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Today's
Stories
April 17, 2008
Robert Bryce
The
Ethanol Apologists
April 16, 2008
Bill Kauffman
The
Candidates from Nowhere
Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
Colonization and Massacres
Saul Landau
How to Leave Iraq
Peter Morici
McCain's Economic Plan: GOP Out of Ideas (But So are the Democrats)
Eric Toussaint /
Damien Millet
Bankers Saved, Human Rights Sacrificed
Jeff Ballinger
Inside Nike's Asian Sweatshops: Squeezed Vietnamese Workers Strike
Back
David Macaray
Union Strikes and Replacement Workers
Gary Leupp
Electoral Revolution in Nepal
Richard Morse
The Food Riots in Haiti
George Ciccariello-Maher
Einstein Turns in His Grave
Dave Lindorff
Letters from the Bitter Belt
Website of
the Day
Surviving Prozac
April 15, 2008
Ralph Nader
The
Politics of Distraction in an Age of Gotcha Capitalism
Uri Avnery
Manifest
Destiny and Israel
Brian Cloughley
Arrogant
Lies
David Price
Outrageous
Pre-Tour de France Ban
Joe Bageant
Bitter America: Media Shit Storms and Heartland Reality
Steve Early
The Purple Punch-Out in Dearborn
Mats Svensson
To Create Something from Nothing: the Making of a Palestinian
State
Michael Donnelly
Dead-Eye Hil and the Elitist
April Howard /
Benjamin Dangl
Dissecting the Politics of Paraguay's
Next President
Laray Polk
Let's Not Put the Torch in a Bubble
Charles Modiano
What Does a Woman Have to Do to Get on the Cover of Sports Illustrated?
Website of
the Day
The $3 Trillion Shopping Spree
April 14, 2008
Carl Finamore
Airline
Deregulation Makes a Hard Landing
Michael Hudson
A
Trillion Dollar Rescue for Wall Street Gamblers
M. Shahid Alam
Hizbullah's Big Win: Has Israel Finally Met Its Match?
Patrick Cockburn
A
Cleric, a Pol and a Warrior
Paul Craig Roberts
Petraeus Sets Up Iran
Joanne Mariner
Redition to Jordan: What Happens When the Gloves Come Off?
Martha Rosenberg
Suicide and Cymbalta
Dave Lindorff
The Bitterness Thing: Is Obama Channeling Nader
P. Sainath
Hot Messages to Sex Dancer Doom Condi's New Finnish Pal
John V. Whitbeck
On Hypocrisy Over Tibet: a Personal Reflection
Website of the Day
Spying on Environmental Groups
April 12 /
13, 2008
Alexander Cockburn
Olympic
Torch Toasts US Candidates
Patrick Cockburn
Warlord:
the Rise of Muqtada al-Sadr
Mike Whitney
Want to Save the Economy?
David Yearsley
Film Scores and Westerns: the Stealth Cavalry of Empire
Robert Fantina
Bush's Brand of Morality
Conn Hallinan
Another Defining Moment in Iraq
Bill Hatch
In Praise of Hippies and the Counter-Culture
Ramzy Baroud
The Basra Battles
George S. Hishmeh
Back to Square One
Ron Jacobs
The New New Left in Latin America
Nikolas Kozloff
Olympic Torch in Buenos Aires
Charles Thomson
The British Prime Minister and the Tate's Tin of Shit
Alexander Billet
The Disney-fication of CBGB
Missy Beattie
Huffing and Puffing to Failure
David Michael Green
America's Jones for War
Seth Sandronsky
Education Entrepreneurs
Prairie Miller
Meeting David Wilson
Jeffrey St.
Clair
Booked Up
Poets' Basement
Ko Un, Ibn Salma and Greaves
Website of
the Weekend
Americans United for Palestinian Human Rights
April 11, 2008
Nikolas Kozloff
The Clintons and Their Sordid
Colombia Advocacy
Wajahat Ali
Revenge of the Ghetto Nerd: an Exclusive Interview with Junot
Diaz
Sharon Smith
Let
Them Eat Ethanol!
Yigal Bronner
/ Neve Gordon
Digging for Trouble: the Politics of Archaeology in East Jerusalem
Alan Farago
Eating South Florida
Dave Lindorff
On Waking Sleeping Giants: Lessons for America from China
George Wuerthner
Money for Nothing? The Problems with the Conservation Reserve
Program
Christopher
Brauchli
Prostitutes Don't Do Funerals
Website of the Day
Animals Explain the Insurance Industry: a Health Care Video
April 10, 2008
Mathieu Vernerey
Tibet
for the Tibetans!
