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Today's
Stories
February 8
/ 10, 2008
Paul Craig
Roberts
Does
the GOP Have Aces Up Its Sleeves?
February 7,
2008
Patrick Cockburn
Why
Baghdad Will Explode Again
Bill Christison
Potholes Bigger Than Ever for Palestinians
David Anderson
NBC's "To Entrap" a Predator: Perverting Justice for
the Sake of Ratings
Ron Jacobs
Innocent Flesh: Recruiting Kids to Kill
Nikolas Kozloff
Hugo Chávez's Coca: It's the Real Thing
Jane Rockefeller
The Moral Economy of an Anti-Poverty Foundation
Andy Worthington
On Waterboarding: Two Questions for Michael Hayden
Dave Zirin
Instep Intifada
Saul Landau
The "Honestest" Candidate Since Lincoln
Susie Day
Our Blob in the White House
Website of the Day
George Carlin on Voting
February 6,
2008
Cockburn /
St. Clair
Super
Tuesday's Vote for Chaos
Ben Rosenfeld
Informant Games: The Disturbing GreenScare Case of Briana Waters
Vijay Prashad
An Intellectual Hustler Lays It All Out
Joe Bageant
Nine Billion Little Feet on the Highway of the Damned
Michael Donnelly
What White Women Do In Private Voting Booths
Allan Nairn
Does the US Need a Civilizing Mayan Invasion?
Kathryn Gray
Wilderness on Edge: The Fate of Donner Summit
Ray McGovern
Powell's UN Fiasco
Sheldon Richman
The Whining Empire
Paul Cantor
/ Roger Sparks
A
Presidential Aptitude Examination
John Chuckman
Political Bits and Pieces
Website of
the Day
Save the Albatross
February 5,
2008
Winslow T.
Wheeler
The
Chaos in America's Vast Security Budget
Tariq Ali
Why I Will Not Participate in the Turin Book Fair
Stephen Soldz
The Secret Rules of Engagement in Iraq: Did Rumsfeld Authorize
War Crimes?
Chris Floyd
Strange
Fruit: America's Gulag and the Good War
William S. Lind
Saddam's Secret War Strategy: Die and Win
Martha Rosenberg
Live From the Killing Floor
Heather Gray
Conversations with Georgia Voters
Ayesha Ijaz
Khan
Obama, Bhagwandas and the Battle for a Secular Politics
David Macaray
Unions Need to Stop Being So Nice
Eliza Ernshire
Making Music and Laughing Till the Tears Run
Brenda Norrell
Hated Nation
Website of
the Day
The Things I Used to Do
February 4,
2008
Marc Levy
Winter
in America
Patrick Cockburn
The Bird Market Bombings
Saree Makdisi
Strangling Gaza
Uri Avnery
From Stalingrad to Winograd
Alan Farago
Let's Get Bambi! Someone is Slaughtering Florida's Key Deer
Ben Tripp
Spare Change: the Whine of the Progressive Voter
Paul Wolf
Civil Wars North and South
Paul Craig
Roberts
Why Were the 9/11 Tapes Destroyed?
Joshua Frank
MoveOn's Obama Endorsement: Why There's No Hope for Change
John Halle
Whither Progressive Democrats?
Website of the Day
How to Cheat in School
February 2
/ 3, 2008
Alexander Cockburn
Hot
Democratic Properties
Pam Martens
Bankers
Gone Bonkers: Global Finance and the Insanity Defense
Ralph Nader
The Great Clinton-Obama Debate: Questions They Weren't Asked
John Ross
Hilaria
vs. "El Moreno"
Wajahat Ali
Hillary, Obama and the Clash of Civilizations: an Interview with
Imam Zaid Shakir
Robert Fantina
A Colony by Any Other Name: Iraq as Stepchild of the American
Empire
B. R. Gowani
Not All Veils and Guns
James L. Secor
China in Winter: On the Western Edge of the Great Snow
John V. Walsh
The Invisible Green Primary
Niranjan Ramakrishnan
Barack's Bubble, Bubba's Trouble
Dave Zirin
Who Stole the Super Bowl's Soul?
