Frog

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Abused Women ... Still a Growth Industry

David Swanson
Tall Tillman Tales

Saul Landau
"Stone:" Walking Invisibly in the American Crowd

Kim Nicolini
An Intimate Look at How Things are Made in China

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The Esserzici Work-Out Book

Poets' Basement
Three by Lee Stern

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November 11, 2010

Peter Linebaugh
Laying Down of Arms

Paul Craig Roberts Licensed to Kill

Bill Quigley
Bush Pens True Crime Book

David Macaray Dissing the Boss: the NLRB Files a Landmark Complaint on Free Expression in the Workplace

Liaquat Ali Khan / Jasmine Abou-Kassem
Why the Oklahoma Shariah Law is Unconstitutional

Dedrick Muhammad
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Robert Bryce
Cars for the Elite: Obama's Electric Vehicle Fetish

Alan Farago
What, No Phone Books?

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London Calling

November 10, 2010

Allan Nairn
US-Backed Death Squad Files Surface in Indonesia

Dean Baker
Wall Street's TARP Gang Rides Again: Now They're Coming After Your Social Security!

Nicola Nasser
Waiting for Godot in Palestine

Missy Beattie
Running Scared: My Colonoscopy Saga

Sergio Ferrari
Worrying Signs From Venezuela to Ecuador

Patrick Cockburn
Can Iraq's Leaders Do a Deal?

Dave Lindorff Mumia: New Lawyer, New Round

Sherwood Ross
How Affirmative Action Brought Willie Mays to the Giants

Joshua Frank
Sinking the Breakwater

Website of the Day
Stiglitz: "Throw the Bankers in Jail to Save the Economy"

November 9, 2010

Uri Avnery
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Mike Whitney
Bernanke's Dollar Policy

Jordan Flaherty
The Incarceration Capital of the US: the Crisis Inside New Orleans' Jails

Afshin Rattansi
Red Poppies

Annie Gell
Haiti's Unnatural Disasters

Dean Baker
The Fed's Second Shot

Dave Lindorff
BS From the BLS: Things are Much Worse Than They are Telling Us

Stewart J. Lawrence
The Nancy Monster That Refuses to Die

Walter Brasch
Love and Loss Among the Wild Horses

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November 8, 2010

Paul Craig Roberts
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An Interview with Wendell Berry

David Swanson
A CIA Kidnapping in Milan

David Smith-Ferri
What Laila Sees

Ralph Nader
When Betrayed Voters Go to the Polls

Ray McGovern Torture Sans Regrets: Bush's Confessions

John Feffer
The Lies of Islamophobia

Christopher Ketcham
TV Toxicosis: What the Stewart / Colbert News Clowns Are Really Up To

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November 5 - 7, 2010

Alexander Cockburn
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Vijay Prashad
Obama in India: a Tide of Turbans

Patrick Cockburn
If al-Qa'ida Really Want to Hit the West, They Can

Darwin Bond-Graham
Guess Who's Not Coming to Tea?

Mike Whitney
Dollar in the Dustbin

Linn Washington, Jr.
An Epidemic of Brutality: Oakland Filmmaker Feels Police Wrath

Rannie Amiri
STL = Sandbag the Lebanese

Ramzy Baroud
The Middle East's Stagnant "Change"

Larry Portis
Chou Sar? What Happened in Lebanon?

Gary Leupp
The Yemeni Toner Cartridge Bomb Story

William Loren Katz
Are Cruel Years Coming to a Neighborhood Near You?

Brian Cloughley
Spheres of Influence

Mark Weisbrot
The Fatal Mistake

Rubén M. Lo Vuolo, Daniel Raventós / Pablo Yanes
Basic Income in Times of Economic Crisis

Joseph Nevins
Ecological Privilege and the Frequent Flyer Activist

Neve Gordon
Thought Crimes

Alan Farago
The Bhopal Economy

Stewart J. Lawrence
Immigration Policy After the Midterm Elections

James R. King
The Other Side of Yemen

Ron Jacobs
How Ken Kesey Turned On America

Franklin Lamb
Israel Claims Victory in US Midterm Elections

James McEnteer
Beyond the Rational: the Alamo Election

Richard Phelps
Guy Fawkes and the Pressure of a Terrorism Spotlight

Saul Landau
Where's the Sanity Clause?