Elizabeth Schulte
Slavery
in the Fields
David Macaray
Labor
Unions Will Never Get a Fair Shake
Ashley Smith
The Rise of Muqtada al-Sadr
Peter Morici
Driving Up Debt and Dragging Down Growth
Jacob Hornberger
The Military's Distintegrating Family Life
Harold Austin
Snitch or Else: Prison Officials Threaten Gang Drop Outs
Website of the Day
Hillary: the Wal-Mart Videos
April 9, 2008
Paul Craig
Roberts
The
Fading American Economy
Winslow T.
Wheeler
Congressional
Theater: the Petraeus / Crocker Hearings
C. Hand
Why Dave Marash Left Al Jazeera
Paul Krassner
Sex and Violins
Paul Wolf
Colombian "Magnicidio" Remains a Mystery After 60 Years
Wajahat Ali
Alien Invasion!
Karyn Strickler
Lost in the Fumes: the Sierra Club Sells Out to Clorox
Dan La Botz
Confronting the Economic Crisis
Eric Walberg
The Shadow of Munich: Another NATO Flop
Robin Millenthal
Enough Already! Growth and the Tar Sands Economy
Website of the Day
Conservative
Nanny State
April 8, 2008
Mike Whitney
Should
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed be Set Free?
Nikolas Kozloff
Bush
Bullies Congress on Colombia Deal
Greg Moses
Migrant Detention in South Texas
Joshua Frank
The Other Military Draft
John Ross
Mexico City's Urban Tribes Go on the Warpath Against EMOS
Michael Donnelly
Hillary's Western Swing
John V. Walsh
Why Obama Lost Massachusetts
Jeff Nygaard
Health, Security and Mandates
Bill Piper
Last Shot for a Bush Legacy?
Sen. Russ Feingold
Legal Representation and the Death Penalty
Website of the Day
Catonsville 9, Forty Years Later
April 7, 2008
Ishmael Reed
The
Irish Black Thing
Harry Browne
Irish
Peace Activist Acquitted; Deported
Uri Avnery
Tibet and Palestine
Lenni Brenner
Obama's Constitution, His Pastor and His Unbelieving Mom in Heaven
Ayesha Ijaz Khan
America Must Respect Pakistan's Democracy
Robert Fisk
Fearful Lives in the Land of the Free
Edwin Krales
Ensuring the Success of Fascism in Spain: the US Corporate Role
Chris Genovali
Vancouver Island's Dwindling Ancient Forests
Website of the Day
LA Artists Against War
April 5 / 6,
2008
Alexander Cockburn
Did
the Elites Want MLK Dead?
Ramzy Baroud
There
are No Checkpoints in Heaven
Ralph Nader
Runaway Bailouts
David Yearsley
How Scott Joplin Had Wall Street Down
Saul Landau
Sex Politics in America
Paul Craig
Roberts
The Petraeus and Crocker Show
Lawrence Korb / Ian Moss
Rev. Jeremiah Wright, a True Patriot
Seth Sandronsky
Meet America's Promise Alliance: Colin Powell's New Gig
John Ross
La Cumbia de la Doctrina Bush: Colombia Kills Four Mexican Students
in Ecuador Bombing
Robert Fantina
McCain, Republicans and Family Values
David Michael Green
Back to Disaster: Hoover at Home, Tet Abroad
Missy Beattie
McCan't
Patrick Bond
Vultures Circle Zimbabwe
Dr. Susan Block
The New American Pot Dealers
Phyllis Pollack
The Stones Meet the Press
Adam Engel
The Boobus in the Lie
Jeffrey St. Clair
Booked Up
Poets' Basement
Diamand
and St. Clair
Website of the Weekend
Richard Pryor Goes to the Gun Shop
April 4, 2008
Dave Lindorff
The
Night I Heard King Had Been Shot
Greg Moses
Missing
King
Ron Jacobs
Two Murders, 40 Years On: Bobby Hutton and Martin Luther King,
Jr.
Alan Farago
Show Me the Size of Your Bail Out and I'll Show You Mine
Alison Weir
Funding
Our Decline: U.S. Aid to Israel
David Rosen
Rape as an Instrument of Total War
Robert Weissman
The Unrealized Dream
Jacob Hornberger
Was Killing Iraqi Children Worth It?
Jackie Corr
Hillary and Obama Head for Butte
Carl Finamore
Taking On United Airlines
Laray Polk
We Are All Dith Pran
Susie Day
Advice for the War-Torn
Website of
the Day
Winter Soldiers: a Video Portrait
April 3, 2008
Peter Morici
The Deepening Recession
Joe Bageant
The Audacity of Depression
Andy Worthington
Cleared But Still Detained:
The Ordeal of Moroccan Prisoner Said al-Boujaadia
Nikolas Kozloff
Condi's Divide and Rule Strategy in South America
Rannie Amiri
The U.S. Disdain for Mideast Democracy
David Macaray
More Labor Strife in Hollywood
Stephen Lendman
Lynne Stewart's Long Struggle for Justice
Website of
the Day
The
True Face of Da Vinci?