Jeremy Scahill
Blackwater and Blood
Fidel Castro
Reflections on Lula
Joe Allen
Tet Reconsidered: the Turning Point in the Vietnam War
Stephen Lendman
Life in Occupied Gaza
Patrick Irelan
What Happened to the Streetcars?
Andrej Grubacic
Ziga Vodovnik
Caligula's Horse: the USA, New Europe and Kosovo
Josh Karpoff
Dead Soldiers and the Antiwar Movement
Ron Jacobs
Carl Oglesby's War
Paul Krassner
Tom Waits Meets Super-Joel
Website of the Weekend
Company Woman: Hillary and Wal-Mart
February 1,
2008
Ray McGovern
The
Iniquities and Inequalities of War
Diane Farsetta
The Wild Career of James "Dow 36,000" Glassman
Patrick Cockburn
The
Most Dangerous Country in the World for Journalists
Tariq Ali
Et
Tu, New York Times?
Allan Nairn
Eating Dirt for Lunch in Haiti
Rannie Amiri
Collective Punishment in Beirut
Ramzy Baroud
People Power in Gaza: They Simply Did It
Kenneth Couesbouc
The Mother of All Snowballs
Peter Morici
Recession Looms
Mumia Abu-Jamal
Witha "Brutha" Like This: Bill Clinton as White Negro
Rosemary Jackowski
27 Reasons Nader Should Run for President
Scott Campbell
Direct Action to Stop the War Re-emerges
Website of the Day
Betes et Hommes
January 31,
2008
Saul Landau
Return
to Afghanistan
Andy Worthington
Horror at Guantánamo
Mike Whitney
Rate Cut as Dagger: America's Teetering Banking System
Jeff Ballinger
Sustainability for Dictators Initiative? Clinton Praises the
"Suharto of the Steppe"
Tiffany Ten
Eyck
The Saga of the Freightliner Five
William Loren
Katz
Waterboarding:
Torure or Mystery?
Alan Farago
Why the Republicans are in Deep Trouble
Col. Dan Smith
Oh Say Can You See the 2009 Budget?
China Hand
Slouching Toward Islamabad
Dave Lindorff
The Usual Suspects Once Again
Wadner Pierre
Fake Democracy in Haiti
Website of the Day
One Big Union
January 30,
2008
Cockburn /
St. Clair
McCain
vs. Clinton?
Christopher
Ketcham
The Genius of the Development Industrial-Complex
Robert Weissman
America By the Numbers: The Shameful State of the Union
Neve Gordon
An Experiment in Famine
Paul Craig Roberts
Regulation or Deregulation, Which is Worse?
Joanne Mariner
How Anti-Terror Laws Threaten Free Speech
David Macaray
Labor's Only Real Weapon
Liaquat Ali
Khan
Is NATO Committing Genocide in Afghanistan?
Raymond J. Lawrence
Prankster-in-Chief: Bush's Troubling Non-Verbal Communication
Dan Bacher
The Collapse of the Central Valley Salmon
Website of the Day
Onward Through the Fog
January 29,
2008
Franklin C.
Spinney
Bush's
New War Budget: the $70 Billion Hand-Off
Mike Whitney
The Great Credit Unwind of 2008
Alan Farago
Buyer Beware: Florida, the Candidates and the Latin Builders
Association
Patrick Cockburn
"The Americans Bring Us Only Destruction"
Gary Leupp
"We Can't Afford to Let Them Spill the Beans:" a Sibel
Edmonds Timeline
R. F. Blader
A
World Without Abortion: USA v. Romania
Ahmad Faruqui
Musharraf's Post-Electoral Prospect
Fran Shor
Obama, the Kennedys and "Change We Can Believe In"
Jeremy Scahill
Secret Trials and Criminal Convictions: the Ordeal of the Blackwater
Protesters
Allan Nairn
Bush's
SOTU: Entitlement, Justice and the War of All Against All
Website of the Day
The Ghost of Rambo
January 28,
2008
Patrick Cockburn
Return
to Fallujah
Paul Craig
Roberts
The End of American Liberty
Allan Nairn
The Breaking of the Gaza Wall
Eyad al-Sarraj
/ Sara Roy
Ending the Stranglehold on Gaza
Martha Rosenberg
Obit for the "Front Page" City
Corporate Crime
Reporter
How They Rip Us Off
David Michael Green
Kristolizing Iraq: What a Great Freakin' War
Jennifer Van
Bergen
What's Left?