David Ker Thomson The Long Argument

Evelyn Pringle
The Vaccination Profiteers

Joseph G. Ramsey Until Pigs Fly: the Morning After With Michael Moore

Stanley Heller
Up Yours, John Stewart

Missy Beattie
The Big Universe

Harvey Wasserman
Vermont's Great Green Election Day Victory

Billy Wharton
Where Did Everybody Go?

Shamus Cooke
Democrats Run to the Right

Linh Dinh
War Games: Guns and Balls

Windy Cooler
Rallying Through This

Charles R. Larson
Witnesses of Haiti's History
: Edwidge Danticat's "Create Dangerously"

Phyllis Pollack
Keith Richards' Demon Life

David Yearsley
Bach and the Music of Time

Website of the Weekend
Smearing Jean-Luc Godard as an "Anti-Semite"

November 4, 2010

Doug Peacock
Desert Solitaire, Revisited

Andrew Cockburn
Why Summers Goes and Geithner Stays

Iain Boal
Crisis at Pacifica: the Two-Percent Putsch

Paul Craig Roberts
The Impotence of Elections

Chase Madar
Guantánamo: Exception or Rule?

Dave Lindorff
Take That You Smug Bastards!

Russell Mokhiber
Bought and Paid For

Laura Flanders
Lessons From Elizabeth Warren

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Moyers: the Howard Zinn Lecture

November 3, 2010

Alexander Cockburn
America the Clueless

Franklin C. Spinney
Democratic Debacle

Chris Floyd Dissatisfied Mind: Flickers of Hope in a Deadly Political Cycle

William Blum
Jon Stewart and the Left

Sheldon Richman
Provoking Yemeni Terrorism

Stephen Soldz
Fleecing Members, Colluding in Torture

Mark Weisbrot
Dilma's Victory in Brazil

Stewart J. Lawrence
Court Sends Mixed Signals on Arizona Immigration Law

Manuel Garcia, Jr. Election Night in Oakland

Norman Solomon
Now What?

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Save Our Social Security

November 2, 2010

Vincent Navarro
What's Happening in Europe?

Ishmael Reed
Brown Shirts, Black Shirts, T-Shirts

Uri Avnery
The Occupation and Political Corruption in Israel

Mark Driscoll
When the Pentagon "Kill Machines" Came to an Okinawan Paradise

Mike Whitney
Midterm Day of Reckoning: "Let the Landslide Begin"

Linh Dinh
Prone Pioneers: Punishing the Desperate for Being Desperate

David Macaray
Bring Back the Fifties! America's Most Misunderstood Decade

Randall Amster Wikilessons: War is a Joke, But It Isn't Funny

Betsy Ross
How the Banks Trumped Keynes

Yves Engler
A Sad Spectacle: Canada and the Jewish National Fund

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Gulf Oil Toxic to Humans

 

November 1, 2010

Ted Honderich
The Farce of Fairness

Steven Higgs
Don't Act Don't Sell: Why Liberals Will Get What They Deserve on Election Day

John Ross
A Ding-Dong Year for Death in Mexico

Dean Baker
A Darkening Future: Why Growth Still Feels Like a Recession

Ralph Nader
When Corporations are the Government

Justin E. H. Smith
The People Without History

Marjorie Cohn
Hyping Fear

Scott Boehm
Juan Williams and Katrina

Brian Tierney
The Struggle of DC's Nurses

Trish Kahle
Jon Stewart, Are You Really That Sane?

Martha Rosenberg Bathrobe Erectus: Feting Hugh Hefner

Website of the Day
Scary New Wage Data

 

 

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Weekend Edition
January 21 - 23, 2011

The Global Food Crisis

The Time Has Come to Do Something

By FIDEL CASTRO

I shall relate a bit of history.

When the Spanish “discovered” us five hundred years ago, the estimated population on the Island was no more than 200,000 inhabitants who were living in harmony with nature.  Their main sources of food came from the rivers, lakes and seas rich in protein; they were also carrying out a rudimentary form of agriculture that supplied them with calories, vitamins, mineral salts and fibre.