April 2, 2008
Diane Farsetta
Indian
Point on the Potomac
Harry Browne
Bertie
Ahern Laid Low by Secretary
Wajahat Ali
The Folly of Attacking Iran: a Conversation with Steven Kinzer
George Wuerthner
Open Season on Wolves
Col. Dan Smith
The
Militarization of America
Philippe Marlière
The Politics of Bling-Bling in France: Sarkozy's Cultivated Anti-Intellectualism
Steve Early
A Purple Uprising in Oakland
Bernard Chazelle
Saving the American Left
Reza Fiyouzat
Bowling in Hell
April 1, 2008
Jeff Leys
Fracturing
the Peace to End the War
Thomas P. Healy
Restoring the Constitution: a Conversation with Daniel Ellsberg
Winslow T. Wheeler
When Pigs Sprout Wings: Mangled Rationales for a Fatter Defense
Budget
Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
New Deal Nostalgia
Patrick Irelan
Cocaine, Colombia and the Cartels
Andy Worthington
The Case of Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani
John V. Walsh
The Shunning of Ralph Nader
Michael J.
Smith
Woolly Mamet
Robert Weissman
The New Philip Morris--Even Worse Than the Old?
Dave Lindorff
Bush's Defining Moments
Martha Rosenberg
Brain Mist Disease: Boss Hog's Gift to Humanity
Website of
the Day
Support Briana!
March 31, 2008
Mike Whitney
Dead
on Arrival: Paulson's Fixit Plan for Wall Street
Mats Svensson
Walls,
Tunnels and Daily Humiliations
Paul Rockwell
Hillary's
Lies About Outsourcing
Paul Craig Roberts
A Third American War in the Making?
Patrick Cockburn
Sadr
Calls for Ceasefire
Peter Dale Scott
The Showdown
Alfredo Molano
Cultura Mafiosa in Colombia
Peter Morici
Why Paulson's Reform Plan Falls Short
Uri Avnery
Day of the Land, 32 Years Later
Michael Simmons
The American Bard in New Orleans
Betsy Roberts
/ Karen Orr
The Clorox Coup
Phyllis Pollack
First the Sun and Then the Moon: Scorsese Does the Stones
Website of
the Day
Five Years Too Many
March 29 / 30, 2008
Alexander Cockburn
When
They Pick Up the Phone at 3 AM, What Will They Say?
Patrick Cockburn
Iraqi
Police Refuse to Back Maliki's Attacks on Medhi Army
Mike Whitney
Bernanke's Next Big Bail Out Plan
Christopher Brauchli
The Pastor of Armageddon and the Slave Sale: McCain, Lieberman
and Rev. Hagee
William Blum
China, Tibet and the Propaganda Olympics
Robert Fantina
Iraq
Troika: McCain, Obama and Clinton
John Ross
AMLO, the Comeback Kid? Fighting the Privatization of Mexico's
Oil
Allison Kilkenny
Shady Lending Hits Home
Nelson P. Valdés
Cuba, the Beatles and Historical Context
Suzanne Baroud
The Great Lake of Gaza: a New Crisis in the Making
Richard Rhames
Social Security: Throwing Granny from the Gravy Train
Christopher Fons
Transcending the 60s? Obama and the Baby Boomers
Carl Finamore
Misery at 35,000 Feet: Mergers Stall, Fares Soar, Services Slump
and Consumers Sour
Eamonn McCann
Hillary Misremembers Again!
Missy Beattie
Justice and the Monsters of War
Fred Gardner
Jim Thorpe, All-American
Kim Nicolini
Cock Chuggers and Cheese Curls: Richard Kelly's "Southland
Tales"
David Yearsley
"All the World's a Hospital"
Jeffrey St.
Clair
Booked Up
Poets' Basement
Valentine and Ko Un
Website of
the Weekend
Hidden Iraq
March 28, 2008
Saul Landau
Growing
Dread About Iraq
Alan Farago
Other People's Money: the Chop Shop Economy
Peter Morici
Knocking Down False Economic Gods
Andy Worthington
Plight of the Uyghus: a Chinese Muslim's Desperate Plea from
Guantánamo
Felice Pace
Ashes of Lies: Why No One Trusts the US Forest Service
Peter Montague
Sierra Club Cleans House -- With Clorox!
Dave Lindorff
The Mumia Exception
March 27, 2008
Patrick Cockburn
Basra
Erupts
Binoy Kampmark
Free Market Apostates
Joanne Mariner
"Was George Washington a Terrorist?"
Norman Solomon
NPR News: National Pentagon Radio?
William S. Lind
Mars Only Knocks Once: a Prognosis for Iraq
John V. Walsh
Obama's Speech: a Touch of Bigotry?
