Exclusively in the new print issue of CounterPunch
HOLLYWOOD AND THE CIA — Film historian Ed Rampell details Hollywood’s entangled relationship with the CIA and the Pentagon; HOUSES OF THE DEAD: Nancy Kurshan exposes the cruel human rights offenses taking place inside America’s vast gulag of Control Unit Prisons; BROTHERHOOD OF SUMMER: David Macaray charts the history of the most powerful union in the US: the Baseball Players Association; TAR SANDS COME TO AMERICA: Steve Horn explains how the Keystone Pipeline debates have diverted attention from Big Oil’s other plans to transport Alberta’s oil into the US. PLUS: Jeffrey St. Clair on CONSTITUTIONAL ENTROPY; Mike Whitney on HOW THE BANKS TARGETED BLACKS; Chris Floyd on THE RISE OF BRITAIN’S TEA PARTY; Kristin Kolb on THE NEEDLE AND THE DAMAGE DONE; Kim Nicolini on the FILMS OF WILLIAM FRIEDKIN; and Lee Ballinger on POETS VS. THE ONE PERCENT.
Archives from February 2003
Sometimes I think the televangelists are right. We are living in the End Times. Last night, I was invited to a reception at the United Nations in New York City to fete the release of an important book about how to use the UN human rights treaty body system. I set ...
About a month ago, I was asked to speak at an anti-war event in the People’s Republic of Brooklyn. I immediately put together some notes but the event was subsequently re-scheduled and I was no longer able to attend. In the hope of provoking more thought, I ...
I search for the language that is also yours– Almost all our language has been taxed by war. –Allen Ginsberg, from “Wichita Vortex Sutra” A patriot is one who wrestles for the soul of her country. –Adrienne Rich, ...
According to some estimates, Bush’s Iraq attack will cost each and every American $320. Now, for the Waltons and Gates and Buffetts, this isn’t a whole lot of scratch, but for most of us it’s a decent chunk of change. For instance, I need a new c...
Forget about the smoke and fog spewed by corporate media and chattering consultants of all colors. Let us begin with a stark forecast: The Democratic Party primaries must result in a national ticket that is fit for Black participation. If the party cannot loosen t...
Who’s the hack? I nominate The New Yorker’s Jeffrey Goldberg. He’s the new Remington, though without the artistic talent. Back in 1898, William Randolph Hearst was trying to fan war fever between the United States and Spain. He dispatched a repor...
“On the day they were going to kill him, Santiago Nasar got up at five-thirty in the morning to wait for the boat the bishop was coming on.” This is how it begins. From the very first page, from the very first sentence,...
As a leftist, I’m getting just a bit weary of hearing how much I “hate America.” Ever since the big you-know what in late 2001, that little zinger has been the comeback of choice for any objections to US foreign policy. Don’t like our new w...
In 1848, Napoleon Bonaparte’s nephew, Louis Philippe, was elected to the French presidency. A few years later he staged a coup against his own government, setting up a military dictatorship. In two analytical pamphlets written soon after these world-historic...
I’ve said it myself many times. I need a break from this awful business I can’t watch any more news about Iraq or Palestine. I’m dreading this bloody war and want an escape. Spare me the euphemisms and lies, the blas? manner with which our leader...
Every once in a while, stories appear about “Castro’s” biological weapons, as in “Castro Weaponizes West Nile Virus”(by Martin Arostegui, Insightmag posted September 16, 2002. The term “Castro” is used in this literature i...
On September 11, 2001, when the nineteen Arab hijackers from Al-Qaida struck the most visible icons of America’s military and financial power–the Pentagon and the Twin Towers–there were more than a few pundits who concluded with some satisfactio...
George W. Bush has chosen a course to divide the country. Even before 9/11, he pitted Americans against each other as at no other time since the 1960s. After 9/11 the polarization became dramatic: pro and anti war groupings, environmentalists and polluters, worker...
1000s Dead in Fire Following American Attack BAGHDAD, IRAQ,2003. A raging fire ignited by a barrage of military pyrotechnics ripped through the city here late at night, leaving at least 15,000 people dead and tens of thousands more injured. The inferno in ...
US attitudes towards Iraq, both pro-war and anti-war, suffer from a distressing lack of hysteria about an event of vastly underestimated importance. The event was called 9-11. 9-11 didn’t just challenge America’s hegemony; it challenged its sove...
Edward Rosenthal was prosecuted for growing and distributing medical marijuana in compliance with the California Compassionate Use Act. At his Federal trial, District Court Judge Charles Breyer refused to let the jury learn that Rosenthal was growing marijuana for...
Jeffrey St. clair, the co-editor of Counterpunch, asked me to write a short piece on the incredible reaction to my recent article on Columbia. This short little observation tapped a groundswell of emotion. I received 75 emails almo...
When interim President Bush traveled to Europe in May of 2001, he didn’t realize people spoke gibberish in many of the European countries. This led to some embarrassing moments, such as when he upbraided a reporter for asking the French President, Jacques Ch...
The Grammy Award’s selectors overlooked the American Petroleum Institute’s (API) hit children’s recording titled Energy and Me by Bill B (Bill Brennan). With its accompanying dance video, API describes the project as one that “integrates mu...
DOMESTIC AND INTERNATIONAL LAW As the United States government under George Bush gets closer to attacking the people of Iraq, there are several things that the men and women of the U.S. armed forces need to know and bear in mind as they are given orders fro...
Never before in the history of the United States presidency has a think tank had such an impact on shaping U.S. foreign policy as the Project for the New American Century has on helping President George W. Bush set foreign policy goals for his Administration, par...
Without even watching the news (our satellite dishes were buried in the snow 48 hours ago) we can imagine that newspapers and TV stations around the world are running pictures of a snowy Jerusalem and Ramallah. Pastoral pictures of a snow covered Dome of the Rock ...
photos by JOANNE MARINER “I was maced in the left eye and face by a police officer at 53rd Street and Third Avenue. We were forced by the police to march into a cul-de-sac, and the weight of the people behind us pressed the crowd against ...
The first shots of the US-Iraq war were fired on February 26. Instead of using precision guided munitions or Scuds, the primary combatants–George W. Bush and Saddam Hussein–used the medium of television to lob the first propaganda rounds. Bush ...
While we live out our lives as students, staff, therapists and faculty, engaged in the activity that most interests and excites us, the United States is hurtling furiously toward war in the Middle-East. All the engines of government are harnessed to the goal of es...