Nancy Oden
Survival Tips for Hard Times
Divya Karnad
Saving India's Sea Turtles
James L. Secor
Pissed About Pistorious: Why the Olympics Needs a Gimp
Website of
the Day
Yellow Journalism?
January 26
/ 27, 2008
Uri Avnery
Worse
Than a Crime
JoAnn Wypijewski
How the Clintons Lost It, Whatever the Outcome in S. Carolina
Ralph Nader
Ambition, Power and the Clintons
Paul Craig
Roberts
How Bush Destroyed the Dollar
Paul Watson
I'm Proud to be a Pirate!
John Ross
Murder and Cover-Up in Mexico
Fred Gardner
Ross v. Raging Wire: Employer's Right to Fire Workers Held Sacred
by California Supreme Court
Allan Nairn
Little Hands with Fever: Some Consequences of Poverty Death
Joshua Frank
Why Bush Wants to Legalize the Nuke Trade with Turkey
Binoy Kampmark
Société Générale and the Economic
Meltdown
James T. Phillips
America's Sick Comedy: Bringing the War Home
Stan Cox
The Depressing Truth About Anti-Depressants
Eamonn McCann
Hillary's Lie: "I Brought Peace to Northern Ireland"
Ron Jacobs
The Horizons of History: What's at Stake in Bolivia
Seth Sandronsky
California's Health Care Crisis
Ben Terrall
The Future is Unwritten
Poets' Basement
Tripp, Gardner, Gibbons and Davies
Website of
the Weekend
City of Immigrants
January 25,
2008
Douglas Valentine
Operation
Two-Fold: How the CIA Infiltrated the DEA
Patrick Cockburn
US Troops Will Be In Iraq for 10 More Years: an Interview with
Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari
JoAnn Wypijewski
Down to the Wire in South Carolina
Heather Gray
Are We Seeing a Racial Shift in the South? Conversations with
South Carolina Voters
Marjorie Cohn
Senate Democrats Poised to Fold to Cheney on FISA
Erica Rosenberg
Environmentalists Out on a Limb: the Perils of Collaboration
Alan Farago
Jeb Bush Goes Nuclear
Robert Weissman
Reclaiming Economic Freedom
Laura Carlsen
Wild Cards: Mining the Hispanic Vote in Nevada
Stephen Lendman
Israeli Repression in the Hebron
Website of the Day
The FIX is In
January 24,
2008
JoAnn Wypijewski
Obama
as Anthologist of Uplift
Paul Craig
Roberts
President Hillary
Alexander Cockburn
Hillary Wants to Talk About Dirty Legal Dealings? Remember Her
Nursing Home Scam?
Kathleen Christison
One and Two State Solutions and the Myth of International Consensus
Jeff Halper
Power to the (Palestinian) People!
Stanley Heller
The Siege of Gaza is Broken
George Wuerthner
The Moronic Sport: ORVs on the Public Lands
Patrick Cockburn
Desperate Iraqi Farmers Turn to Opium
Jeff Sher
Just How "Good" is Your Health Insurance?
Patrick Irelan
Musharraf, the Steadfast Ally?
Charles Modiano
Restoring the Anti-War King
Website of
the Day
An Illustrated History of Trepanation
January 23,
2008
David Rosen
The
Great Disappearing Act: the Presidential Candidates and the Politics
of Sex
David Isenberg
Is
It Really So Hard to Believe That Iran Stopped Its Nuclear Weapons
Program?
Farzana Versey
Hillary's
Harem
Paul Craig
Roberts
The Empire That Must Be Obeyed
Alan Farago
Where Did All the Good Times Go?