Robert Weissman
How Things Work
Ron Jacobs
Meeting Charlie Ehlen
Ralph Nader
Put Impeachment Back on the Table
David Macaray
Court Rules Against Grocery Workers
John Borowski
Clearcutting the History of Forest Destruction
Website of
the Day
Going Out for an English
March 26, 2008
Stan Cox
The
Germs Next Door
Sharon Smith
Greed
Pays: Welfare on Wall Street
Anita Sinha / Jill Tauber
Dreams Turned into Rubble in New Orleans
Matt Vidal
So Much for the Self-Regulating Market
William S. Lind
Operation Cassandra
Joe Mowrey
The Audacity of Hypocrisy: Obama's Pandering to Israel
Dave Lindorff
Duck and Cover (Up): Hillary Under Fire
Ray McGovern
Frontline's War: Too Timid, Too Little, Too Late
Justin Smith
Why Race and Gender are Separate Issues
Sam Husseini
The Winter Soldier Hearings and Indy Media
Martha Rosenberg
Blood on Ice: Gentlemen, Pick Up Your Clubs
Michael Dickinson
Politicians as Dogs
Website of the Day
The Wal-Mart Virus: How the Infection Spread
March 25, 2008
Ishmael Reed
The
Crazy Rev. Wright
Corey D. B.
Walker
The Politics of Jeremiah Wright
Linn Washington Jr.
Racism in America and Other Uncomfortable Facts
Alan Farago
The Money Launderers: a Picnic for Wall St. Insiders
Vijay Prashad
A Glimmer of Hope From the Gulf Coast
Joshua Frank
A Silver Lining to the Bush Years?
Ralph Nader
How Public Servants Can Help End This War
David Rovics
If I Can't Dance: Why is the Left So Boring?
Peter Morici
America's Banks are Broken
Dave Zirin
Olympic Flames: China's Crackdown in Tibet
David Krieger
The Crisis in Tibet
Website of
the Day
Memorializing Iraq
March 24, 2008
Jeffrey St.
Clair
Blonde
Ambition: Hillary's Berserker Campaign for 2012
Peter Morici
Digging Out of the Recession
Uri Avnery
Two Americas
Wajahat Ali
First of the Mohicans: an Interview with Rep. Keith Ellison
Paul Craig Roberts
Inside the Shell Game
George Ciccariello-Maher
The Coming War on Venezuela
Stephen Lendman
Sami Al-Arian's Long Ordeal
Christopher
Brauchli
Possessing Someone Else's Country
Cat Woods
A Letter to Mom on Obama
Stacey Warde
Tax Burden
Dave Lindorff
The American Dead Hits 4,000, But Who's Counting?
Website of
the Day
Live from the Longest Walk
March 22 /
23, 2008
Ralph Nader
Bush
Blisters the Truth on Iraq
Nicole Colson
Can You Afford to Feed Your Family?
James Petras
The Cost of Unilateral Humanitarian Initiatives
Laura Carlsen
From Bombs to Markets: The Andean Crisis and the Geopolitics
of Trade
Greg Moses
Tolerance and the American Pulpit
Andy Worthington
Torture Stories Dog Guantánamo Trials
Michael Dickinson
Art on Trial
John Ross
Bush's Surge Hits Mosul
Missy Comley Beattie
Killer Economics
David Michael
Green
Happy Anniversary, America!
Ramzy Baroud
The Coming Uncertain War on Iran
Martha Rosenberg
Easter Egg Shells from Hell
Paul Watson
Evolution is Going to the Dogs in the Galapagos
Isabella Kenfield
Monsanto's
Raid on Brazil
James Murren
Logging v. Water in Honduras
Jacob Hornberger
Sex and the Immigration Officer
Kathlyn Stone
Ben Heine, Master of the Art of Resistance
Seth Sandronsky
Rethinking New Mexico's History
Kim Nicolini
Class, Gender and Abortion in Communist Romania
Jeffrey St.
Clair
Booked Up: What I'm Reading This Week
Poets' Basement
Wilson, Woods, Gibbons and Orloski
Website of
the Weekend
Merci, McCain!
March 21, 2008
Marleen Martin
Land
Behind Bars: the Hidden Casualties of America's "War on
Crime"
Peter Montague
Run
Your Car on Coal? Maybe Not
Saul Landau
Monroe's
Deadly Doctrine
Anis Hamadeh
Merkel in the Knesset
Jacob Hornberger
McCain's Al Qaeda Scare: Slip or Tactic?
Khalil Nakhleh
Al Nakba of 1948: How Long Will It Persist?
Adam Isacson
Colombia, Paramilitary Threats and Assassinations
Kenneth Couesbouc
Money for Nothing
Madis Senner
Will the Feds Underwrite the Stock Market?
Monica Benderman
The Costs of Freedom: What Are You Willing to Pay?
Website of the Day
Stop Foreclosures and Evictions
March 20, 2008
Damien Millet
/
Eric Toussaint
The
Triple Failing of the Big Private Banks
Mike Whitney
Winding
Up Bear
John Ross
What Do We Owe Iraq?
