Pages: << 1 ... 1231 1232 1233 1234 1235 1236 1237 1238 1239 1240 1241 ... 1261 >>
Toothless: The Watchdog Press That Became the Government's Lapdog
Walter Brasch
PART 1
The president of the Associated Press (AP) was spewing venom at the Bush–Cheney administration for having turned the Department of Defense into a propaganda machine.
Americans “expect honest answers about what’s happening to their sons and daughters,” Tom Curley told journalism students and faculty at the University of Kansas. Listing innumerable ways the Pentagon had advocated Bush–Cheney political beliefs, Curley questioned if the United States should “be trying to influence public opinion through subterfuge, both here and abroad,”
Israel Sought 'Politicide' Through Gaza Attack
Saree Makdisi
In three weeks of incessant bombardment, Israel killed or injured more than 6,000 Palestinians in Gaza, most of them civilians, and a third of them children.
It pushed the territory it has militarily controlled for four decades (and for the welfare of whose population international law holds it legally accountable) even deeper into deliberately engineered, even fine-tuned, misery.
It wrecked much of what was left of Gaza's civilian infrastructure after months of siege and years of isolation from the outside world; it smashed thousands of family homes, schools, offices and mosques; it obliterated the personal property of tens of thousands of refugees -- many of whom have now lost two or three homes in succession to Israeli bombs.
Obama's 'War on Terror'
Stephen Lendman
The language is softened and deceptive. The strategy and tactics are not. The "war on terror" continues. Promised change is talk, not policy. Just look at Obama's "war cabinet," discussed in an earlier article. It assures:
-- the "strongest military on the planet" by outspending all other countries combined;
-- continued foreign wars;
-- possible new ones in prospect; on February 7, vice-president Joe Biden outlined continuity of the Bush administration's policy toward Iran, including "preventive" wars under the National Security Strategy; demands also that Iran abandon its legal nuclear program meaning nothing going forward will change;
-- permanent occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan is planned;
Triangulation or strangulation?
Eric Walberg
The new president is discovering that America ’s road to Kabul goes through Moscow.
As Obama prepares to transfer troops from Iraq to Afghanistan , Al-Qaeda and other jihadists are also “transferring” there according to Afghan Defence Minister General Abdul Rahim Wardak, giving the country the dubious distinction of remaining the centre of the “war on terror”. Throwing down the gauntlet to Obama, the Taliban successfully closed the Khyber Pass yet again last week by blowing up a bridge, torching 10 supply trucks for good measure. The Pakistan army responded by bombing an insurgent base, killing 52 suspected militants. The Taliban have killed nearly two dozen suspected US spies in recent months, all of them in the border region where American drone aircraft have carried out a series of missile strikes.
Yes We Can Waffle!
Edgar J. Steele
"If you don't know where you are going, you will wind up somewhere else." -- Yogi Berra
President Barack Obama held his first press conference last night. Thirteen questions from the press corps, albeit some of them compound. Thirteen chances to impress us with his promised transparency and forthrightness. Bottom line: We lost.
This guy quite simply does not know where he is going, though he does convey the self-confident aura of one who does know the road ahead. I like to think that Bush, at least, knew he was clueless. I'm not sure which is worse.
Requiring Accountability From Pampered Public Servants
Emily Spence
The taxpayers of Mississippi, whether they condoned the action or not, bought their current or a former governor an eight seat plane for 3.7 million dollars. The state's authorizing fiscal managers, obviously, must have deemed it an essential for his office and ratified its purchase order. In addition, it costs approximately $1,200 to operate for each hour in use for trips by the present governor's family, associates and himself.
Despite its advantages, he, nonetheless, has decided to possibly recommend its being auctioned off to generate some additional revenue for his state even though the resale value won't be all that high in light of the poor surrounding economic circumstances. However, he, apparently, doesn't feel too "put out" by the thought of giving it up since the state government owns two or three other planes for "official" use that he can commandeer any time that he would elect to do so for his various excursions. (The background information concerning this plane, including the possibility of its sale, was briefly discussed on a recent news program aired in Massachusetts.)
A Short History of the Israeli - Palestinian Conflict: Past Is Prologue
Stephen Lendman
Its roots are from the late 19th century when Theodor Herzl founded modern Zionism at the First Zionist Congress in Basle, Switzerland in 1897.
In his book "Overcoming Zionism," Joel Kovel writes:
Zionism seeks "the restoration of tribalism in the guise of a modern, highly militaralized and aggressive state. (It) cut Jews off from (their) history and led to a fateful identity of interests with antisemitism (becoming) the only thing that united them. (It) fell into the ways of imperialist expansion and militarism, and showed signs of the fascist malignancy."
Why Lee Harvey Oswald Had to Die!
Len Hart
Without a bullet that can be proven to have been at the scene of the crime, the government would have had no case against Lee Harvey Oswald, tried in absentia because he was murdered. Conveniently! The government needed a piece of hard evidence --a magic bullet'!
They got one! Conveniently!
The government needed a truly magical bullet that did magical things --the work of six or seven other bullets most which got beat up and misshapened, deformed in the line of duty. They got one!
Arlen Specter must be credited with ascribing magic properties to ordinary bullets that could smash bone and cartilage and emerge with nary a scratch! The government need a single bullet that could do the work of six or seven bullets! They got found one! Conveniently! Arlen Specter would pull a pull a 'magical theory' out of thin air while a friendly shill would pull an equally 'magic bullet' out of his ass.
Letter to Editor, CNN Money – Why Won't President Obama's Stimulus Work
Zahir Ebrahim
In reference to your article of January 13, 2009 'Bernanke: More bank bailouts needed', perhaps Dr. Bernanke, Ph.D. 1979 from my alma mater, has an altogether different agenda because he can't obviously be an imbecile. An expensive MIT education does not create crétins. It can however, create hectoring hegemons.
As Mr. Gerald Celente of Trends Research Institute recently observed to Alex Jones:
“We are going to go into a depression worse than the Great Depression, and here is why. There is a way to get out of this but not through fiscal or monetary stimulus”
Time for a National 'March on Wall Street' to Nationalize the Banks
Eric Sommer
The time has come for a nationwide U.S. "March on Wall Street'. This march should be organized on a nation-wide basis inside the U.S. by the broadest possible coalition of progressive political organizations, trade unions, anti-poverty, anti-racist, anti-foreclosure, and environmental groups.. It should bring people from throughout the U.S. to culminate in a gigantic rally in Wall Street in New York.
The march can be organized around seven or so simple and clear points, such as:
1. Nationalize the Banking system and ban the use of exotic financial instruments such as derivatives.
2. Use nationalization to create Banking 'of, by, and for the people'
3. Use nationalization to ramp up the economy towards full employment.
<< 1 ... 1231 1232 1233 1234 1235 1236 1237 1238 1239 1240 1241 ... 1261 >>