Allan Nairn
Indonesian Intelligence Service Threatens to Kill Human Rights
Activist
Kenneth Couesbouc
Another Turn of the Screw
Niranjan Ramakrishnan
How the West was Re-Sold
Michael Donnelly
Obama Strikes Back
Norman Solomon
The Power of Love
Website of the Day
Rafah Today
January 22,
2008
Paul Craig
Roberts
Farewell
to Old Economic Nostrums
JoAnn Wypijewski
King Day in Columbia, South Carolina
Al Giordano
Divide and Conquer Politics: How the Clinton Campaign Armed a
Black-Latino Time Bomb in Nevada
Felice Pace
Power Politics in the Klamath: Water, Dams and Salmon
Paul Wolf
Bolívar's Sword
Robert Weissman
Deregulation and the Financial Crisis
Dave Lindorff
The Bush Dollar Trap
Marjorie Cohn
Cheney Impeachment Gains Traction
Richard Neville
Keeping Shakespeare in a Box
Don Fitz /
Zaki Baruti
St. Louis Mayor Booed Off MLK Platform
Ben Terrall
Cindy Sheehan and the Virtues of Divisiveness
Sam Husseini
Stoning Martin Luther King, Jr.
Website of
the Day
Defend the Mapuche!
January 21,
2008
Kevin Alexander
Gray
Playing
the Race Card
Linn Washington,
Jr.
Deferring Dreams, Delusions of Democracy
Pam Martens
How Wall Street Blew Itself Up
David Macaray
Labor's Grim Dilemma: Do We Need a Labor Party?
Uri Avnery
Look Who's Talking
Omar Barghouti
Europe's Collusion in Israel's Slow Genocide
Joe DeRaymond
Protest and Trial in D.C.
B.R. Gowani
Why Islam Should Tolerate Images
Shepherd Bliss
The False U.S. Economy
Jean-Guy Allard
Philip Agee Versus the CIA
Dan Bacher
Leaping Steelhead!
Website of
the Day
Destroyed
By a Rising Flood
January 19
/ 20, 2008
Alexander Cockburn
The
Campaign in Black and White
Saul Landau
Good Time Charlie's War
China Hand
Endgame for Pakistan?
Conn Hallinan
Desert Mirage: What Was the Bombing of Syria Really About?
Ron Jacobs
No Retreat
Dave Lindorff
A Tax Rebate Won't Fix This Mess
Andy Worthington
Canada's Humiliating Double Standard on Torture
Paul Armentano
What's the Going Price for a Joint? More Than You Might Think
Seth Sandronsky
High Crimes and Economics
Michael Donnelly
Dodging Ecocide
Patrick Irelan
The Ordeal of Dr. Safdar Sarki
Martha Rosenberg
The Drug Industry Takes Another Hit
Sherwood Ross
Making the World Safe for Despots: Bush's Global Arms Trade
David Michael
Green
So You Want to be My President, Eh?
James Rothenberg
Unimpeachable: Under House Protection
Daniel Gross
Starbucks Shortchanges Dr. King
Peter N. Carroll
In Memory of Milton Wolff
Susie Day
Croakin' on Hudson
Paul Krassner
Woody Allen Meets Tongue Fu
Poets' Basement
Wolff, Buknatski and Orloski
Website of the Day
Rocky Mountain
Blues
January 18,
2008
Allan Nairn
Killing
Civilians, Carefully
Ralph Nader
When
the Big Boys Get in Trouble, Who Pays the Ultimate Bill?
Joanne Mariner
Terrorism and Preventative Detention
Alan Farago
The Stimulus and the Meltdown
P. Sainath
Pity the Brahmins
R.F. Blader
Beyond Steinem's Feminism
Andy Worthington
A Letter from Guantánamo
John Jonik
Private Insurance is Bad for Your Health
Brian McKenna
Where Even Sharing is Prohibited: Notes from Inside a Michigan
Women's Prison
Daoud Kuttab
This Time Next Year?
Website of the Day
Those South Carolina Voting Machines
January 17,
2008
Paul Craig
Roberts
Leader
and Vassal
Christopher
Brauchli
The FBI's Bills Come Due
Robert Fantina
Leadership, Bush and the New York Times
Patrick Irelan
Eternal War
Paul A. Moore
When the Rich Pay No Taxes
Stephen Lendman
Institutionalized Spying on Americans
Beena Sarwar
Bhutto and the "State Within a State"
Walter Brasch
Buzzwords in the Echo Chamber: Change and the Establishment
Brenda Norrell
Bush Legacy in Texas Sours
Adam Federman
End of the Left?