Dave Lindorff
Paying the Piper: the Bodies and Bills are Piling Up
Wajahat Ali
Pakistan on Fire
Jill Nagle
Memo to Sex Workers: Stop Financing Shock Journalism
Manuel Garcia, Jr.
Obama and the Psychic Auto-Shrink-Wrapping Called Race in America
Dan La Botz
Obama's Race Speech
Robert Weissman
Alternative Power: Shutting Down the API
Stella Dallas
/
Jennifer Matsui
Apostasy Now! Mamet, Enter Stage Right
Website of the Day
The Angry Monk
March 19, 2008
Patrick Cockburn
A
War of Lies
Robert Fisk
The Little Men and the Inferno
Jeff Taylor
Five Years of War in Iraq
Ed Ruggero
From Pinkville to Iraq: the Dark Anniversary of My Lai
Ron Jacobs
Who'll Stop the Rain?
Christopher
Fons
Obama Takes the Race Bait
Sherwood Ross
In Defense of Rev. Wright
Cynthia McKinney
An Urgent Crisis: Confronting America's Racial Disparities
Joshua Frank
The Kool-Aid That Kills
Robert Weissman
Monsanto's Genetic Food Gamble
Walter Brasch
It's a Welfare State--If You're Rich
Yifat Susskind
Iraqi Women Resist the Occupation
Andrew Wimmer
War Demands Its Due
Website of
the Day
Glimpses of Nature
March 18, 2008
David Price
The
Military "Leveraging" of Cultural Knowledge
Paul Craig
Roberts
The
Collapse of American Power
Tim Wise
Of National Lies and Racial America: Jeremiah Wright, Barack
Obama and the Unacceptability of Truth
Patrick Cockburn
One of the Most Disastrous Wars Ever Fought
Conn Hallinan
Afghanistan, a River Running Backward
James T. Phillips
Monsters: Past, Present and Wannabe
Uri Avnery
The Killing in Bethlehem
David Macaray
Could Wal-Mart Revive the Labor Movement?
Marjorie Cohn
Beware an Attack on Iran
Peter Zinn
Obama in New Orleans
Dan La Botz
The Economic Crisis, Labor and the Left
Monica Benderman
Where are We Going?
March 17, 2008
Pam Martens
The
Fed's Wall Street Dilemma
Sasan Fayazmanesh
The US, Iran and the Policy of Dual Containment
Nelson P. Valdés
The Imperial Branding of Simon Bolivar and the Cuban Revolution
Peter Morici
The Corrosive Consequences of the Trade Deficit
Wajahat Ali
Disrobing the Nine: a Conversation with Jeffrey Toobin on the
Supreme Court Since 9/11
Ronnie Cummins
Beyond Progressive Malpractice: Taking Down Big Pharma
Shaun Harkin
Saint Patrick's Day in Fortress America
Ali Khan
No Pardon for Musharraf
Robert Jensen
Beyond Peace
P. Sainath
Oh, What a Lovely Waiver!
Greg Moses
Jeremiah was a Bullhorn
Dr. Susan Block
Advice for Eliot Spitzer
Website of the Day
No Cowboys
March 15 /
16, 2008
Patrick Cockburn
How
to Destroy a Country in Five Years
Mike Whitney
Bearly
Alive: Investment Giant Rushed to ICU by Panicky Fed Chief
Ralph Nader
Of
Laws and Men
Robert Pollin
It's Still the Economy, Stupid
Diane Christian
The Poetics of Perversity: From Boccaccio to Spitzer
Wajahat Ali
Faking the Hood: a Conversation with Ishmael Reed
Tom Wright
/
Therese Saliba
Rachel Corrie's Case for Justice
Alan Farago
Back to Florida: Where Bushtime Began
Greg Moses
Raiding the Family Room in Texas
Michael Hudson
A Grand Global Bargain?
Martha Rosenberg
Why Hillary's Favorite Chicken Company is Eying China
John Goekler
Fourth Generation Warfare in a Fifth Generation Conflict
Uzma Aslam
Khan
A Letter to Barack Obama: Where's the Change, Barack?
