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 July 2012
Are the Jews a nation? Can they hit a curveball breaking low and away? Major League Baseball (MLB) says yes to both. And Commissioner Bud Selig will prove it by allowing a team comprised solely of Jewish ballplayers to compete in the 2013 ...
Attitude, far from being “everything”, is simply an offshoot of the self-identity. People are constantly changing their self-identities, either to project the desired image or to gain personal growth. How do you perceive yourself? How much do you accept what other peo...
The porn industry must be throwing a fit right now. The adult book Fifty Shades of Grey has sold over twenty million copies in record time, and sales are still going strong. How did E.L. James, a first-time author who was a television executive, manage to pull of...
If you enjoyed the 1981 movie, Chariots of Fire, you’re going to love the stage version, recently opened in London—obviously with an eye for the summer Olympics. Remarkably, the new version (adapted by Mike Bartlett) stays close to the original film. I sa...
For Hamza Ali al-Khatib
by PELEG HELD
A thirteen-year old boy tortured and killed in Syria. He kept homing pigeons.
From my father’s roof I rise, circl...
Edward Said: Alexander the Brilliant
...
“He was a documented gang member,” say the Anaheim police of Manuel Diaz, a 25 year old unarmed man they shot dead around 4:00 pm Sunday. They shot him in the buttocks as he ran, and as he stooped to his knees in someone’s yard they followed up by a bullet to the ...
A few days after the announcement of Alexander Cockburn’s death from a cancer affliction, former U.S. Senator Larry Pressler (R-SD) told the Rapid City, South Dakota Journal that he had obtained a “huge libel settlement f...
I just stumbled across this headline: “McClatchy’s Washington Bureau Establishes No-Alter Quote Policy” (July 20). Sounds weird, no? Let me explain: I’m currently teaching my summer course “How to Read the New York Times.” Yes, it’s as fun as it sou...
“The flames are quickly approaching Yarmouk (as) someone is trying to drag the Palestinians into the fire,” reported Palestinian commentator Rashad Abu Shawar (as cited in Israeli Jerusalem Post, July 20).
Yarmouk is the largest Palestinian refugee cam...
The United States has more than 20 million people unemployed, underemployed or out of the workforce altogether because of a burst housing bubble. We also have more than 10 million homeowners who are underwater in their mortgages. And, we have tens of millions of people ap...
There was a reunion of sorts in South Africa last month.
A group of white-haired visitors, mostly Brits with a scattering of other nationalities, were gathered at the University of Johannesburg along with veteran leaders of the African National Congress, former und...
The battle over Eva Peron´s final resting place remains as uncertain as her political career was controversial.
Her mausoleum, ironically for a champion of the poor situated in an upmarket area of Buenos Aires, draws thousands of visitors daily. She is surrounded ...
The United States recently announced that Canada and Mexico will join negotiations for the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP)—a secretive U.S.-led multinational ...
Echoing the story of David vs. Goliath, janitors in Houston are on strike and taking on such corporate giants as JPMorgan, Chase and Exxon Mobile in an effort to pressure the janitorial companies they employ to agree to the workers’ modest demands. It is these big b...
Joseph “Jazz:” Hayden is a community activist from Harlem whose main goal was to expose the ...
Occupy the Dam!
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In a July 22nd speech marking the one month anniversary of the parliamentary coup that overthrow left-leaning Paraguayan President Fernando Lugo, the former leader denounced that a motivating interest among the coup-plotters was a sought-after deal between Paraguay and ...
Strange things are happening in the United States these days, and every day seems to bring additional scary news. The similarity to the erosion of civil liberties in Germany during the 1930s is a bit too close for comfort. Many will regard this statement as hyperbole, a...
Ever visit a major prison? The vast majority of Americans have not, despite our country having by far a higher incarceration rate per capita than China or Iran. Out of sight is out of mind.
Imagine the benefits of the average taxpayer touring a prison. The lucrativ...
It is a year now since all hell broke loose in Longview, Washington, an industrial town on the Columbia River, 45 miles downstream from Portland, Oregon. On Monday, July 11, 2011, more than 100 dock workers, including the leaders of Local 21, International Longshore and W...
In early July, the United States Navy moved a converted transport ship, USS Ponce, into the Persian Gulf to its temporary home off Bahrain’s waters. The Ponce is a floating forward base for military operations in the region. This ship, originally built in 1966 but now r...
It’s gradually emerged in recent months that the Food and Drug Administration not only spied on its employees, but did so on a massive scale — collecting tens of thousands of employee emails to one another, as well as to journalists, members of Congress and co...
These photographs were taken at the Village Voice in the late 70s. In every picture he is present and at the same time, you can almost hear him think. There is one talking with Marianne Partridge, who was the editor then. There is an editorial meeting when he ...
Libya seems well on its way to becoming the next Somalia, with much of the country already ruled by tribal/clan based armed militias. As was the case in Somalia, Libya is in the process of separation, with the eastern, oil rich, Cyrenica region having issued a de facto de...