Website of the Day
Democrats for Romney
January 16,
2008
Jeffrey St.
Clair
Return
of the Native
Franklin Lamb
The Bombing at Qarantina
Julian Sanchez
David Weigel
Who Wrote Ron Paul's Newsletters?
Sharon Smith
Ron Paul and the Left: a Slippery Slope?
Allan Nairn
Economic Indicator: No Free Lunch, No Free Market
Ayesha Ijaz
Khan
How the American Media Enables Bush's Iran Fixation
Andy Worthington
A Strategic Call to Close Guantánamo
Richard Behan
Nancy Pelosi, You Must Impeach!
Website of the Day
Obama the New JFK? He's Not That Bad!
January 15,
2008
Andrea Peacock
Breach
of Trust in America's Most Toxic Town: How the EPA is Rubbing
Poison Into Libby's Wounds
Wajahat Ali
An Interview with Seymour Hersh on Iraq, Bush Foreign Policy
and the Prospects of War with Iran
Joe Bageant
Getting Out the Bling Vote
Ralph Nader
The Candidate Taboos
John Ross
Zero Hour: NAFTA and Mexico's Agrarian Apocalypse
Elaine Cassel
Jose Padilla vs. John Yoo: Can a National Disgrace be Rectified?
Peter Morici
The Fed Needs More Than a New Communications Strategy
Beena Sarwar
Pakistan's Dirty Tricks Brigade
Robert Weissman
Big Business is Even More Unpopular Than You Thought
Binoy Kampmark
Going Tata in India
Dave Zirin
Dennis Brutus Smacks Down the Hall of Fame
Website of
the Day
David Lynch on the iPhone
January 14,
2008
Ishmael Reed
Ma
and Pa Clinton Flog Uppity Black Man
Roger Morris
Burials in the Sind
Uri Avnery
The
Hands of Esau
Mike Whitney
Bush's Voodoo Stimulus Package
Allan Nairn
General Suharto of Indonesia: One Small Man Leaves a Million
Corpses
William Blum
Oh, By the Way, the Iraqis Don't Really Want Us
Alan Farago
A Subprime Wake Up Call
David Macaray
Are Labor Unions Ready for Prime Time?
Eva Liddell
Getting Drunk with Obama
Zoe Blunt
Road Kill: New Highway Blocked by Protesting Raccoons
Website of the Day
Doug and Andrea Peacock on Grizzlies
January 12
/ 13, 2008
Andrew Cockburn
How
the New England Journal of Medicine Undercounted Iraqi Civilian
Deaths
Saul Landau
60
Years of Empire
Corey D. B. Walker
Barack Obama and the Crisis of the White Intellectual
Col. Dan Smith
Bush, Iran and the Magician of the Tarot
Eric Toussaint
The US Subprime Crisis Goes Global
Ron Jacobs
Television, Murder and Vietnam
Fred Gardner
The People vs. Christopher James Chakos
Stan Cox
Don't Take That Pill!
Jacob G. Hornberger
The Warfare State
Ramzy Baroud
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
Joseph Grosso
The Anglosphere: a Special Relationship of Elites
David Díaz-Arias
Imagining An/Other Latin American Left
Stacey Warde
Before We Move On ...
Dan Bacher
Pumped to Extinction: the Decline of the Delta Smelt
Michael Dickinson
Georgie in Jesusland
Website of
Weekend
CounterPunchers Protest Outside NYT Offices
January 11,
2008
Dave Lindorff
Did
Hillary Really Win New Hampshire? More Questions About Diebold
Voting Machines
Paul Craig
Roberts
No
Escape from War and Unemployment
Andy Worthington
Six Years of Guantánamo
Kenneth Couesbouc
Banking on Thin Ice
Jeff Ballinger
Inside the Vienna Consensus
Christopher
Brauchli
Lethal Injection, the Supremes and China
Manuel Garcia, Jr.