Oren Ben-Dor
The Silencing of Gilad Atzmon
David Underhill
Mammon, Morals and the Mobile Tanker Deal
Fred Gardner
The Education of Eliot Spitzer
David Michael
Green
Why Spitzer Should Have Resigned (and Why He Shouldn't Have)
Rev. William E. Alberts
Jesus, Entombed in Heaven
Gail Dines
It's All About the John: Prostitution and Male Power
David Yearsley
Conducting, Anarchy and the Problem of When to Begin
Chris Clarke
Walking with Zeke: the Luckiest of Dogs
Poets' Basement
Anderson, Lodge & Subiet
Website of
the Day
Deviant Art
March 14, 2008
Paul Craig
Roberts
Watching
the Dollar Die
Don Santina
Vichy
Democrats: Pelosi and the Politics of Collaboration
Patrick Cockburn
Iraqi
Mother Vows Revenge on US: How She Lost Her Husband and Her Sons
Tim Rinne
StratCom
Rules! The Next War Will Start in Nebraska
Robert Fantina
In
Torture We Trust
Saul Landau
Letter
to the Presidents-in-Waitings
David Macaray
Common
Myths About Labor Unions
Franklin Lamb
Is
the Bush Administration Switching Horses in Lebanon
Michael Neumann
The
One State Illusion: Reply to My Critics
March 13, 2008
Paul Craig
Roberts
Republicans
and "Free Market" Zealots Bring Disaster to America
Mike Whitney
Meltdown
Looms Larger As Credit Markets Freeze
Assaf Kfoury
"One-State
or Two State?"- Sterile Debate on False Alternatives
Andy Worthington
Afghan
Hero Who Died in Guantánamo: The Background to the Story
Adam Federman
From
Autopia to Autogeddon: Cars Reach the End of the Road
March 12, 2008
Dave Lindorff
Bringing
Down Spitzer: It's the Big Brother Who Should Bother US
R.F. Blader
The
Spitzer Backlash
Yonatan Mendel
How
to be an Israeli Journalist. Never Write "Murder" or
"Palestine"
Jonathan Cook
One
State or Two? Neither. The Issue is Zionism
Bill and Kathy
Christison
Fallon
and Gates -- At Least One Cheer
James J. Brittain
Was
the U.S. Involved in Killing the FARC-EP Leaders
Ron Jacobs
"All
the Money You Make Will Never Buy Back Your Soul"
March 11, 2008
Paul Craig
Roberts
How
to End the Subprime Crisis
Ed O'Loughlin
How
Israeli Troops Invade Homes in Gaza, Brutalize, Smash and Steal
Ramzy Baroud
'Unwavering
Commitment' to Inequality
Kathy Christison
One
State or Two? The Debate Over Israel and Palestine
China Hand
PRC
Plays it Cool, as U.S. Tries to Amp Up Pressure on Iran
John Joslin
Thank
You, Nafta! Welcome to Weirton, Home of the Discount Cigarette
Mike Averko
Serb
Politics, Kosovo and the Moscow-Washington Divide
Ben Rosenfeld
Gavin
Newsom's Kneejerk Plan
Thierry Paquot
High
Rise, Low Spirits:The Curse of the Tower Block
March 10, 2008
Uri Avnery
"Kill
A Hundred Turks and Rest": The Five-Day War in Gaza
Col. Dan Smith
Scoring
the "Surge" and What Lies Beyond
R.F. Blader
Why
"Lock Them Up and Throw Away the Key" is Losing its
Sheen
Michael Neumann
The
One-State Illusion: More is Less
Bob Fitrakis
and Harvey Wasserman
Did
the Republicans Give Hillary Her Victory in Ohio?
James J. Brittain
Anti-Uribe
Protests in Colombia and the World
Missy Comley
Beattie
The
Passion of John McCain
March 8-9,
2008 Weekend Edition
JoAnn Wypijewski
The
Only Way to Fight the Clintons
Mike Whitney
Sorting
Through the Rubble in Post Bubble America
Peter Morici
Fed
and Treasury Fiddle as Economy Plummets
Ralph Nader
The
Silent Violence of Gaza's Suffering that Candidates Ignore
Jonathan Cook
The
Meaning of Gaza's Shoah
Steve Niva
Behind
the Israeli Escalation in Gaza
Bill and Kathy
Christison
Crisis
over Teheran's Alleged Nuclear Plans Nearing Climax
Hervé
Do Alto and Franck Poupeau
Bolivia:
Morales is Checked
Eric Walberg
To
Leave and Stay at the Same Time: Putin to Medvedev to…?
Scott Johnson
City
of A Thousand Foreclosures
Mark Scaramella
James
Brown's Gate
Bill Clinton
President
Clinton's Remarks on Naming William M. Daley as NAFTA Task Force
Chairman
Poet's Basement
St.
Thomasino, Engel, Davies and Willson
Website of
the Weekend
Hillary
Blackens Barack
March 7, 2008
Patrick Cockburn
Why
Iraq Could Blow-Up in John McCain's Face
Robin Blackburn
Question
for Barrack Obama: Why Afghanistan is the'Right War'?