In some regions of Cuba they still have the custom of making “casabe”, a kind of bread made from casaba.  Certain fruits and small wild animals rounded off their diets. They used to concoct a beverage with fermented products and they brought to world culture the rather unhealthy habit of smoking.

The current population of Cuba is possibly 60 times greater than the one existing then.  Although the Spanish mixed with the native population, they practically exterminated them by making them work in the fields as semi-slaves and by the search for gold in the river sands. 

The native population was replaced by the importing of Africans captured by force and enslaved, a cruel practice that was applied during centuries.

Of great importance for our existence were the eating habits that were created.  We were turned into consumers of pork, beef, lamb, milk, cheese and other by-products; wheat, oats, barley, chickpeas, kidney beans, peas and other legumes coming from different climates.

Originally we had corn and sugar cane was introduced among the calorie-rich plants.

Coffee was brought in by the conquistadors from Africa; cacao was possibly brought from Mexico.  Both of these, along with sugar, tobacco and other tropical products became enormous sources of resources for the metropolis after the slave rebellion in Haiti that occurred at the beginning of the nineteenth century.

The slave-based production system lasted in fact until the transfer of Cuban sovereignty by Spanish colonialism to the United States, in a bloody and extraordinary war where Spain had been defeated by the Cubans.

When the Revolution triumphed in 1959, our island was a true Yankee colony.  The United States had duped and disarmed our Liberation Army.  One couldn’t speak of developed agriculture, but of immense plantations exploited on the base of manual and animal labour that in general used neither fertilizers nor machinery.  The great sugar mills belonged to the Americans.  Several of them had more than one hundred thousand hectares; others were tens of thousands of hectares in size.  All together there were more than 150 sugar mills, including those belonging to Cubans; they were working less than four months a year.

The US received Cuban sugar during two great world wars, and had conceded a sales quota on its markets to our country, tied in with commercial commitments and limitations on our agricultural production, despite the fact that sugar was in part produced by them.  Other decisive branches of the economy such as the ports and the oil refineries were American property.  Their companies possessed huge ships, industrial centres, mines, docks, maritime and rail lines along with public services as vital as the electric and telephone systems.  

For those who want to understand, that’s all you need.

In spite of the fact that the necessities of rice, corn, fats, grains and other food production were important, the United States was imposing determinate limits on everything that was in competition with its own domestic production, including the subsidized sugar beet. 

Of course, in terms of food production it is a real fact that within the geographical limits of a small, rainy and hurricane-beset tropical country bereft of machinery, dams, irrigation systems and adequate equipment, Cuba could not have the resources, nor did it have the conditions to compete with the American mechanized productions of soy, sunflower, corn, legumes and rice.  Some of these, such as wheat and barley could not be grown in our country. 

It is a fact that the Cuban Revolution has not enjoyed a moment of peace.  The Agrarian Reform had barely been passed, before the five-month mark of the revolutionary triumph had been reached and the programs of sabotage, fires, obstruction and the use of harmful chemical measures were begun against our country.  These even came to include pests to attack vital productions and even human health.

By underestimating our people and their decision to fight for their rights and their independence, they committed an error. 

Of course, none of us at that time possessed the experience collected during many years; we were taking off from fair ideas and a revolutionary conception.  Perhaps the main error of idealism that was committed, was to think that in the world there was a determinate amount of justice and respect for the rights of peoples when, certainly, it didn’t exist at all.  Nevertheless, the decision to fight wouldn’t depend on this.

The first task taking up our efforts was to prepare for the struggle that was coming up. 

Experience acquired in the heroic battle against Batista’s tyranny showed that the enemy, no matter what his strength, could not defeat the Cuban people.

The country’s preparation for the struggle turned into the people’s main effort, and it took us to episodes that were as decisive as the battle against the mercenary invasion promoted by the United States in April of 1961, the landing at the Bay of Pigs escorted by the US Marines and Yankee planes. 

Unable to resign themselves to the independence and exercise of the sovereign rights of Cuba, the government of that country adopted the decision to invade our territory.  The USSR had absolutely nothing to do with the triumph of the Cuban Revolution.  The Revolution did not assume a socialist nature because of support from the USSR; it was the other way around: support from the USSR was produced by the socialist nature of the Cuban Revolution.  To such a degree, that when the USSR disappears, Cuba keeps on being socialist.