Paying No Attention to the Presidential Campaigns
Andrew Silverstein
Bush's Weepy Visit to Jerasulem
Marwan Bishara
Bush in the Middle East
Robert Weissman
The First Amendment Gone Wild
Patrick Irelan
Damn the Small Boats!
Website of
the Day
Hillary and the Superdelegates: Or Why She Wins Even When She
Loses
January 10,
2008
Alexander Cockburn
Now
Nader Claims He Didn't Endorse Edwards
Bob Wing
Marqueece Harris-Dawson
Race Within the Race: Obama, the NH Vote and the Specter of Tom
Bradley
Michael Donnelly
White Women Gone Wild?
David Macaray
Three Big Reasons for the Decline of Labor Unions
China Hand
Bush's Delusional Policy Pushes Pakistan to Brink of Catastrophe
Ayesha Ijaz Khan
Saudi Arabia and Pakistan: Brotherly, Friendly Countries?
Rannie Amiri
Obama, Man of Kansas or Kenya?
Website of the Day
Iranian Video of the Hormuz Incident
January 9,
2008
Cockburn /
St. Clair
The
Empire Strikes Back
Dave Lindorff
The Bad News from New Hampshire: Death By Triangulation
John Chuckman
Pardon My Laughter: Watching the US Primaries from Canada
James Bovard
Stomping Freedom: Inside the Martial Law Act of 2006
Alan Farago
As Florida Sinks: the View from the Titanic
Russell Mokhiber
Why Picket the New York Times in DC on Friday?
William S. Lind
Kicking the Can Down the Road in Iraq
Peter Morici
Beyond the Sophistry: Why the Trade Deficit Matters
Josh Reubner
Sudan vs. Israel: Double Standard on Divestment
Mike Roselle
The Pursuit of Happiness
Website of the Day
Bottles of Tears on the Wall: Steve Perry on NH
January 8,
2008
Paul Craig
Roberts
No
Jobs for the New Economy (or the Old)
Russell Mokhiber
The Black Hillary: Obama is Just Another Political Sedative
Robert Fantina
The Gulf of Tonkin and the Strait of Hormuz
Dave Zirin
Butts on Parade
Shamako Nobel
I Am an Emcee: the Politics of Hip Hop
John Ross
Zapatista Women Encounter Themselves
Brenda Norrell
Apaches Defend Homeland from Homeland Security
Laura Carlsen
Why Bolivia Matters
Patrick Irelan
Remember the Maine!
Evelyn J. Pringle
The Holes in Bush's FDA
Jonathan M.
Feldman
After Iowa and New Hampshire: a Strategy for Rebuilding the Peace
Movement
Michael Dickinson
Playing Soldier
Website of
the Day
Sean Hannity on the Run!
January 7,
2008
Chris Floyd
There
Will Be Blood: But No Justice for Iraq Atrocities
John Blair
Remove That Man! Creeping Fascism in Indiana
Uri Avnery
The Case of the White Bird
Andy Worthington
Who Are the Gitmo Saudis?
Binoy Kampmark
Needling the Convict: Lethal Injection and the Supreme Court
David Macaray
Women on Strike
Ralph Nader
Obamarama: the Politics of the Smooth Mood
Michael Donnelly
It's the War Vote(s), Stupid!
Ron Jacobs
Ron Paul's Run: Is Being Against the War Enough?
Gideon Levy
The Hostile President
Dave Lindorff
A Real 9/11 Cover-Up? Sibel Edmonds, Turkey and the Bomb
Website of
the Day
Plagues and Pleasures on the Salton Sea
January 5 /
6, 2008
Douglas Valentine
Good
Guys in Black Hoods
Kevin Young
The
US Occupation and Popular Opinion in Iraq
Richard Rhames
Saddam
Who?
Saul Landau
Bush Snatches Defeat from Victory
Marc Lynch
Why Bush's Iran Strategy is Failing
Robert Fantina
Iowa, Democrats and the Iraq War
Donna Volatile
Antiwar Soldier: an Interview with Jonathan Hutto, Sr.