Saul Landau
The
Stupid Economy
Binoy Kampmark
When
Competition is Good: McCain and the Muddled Democrats
Chris Floyd
Crushing
the Ants: Admiral Fallon and His Empire
Andy Worthington
Spanish
Drop "Inhuman" Extradition Request for Guantánamo
Britons
Will Potter
Before
the Smoke Even Clears in Seattle: Bringing Out the T Word
March 6, 2008
March 6, 2008
Vincent Navarro
The
Next Failure of Health Reform
Forrest Hylton
High Stakes in the Andes: Colombia's Cornered President
Peter Morici
Why the Dollar is So Cheap
George Ciccariello-Maher
Counter-Attack of the Bureaucrats
John Ross
Taxi! Taxi! The Dark Side of the Oscars
Jacob Hornberger
No Standing to Lecture on Justice
Paul Watson
Illegal Japanese Whaling by the Numbers
Dan Bacher
Off the Deep End
Website of the Day
A Katrina Reader Online
March 5, 2008
Cockburn /
St. Clair
A
Great Day for John McCain (and Maybe Nader)
Joanne Mariner
After Guantanamo
Fidel Castro
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Apri1
17, 2008
The Mandates Aren't
Just Wrong, They're Immoral
The
Ethanol Apologists
By ROBERT BRYCE
The outrages of the ethanol mandates
are growing by the day.
Last week, a study funded by
American beef, pork and chicken producers estimated that the
total cost to taxpayers of the corn ethanol mandates now exceeds
$33 billion per year. That's equal to about $106 per American
citizen. While the soaring cost of the ethanol are maddening,
even more galling are the continuing claims by a group of ethanol
apologists who insist that the ethanol industry is having no
effect on food prices. Those spurious claims are being made at
the same time that the World Bank is warning of a global food
crisis and unrest is increasing in several countries due to soaring
food prices.
In early March, Robert Zubrin,
a major proponent of biofuels and the author of the book, "Energy
Victory," wrote an oped in which he declared that "you
can't blame ethanol for food price increases." Earlier this
month, Sean O'Hanlon, the executive director of the American
Biofuels Council, when asked how biofuels are affecting good
prices, replied, "They really don't." He went on to
declare "Ultimately, there is more food available because
of biofuels rather than less."
In an April 11 letter to the
New York Times, Ron Litterer, the president of the National
Corn Growers Association, said that U.S. farmers are "producing
enough corn for all needs" and that when it comes to food
price increases, it is wrong to cast "ethanol as the devil."
On April 15, after several
foreign leaders blamed America's ethanol mandates for pushing
food prices higher, the New York Times quoted Senator
Charles Grassley, an Iowa Republican and longtime ethanol backer,
as saying it was a "a big joke" to blame ethanol. He
then said none of those foreigners would eat corn if it was placed
in front of them.
Several factors are driving
food prices higher including growing global grain demand, crop
failures in other countries, rising energy prices, and the weak
dollar. That said, its abundantly obvious that the ethanol apologists
are denying reality. There's simply no question that the key
variable in the food price equation--and the one that could have
been easily avoided--is the ethanol scam.
The numbers tell a clear--and
disturbing -- story.
Since 2000, the amount of corn
used to make ethanol has increased nearly six fold. By next year,
according to the National Corn Growers Association, some 4 billion
bushels of corn--about one-third of the expected crop -- will
be used to make motor fuel.
In February, the Federal Reserve
Bank reported that food prices in 2007 jumped by 4.5 percent,
which it calls the "largest in nearly two decades."
And the Fed  placed much of the blame on
corn ethanol, saying "Food prices accelerated in response
to strong world demand and high demand for corn for the production
of ethanol." It went on, saying "Taken together, prices
for meats, poultry, fish, and eggs rose 5.5 percent, and prices
of dairy products were up at double-digit rates."
More telling numbers come from
the U.S. Department of Agriculture. On March 11, the agency released
its report on world agricultural supply and demand. The USDA
estimates that global grain demand will grow by 5.4 percent this
year. Fully half of that growth will come from U.S. consumption
of corn for ethanol.
On April 9, the World Bank
released a report which said "Increased bio-fuel production
has contributed to the rise in food prices." It continued,
"Almost all of the increase in global maize [corn] production
from 2004 to 2007 (the period when grain prices rose sharply)
went for bio-fuels production
in the U.S., while existing stocks were depleted by an increase
in global consumption for other uses." The report went on
to dismiss the notion that higher energy prices are to blame
for soaring food costs. "Only a relatively small share of
the increase in food production prices (around 15%) is due directly
to higher energy and fertilizer costs."
The soaring demand from the
ethanol sector has helped push prices higher for all grains.
Over the past two years, corn prices have more than doubled and
soybeans have nearly tripled. Those soaring grain prices are
likely to mean higher food prices for years to come. Earlier
this year, Bill Lapp, an Omaha-based agricultural economist,
predicted that that food prices will increase at an annual rate
of 7.5 percent for the next five years. And Lapp told me that
he based his projections on a corn price of $4 per bushel. Corn
is now selling for about $6 per bushel. Thus, food price inflation
could be even higher than Lapp's 7.5 percent estimate.