By some means, the USSR learned that Kennedy would try to use Cuba with the same method that they had applied in Hungary.  That led to the errors committed by Khrushchev in regards to the October Crisis that I saw the need to criticize.  But it was not only Khrushchev who made a mistake, so did Kennedy.  Cuba had nothing to do with the history of Hungary, and the USSR had nothing to do with the Revolution in Cuba.  This was the sole and exclusive fruit of the struggle of our people.  Khrushchev merely made the brotherly gesture of sending weapons to Cuba when it was being threatened by the invasion that was organized, trained, armed and transported by the United States.  Without the weapons sent to Cuba, our people would have defeated the mercenary forces as it had defeated Batista’s army and occupied all the military equipment it possessed: 100,000 weapons.  If the direct invasion of the United States against Cuba had occurred, our people would have been fighting right up to the present time against its soldiers, who would surely have had to fight against millions of Latin Americans.  The US had committed the greatest mistake in all its history and perhaps the USSR would still be in existence today.

Hours prior to the invasion, after the cunning attack on our air force bases by US planes painted with Cuban insignia, the socialist nature of our Revolution was declared.  The Cuban people fought for socialism in that battle that passed into history as the first victory against imperialism in the Americas.

Ten US presidents have come and gone, the eleventh is now passing through and the Socialist Revolution is standing firm.  Also coming and going were all the governments that were accomplices to the crimes of the United States against Cuba, and our Revolution is standing firm.  The USSR has disappeared and the Revolution moved forward.  It didn’t take place with the permission of the United States; instead it is being submitted to a cruel and merciless blockade; with terrorist acts that took the lives or injured thousands of people, whose authors today enjoy total impunity; anti-terrorist Cuban fighters are condemned to life sentences; a so-called Cuban Adjustment Act concedes entry, residence and employment in the United States.  Cuba is the only country in the world whose citizens have that privilege, one that is denied to Haitians after the earthquake that killed more than 300,000 persons and the rest of the citizens in the hemisphere, those being persecuted and expelled by the empire. Nevertheless, the Cuban Revolution stands firm.

Cuba is the only country on the planet that cannot be visited by US citizens; but Cuba exists and stands firm, only 90 miles away from the United States, fighting its heroic fight. 

We, the Cuban revolutionaries, have committed errors, and we shall go on making mistakes, but never shall we make the mistake of being traitors.

Never have we chosen illegality, lies, demogoguery, duping the people, pretence, hypocrisy, opportunism, bribery, the total lack of ethics, abuses of power, including crime and repugnant tortures which, with obvious albeit doubtlessly worthy exceptions, have characterized the conduct of the presidents of the United States.

At this moment, humankind is facing serious problems without precedent. The worst is that to a large degree the solutions shall depend upon the richest and most developed countries, the countries that shall reach a situation which they are really in no condition to face unless the world they have been trying to mould for their egoistic interests crumbles around them and which inevitably leads to disaster.

I am not speaking about wars, whose risks and consequences have been transmitted by wise and brilliant people, including many Americans.

I am referring to the food crisis originating in the economic facts and the climatic changes that are apparently now irreversible as a consequence of the actions of man, but which, at any rate, human minds are under the obligation to face in a hurry.  For years, which was really time lost, the matter was being talked about.  But the country which emits the greatest amount of polluting gases in the world, the United States, was regularly ignoring world opinion.  Leaving protocol and the other customary stupidities of the men of state in consumer societies to one side, things that the influence of the media usually bewildered them with once they came into power, the reality is that they didn’t pay any attention to the matter.  An alcoholic, whose problems were widely known, and I don’t need to name him, imposed his line of thinking upon the international community.