Jelle Bruinsma
Norman Finkelstein in The Netherlands
Bob Sutcliffe
Remembering Andrew Glyn, Rebel Economist
Harvey Wasserman
Anti-Nuclear Renaissance
Missy Beattie
Why Obama Can't Save Us
David Swanson
Remembering the Separation of Powers
Jacob Hornberger
The Importance of the Padilla Case
Shepherd Bliss
Survival Tools from Kokopelli Farms
Ron Jacobs
Bleeding Kansas
Poets' Basement
Patti Smith, B.R. Gowani and Peter Buknatski
Website of the Weekend
Jimmy Dean Sausage Call Complaint
January 4,
2008
Cockburn /
St. Clair
A
Good Night in Iowa
Jonathan Cook
War Crimes Airbrushed from History
Paul Craig Roberts
Thinking for Yourself is Now a Crime
Stan Goff
Ron Paul's Monkeywrench
Dave Lindorff
Clinton's Iowa Flop Exposes DLC Myths as Frauds
Niranjan Ramakrishnan
To Pindi Station
Allan Nairn
U.S. Elections Over Before They Began
Joshua Frank
The Failures of Sectarianism
Peter Morici
Economy on the Skids
Mary McInnis
Iowa Cocky-Us: How to be a Caucus Tease
Website of the Day
The Return of Obama Girl
January 3,
2008
Fatima Bhutto
Farewell
to Wadi Bua
Pam Martens
The
Free Market Myth Dissolves into Chaos
Joanne Mariner
The Presidential Candidates and Torture
Zoltan Grossman
Remember the '80s: Social Movements Between Woodstock and the
Web
David Domke
The Echoing Press and Huckabee
Norman Solomon
Edwards Reconsidered
Nikolas Kozloff
Return of the Faux Liberal
Jacob G. Hornberger
The Padilla Case and the Future of Habeas Corpus
Martha Rosenberg
Quit Picking on Huckabee's Son, Michael Vick
Russell Means
This Property is Condemned: a Notice to Those Occupying Lakotah
Lands
Website of the Day
WolfQuest
|
Weekend
Edition
February 8 / 10, 2008
Could Nader be
the Come-Back Kid of 2008?
Down
But Not Out
By CHRIS DRISCOLL
As a life-long activist in the labor,
peace and social-justice movements, I've watched with amazement,
wonder, and exhilaration as the American people gave us the most
surprising primary races in decades; and that was just the first
month! We have eight months to go and undoubtedly many surprises
yet to come. The race among major party candidates has provided
more highs and lows than a calliope on rocket fuel. However,
we've already entered a new phase of the election cycle: the
Republicans are putting aside their differences in order to unify
around a strongly pro-war position. The Democrats have coalesced
on a neck-and-neck race between two "triangulating"
Iraq war funders whose differences are more about race, gender
and style than substance. And the progressive left has, as usual,
fallen into lockstep behind one or another corporate-owned Democrat
like some enabling abused spouse. Honest progressives will admit
that neither Sen. Hillary Clinton nor Sen. Barack Obama offer
us-at this point-a seriously better chance of ending the war
on Iraq and turning out attention-and tax dollars-toward desperate
domestic needs than Sen. John McCain does.
Sen. Obama on his official
campaign website says he will "immediately begin to remove
our troops from Iraq. He will remove one to two combat brigades
each month, and have all of our combat brigades out of Iraq within
16 months." The last I heard, removing "combat brigades"
could leave as many as 80,000 American troops in Iraq, not to
mention the thousands of American mercenaries from companies
like CACI, Titan and Blackwater, and a flood of American commercial
vultures who have been just as destructive to that war-torn country
as the troops and mercenaries have been. Sen. Clinton's deceitful
plan to continue the war and keep U.S. forces in Iraq in perpetuity
is not any better than Obama's. Neither Sens. Clinton nor Obama
have agreed even to pledge to get the U.S. military out of Iraq
by the end of their first term in 2013! And history is brutally
clear on one important point: while Democrats in the last century
have often promised to studiously avoid war while campaigning
for president, they have never followed through once in office.