The soaring price of grain
is being felt around the world. Over the past few months, there
have been violent protests in Egypt, Cameroon, Ivory Coast, Mauritania,
Ethiopia, Madagascar, the Philippines and Indonesia over soaring
food prices. On Saturday, Haiti's prime minister, Jacques-Edouard
Alexis, was ousted in a no-confidence vote. The vote came after
more than a week of violent protests over soaring food and fuel
prices.
Worries about adequate food
supplies have led several countries to ban exports, including
Vietnam and Egypt. China has placed a tax and quota on exports
and India has imposed an export ban on non-basmati rice. Earlier
this month, the USDA reported that America's grain stocks "are
forecast at a 27-year low." And the USDA projects that those
stocks could go lower still thanks to the weak dollar and strong
overseas demand.
On Saturday, the managing director
of the International Monetary Fund, Dominque Strauss-Kahn, said
that, "Food prices, if they go on like they are doing today...the
consequences will be terrible." World Bank president Robert
Zoellick said that the doubling of food prices over the past
three years, "could potentially push 100 million people
in low-income countries deeper into poverty."
A March report from the International
Food Policy Research Institute made a direct connection between
the push for biofuels and the potential for increasing hunger
among the world's poor. "If biofuel production undergoes
a drastic increase, calorie availability in Sub-Saharan Africa
is projected to fall by more than 8 percent in 2020, and the
number of malnourished children in the region is projected to
increase by 3 million."
Food policy analysts are worried
that a poor harvest or bad weather could push the global food
market into crisis. "That's the gamble," says David
Orden, a senior research fellow at the International Food Policy
Research Institute in Washington, D.C. "We can't control
the weather," Orden told me. "If we get a year of bad
harvests, then we'll have further rises in food prices. And that
will create instability, particularly in the poor countries."
While Orden is reluctant to
single out the ethanol mandates as the main factor in rising
food prices, he says, the U.S. has "taken a huge gamble
with the world food situation by promoting ethanol." He
said Congress "did this without recognizing that the global
supply of food is very sensitive to huge increases in demandIt's
a policy decision we made without thinking it through carefully
enough. And it is certainly one of the key factors in driving
the high commodity prices."
Several studies have quantified
the overall cost of the ethanol mandates. Last May 2007, Iowa
State University's Center for Agricultural and Rural Development,
released a report which estimated that the ethanol mandates have
increased the food bill for every American by about $47 due largely
to higher grain prices. The Iowa State researchers concluded
that due to these higher food prices, American consumers are
enduring a "total cost of ethanol of about $14 billion."
And that figure does not include the billions of dollars in federal
subsidies for corn growers or the $0.51 per gallon tax credit
that goes to the ethanol producers.
On April 7, Thomas Elam, an
Indianapolis-based agricultural economist, released the report
referenced at the start of this piece. The report, which was
commissioned by Balanced Food and Fuel, a Washington, DC-based
coalition of eight associations that represent the meat, dairy,
and egg producers, estimates that the biofuels mandates passed
by Congress will cost the U.S. economy more than $100 billion
from 2006 to 2009. And it said that it is "inevitable that
these costs will be passed along to consumers."
Therein lies one of the real
perversities of the ethanol mandates: as the global economy--thanks
to higher energy prices and the subprime mortgage meltdown --
heads for rougher times, food prices are soaring. And those food
prices will increase anxiety among consumers who will further
reduce their discretionary spending. When it comes to food, Congress
has created a feedback loop that will reverberate in the global
economy for years to come.
Thankfully, the U.S. economy
is still fairly strong. And American consumers are, for the most
part, better off than their counterparts in the developing world
who generally spend far more of their incomes on food.
The world's poor will bear
the brunt of Congressional mandates that are paying distillers
to burn enormous quantities of food in order to make motor fuel
at a time when there is no shortage of motor fuel. And that leads
to yet the other outrage of the ethanol mandates: no matter how
much of U.S. or world grain is diverted to make motor fuel, it
will never make a large dent in global oil needs. According to
the latest USDA estimates, total world grain production--including
corn, wheat, soybeans, rice, millet and other grains -- is currently
about 2.1 billion tons per year. Each ton of grain can yield
about 105 gallons of ethanol. Converting all of the world's grain
into ethanol will yield about 220 billion gallons of ethanol
which is the energy equivalent of 145 billion gallons of gasoline
per year or about 9.5 million barrels per day. That's equal
to about 11 percent of total world oil demand of 86 million barrels
per day. Thus, even if we decided to turn all of the world's
grain into motor fuel, we still would need to use oil, and lots
of it--and we wouldn't have anything to eat.
It's time for the ethanol apologists
to face the facts: The ethanol and biofuels mandates that have
been foisted on American taxpayers are not just fiscal insanity,
they are immoral. And over the coming months and years, the people
in the developing world will pay a heavy price for Congress's
scandalous approach to food and energy policy.
Robert Bryce will publish his third book, Gusher
of Lies: The Dangerous Delusions of "Energy Independence,"
on March 10. He can be reached at: Robert@robertbryce.com
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