The problems have suddenly taken shape now, through the phenomena that are being repeated on every continent: heat waves, forest fires, losses of harvests in Russia, with many victims; climate changes in China, excessive rainfalls or droughts, progressive losses of water reserves in the Himalayas threatening India, China, Pakistan and other countries; excessive rainfall in Australia that have flooded almost a million square kilometres; unusually harsh and unseasonable cold waves in Europe that have considerable impact on agriculture; droughts in Canada; unusual cold waves there and in the US; unprecedented rain in Colombia affecting millions of farming land; never-before seen rainfall in Venezuela; catastrophes caused by excessive rain in the great cities of Brazil and droughts in the South.  There is practically no region in the world where such events have not taken place.

Productions of wheat, soya, corn, rice and other numerous grains and legumes that make up the food base of the world – whose population today according to calculations totals almost 6.9 billion inhabitants, now coming close to the new figure of 7billion, and where more than one billion are suffering from hunger and malnutrition – are being seriously affected by climate changes, creating a very serious problem in the world.  When reserves have not been totally recovered or just partially in some items, a serious threat is now creating problems and destabilization in many States.

More than 80 countries, all of them in the Third World, already having difficult problems of their own, are being threatened with real famines.

I shall limit myself to quote these statements and reports, in a summary fashion, which have been published in the last few days:

“The UN is warning about the risk of a new food crisis.

“January 11, 2011 (AFP)”

“‘We are facing a very tense situation’…” FAO corroborates.

“Some 80 countries are facing a shortage of food...”

“The global rate of prices for basic agricultural products (grains, meat, sugar, oleaginous and dairy products) is currently at its highest level since FAO began to use that index rate 20 years ago.”

 “UNITED NATIONS, January (IPS),”

“The UN Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO), with headquarters in Rome, last week alerted that world prices for rice, wheat, sugar, barley and meat […] would undergo significant increases in 2011…”

“PARIS, January 10 (Reuters) - President Nicolas Sarkozy of France shall be taking his campaign to confront the high global food prices to Washington this week …”

“Basel (Switzerland), Janaury 10 (EFE).- The president of the Central European Bank (BCE), Jean Claude Trichet, spokesperson for the governors of the central banks of the Group of 10 (G-10), today cautioned about the strong rise in food prices and the inflationist threat in emerging economies.”

“The World Bank fears a crisis in the price of foods, January 15 (BBC)

“The president of the World Bank, Robert Zoellick, told the BBC that the crisis would be deeper than that of 2008.”

“MEXICO DF, January 7 (Reuters)”

“The annual rhythm of inflation for foods has increased threefold in Mexico in November as compared to two months ago...”

“Washington, January 18 (EFE)

“The climate change will aggravate the lack of foods, according to a study.”

“‘Since more than 20 years ago, scientists have been alerting about the impact of climate change, but nothing is changing other than the increase in emissions that cause global warning’, Liliana Hisas, executive director of the US affiliate of this organization told EFE.

“Osvaldo Canziani, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007 and scientific advisor for the report, indicated that ‘in the entire world meteorological episodes and extreme climatic conditions are being recorded, and increases in average surface temperatures are exacerbating the intensity of these episodes’.”

“(Reuters) January 18, Algeria is buying wheat to avoid shortages and unrest.

 “The State grain agency of Algeria has bought around 1 million tons of wheat in the last two weeks to avoid shortages in the case of unrest, a Ministry of Agriculture source informed Reuters.

“(Reuters) January 18, Wheat shows a strong gain in Chicago after Algerian purchases.”

“The Economist, January 18, 2011

“World alert due to food prices”

“Among the main causes are the floods and droughts caused by climatic changes, the use of foods to manufacture bio-fuels and speculation in commodities prices.”

The problems are dramatically serious.  However, all is not lost.

Current calculated wheat production reached almost 650 million tons. 

That of corn surpasses that amount and nears 770 million tons.   

Soy could come close to 260 million tons; of this the US calculates 92 million and Brazil 77 million.  They are the two greatest producers. 

The general data on grains and legumes available in 2011 are well-known. 

The first matter to be resolved by the world community would be to choose between foods and bio-fuels.  Brazil, a developing country, shall of course have to be compensated.

If the millions of tons of soy and corn being invested into bio-fuels are routed towards the production of foods, the unusual rise in prices would cease and the world`s scientists would be able to propose formulae that might in some way or other halt and even reverse the situation.

We have lost too much time.  The time has come to do something now.

 

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