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 2003
The basic plot of the epic, the Mahabharata, is known to every Indian child. The theme is of greed, ambition, revenge, chicanery — on and off the battlefield, and a final faceoff between good and bad on the sacred land river plains of Northern India, home to...
You think the Americans don’t know what they’re doing in Iraq? They know all too well. Check out, for example, Captain Christopher Cirino of the 82nd Airborne, who told an English journalist in Fallujah a few weeks ago: "The men we are bein...
In keeping with internal bovine lore Saddam will be contained and stymied, denying weapons of DNA disinformation might be used to extract the honey –What is your name? (Buzzz) –Ah-yee!! –Where do you come from? (Buzzz) –Ah-yeee!!...
An odious leader, discredited even before capture, is gradually restored to health and strength while awaiting trial for war crimes. Finally in court, he conducts a vigorous defense and thus retrieves some dignity before his inevitable conviction and condemnation....
The "capture" of Saddam Hussein is being hailed as a great victory for President Bush. After all, who needs to worry about the missing weapons of mass destruction or the lack of ties between Hussein and the perpetrators of the Sept. 11 attacks, now that ...
Al-Dwar, Iraq. There was a kind of satisfaction, lying inside Saddam’s last hole in the earth. Seven months ago, I sat on his red velvet presidential throne in the greatest of all his marble palaces. And so there I was yesterday, lowering myself into the damp...
Why was Asma Abu al-Haija arrested? Why did she have to spend nine months in prison, sleeping on the floor of her cell? Why was a woman arrested, not interrogated, not accused of anything and then released nine very difficult months later, without any explanation? Just be...
My first contact with Matt Gonzalez came when I received congratulations in the form of a hand written note from him when I won my first election in July of 2001. I’m embarrassed to say that even though I should have I didn’t reply so that when I met h...
Howard Dean, like most Democrats, has plenty of faults. From his ugly death penalty posture to his Israel fetish, Dean is surely far from ideal. But the governor’s latest comments regarding the US capture of the bearded Saddam have been right on the mark....
Saddam Hussein’s capture and the hope he will be held accountable for crimes against the people of Iraq and neighboring states is welcome news, no matter what one’s position on the U.S. invasion of Iraq. But this doesn’t vindicate the U.S....
My first reaction to the capture of Saddam Hussein was both anger and disgust. Anger with the old dictator who could not even die honourably. He preferred to be captured by his old friends than to go down fighting, the one decent thing he could have done for his c...
Was this really the man with whom I shook hands almost a quarter of a century ago? I’ve spent 24 hours looking again and again at those videotapes. The more I look, the more Saddam turns into a wild animal. An American interviewed by the Associated Press sai...
The capture of Saddam Hussein poses some interesting dilemmas, not just for the Bush administration, but for Democratic presidential candidates, the Democratic congressional delegation, and for ordinary Iraqis. For Bush, the dilemma will be how to deal with...
Few Americans have heard of Katharine Gun, a former British intelligence employee facing charges that she violated the Official Secrets Act. So far, the American press has ignored her. But the case raises profound questions about democracy and the public’s r...
For Saddam Hussein his capture is the moment of supreme humiliation. He has always portrayed himself as the Arab hero who would fight to the last bullet and die surrounded by the bodies of his enemies. Instead he has fallen alive into the hands of US troops after ...
In her book Race Against Empire, Penny M. Von Eschen showed how during the Cold War Black anti-colonialism was smashed through the judicious use of reward as a carrot to compliant Black leaders who dropped their critique of colonialism, and McCarthyite intimidatio...
(An excerpt from LARRY EVEREST’s new book Oil, Power and Empire.) World oil markets have become increasingly tight and volatile, and this has become a major potential problem. Several trends are responsible: global supplies have not been growing as f...
The Bush Administration has become notorious for hiding information–even ceasing to collect it. Now that policy of obsessive secrecy is being applied to the so-called war on terror. The latest effort to bury bad news comes from the puppet Iraqi "...
It is wide open now. Israelis are training Americans at Fort Bragg on their well tested techniques for carrying out targeted–and of course extrajudicial–assassinations. Americans in Iraq are copying this and all the other wretchedly cruel, unjust (and ...
In an article that I wrote for CounterPunch in early July 2003, I discussed the events leading to the June 19 report on Iran’s nuclear activities prepared by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). The report, as ...
The benefits of breastfeeding are widely acknowledged, but few people see this as relevant to anyone but the parents of babies. In fact, there are advantages directly related to larger concerns, particularly food and the environment. Human breast milk is one of ou...
Saddam is caught store bought joy for Christmas Saddam In Action Figures gussied up in giant chains and celebrating Iraqis go chanting God Is Great Thank you Americans Death To Americans God damn you — get out...
The capture of Saddam Hussein has already brought about a great deal of gloating. But it is critically important to recall that this wicked tyrant of Iraq was a valued friend of the current occupiers of Iraq, particularly when he served his purpose and carried out...
Getting stabbed is like eating a live hog-nosed bat: it’s nasty, gruesome, and not worth doing twice. First thing, your clothes get ruined (I mean by stabbing, although I’m sure the bat would make a mess). Not just the garment transfixed by the offendi...
The mask came off this week. George "No More Beating Around The" Bush came right out and admitted it, on camera no less. American soldiers have died in Iraq, and are still dying, said the Commander-in-Chief, so that Halliburton, Bechtel and other corpora...