President Lyndon B. Johnson, for a typical example, campaigned
by casting Barry Goldwater as the guy who would turn Vietnam
into an all-out war zone, but it was Johnson himself who did
that as president. And this "talk peace, wage war"
strategy goes way back with the Democratic presidential candidates:
Woodrow Wilson in his 1916 campaign for re-election stumped on
the slogans, "he kept us out of war," and "peace
with honor." Yet by April 1917, the United States had entered
the war that even Wilson himself later admitted was a fight between
international commercial interests over who was to control lucrative
international markets. Are the Democratic Party leaders of today
any different; any better; any more courageous and committed
to creating a world without war, even if corporate profits suffer
as a result? Most Americans know at some gut level that for Democratic
Party politicians commercial concerns always trump moral concerns
or the concerns of the hard-working people. We've seen it far
too often to deny it, even when we wish it were not so. Both
Sens. Clinton and Obama are following a campaign model in regard
to the War on Iraq that is most reminiscent of President Richard
M. Nixon when in his 1968 campaign he promised to get us out
of the Vietnam War in 6 months. That was even quicker than Obama's
18 month promise. But after Nixon was elected, there were "complications,"
just as we can expect there will be "complications"
for Sens. Clinton or Obama. When you know in advance that these
"complications" will develop unless we are successful
at building a powerful and large enough anti-war juggernaut,
you can understand why some prefer the brutal honesty of a Sen.
John McCain, who is at least truthful about his intentions.
From the perspective of the
labor, peace and social justice movements, we are now left with
little-to-no maneuvering room within the Democratic Party, the
party progressive movements traditionally have looked to since
the 1930s for allies and alliances. With the withdrawal of Dennis
Kucinich, Bill Richardson and John Edwards, there is little chance
that the pro-people, anti-war position will have any leverage
at the Democratic Party nominating convention, not inside the
convention hall in any case. The demonstrations outside the hall
will probably remind us of the 1968 Democratic Convention in
Chicago.
Corporate America has already
won the election. With Sens. Clinton, Obama and McCain, their
interests are hedged three ways while the rest of us lose on
all counts. The presidential campaign will be at the center of
the public discourse from now till November 4. We are left with
only one reasonable alternative if we hope to force our issues
into this year's national public debate: support the independent
peace and justice candidate with the biggest megaphone, Ralph
Nader!
Alone, Nader still has huge
name recognition and a large and faithful following. If he is
joined by the larger social movements, and by the working families
so threatened by the acts of a Democratic Congress and Republican
president, he could turn that solid base into a powerful campaign
for the people insuring that the people's concerns are addressed.
At best, that could be turned into a three way race that would
for the first time in a century give the progressive left a much
needed face lift, opening up the prospect of building a mass,
independent political force to the left of the Democrats. Ask
yourself, why do Democratic Party politicians take you for granted?
Why do they count on your votes but ignore your needs? Why do
they talk like they care about you but act like they care a lot
more about your boss? Could it be that you are so utterly dependable
to them that they simply have no need to do any more than pretend
to address your interests? They make you the same promises election
year after election year, yet the rich keep getting richer, the
poor, poorer, and the peace, labor, woman's, minorities', environmental,
and other people's agendas keep getting the short shrift.
Now, I know that among some
right-leaning Progressive Democrats, just the mention of Ralph
Nader will elicit fits of rage followed by volleys of hate speech
more violent than even the worst Nazi or KKK invectives. Talk
show host Ed Schultz calls these people "hate merchants,"
and it's hard to argue with him. But in my experience over the
last 8 years as a Nader supporter intimately involved in the
labor, peace and social-justice movements, I've found that for
every hate merchant there are dozens of honest progressives who
know full well how important Ralph Nader has been to our movements
and what a great potential he offers as an effective incentive
for a Democratic Party presidential candidate to be more accommodating
and attentive than they have been in the past. Among the honest
majority, all acknowledge that Ralph Nader has been the single
most effective and important social reformer in the last half
century. In nations across the world when reformers look for
models, they look to Ralph Nader, who is almost as well known
abroad as here in America. Honesty compels us to admit that we
have no greater asset to run as a center-left counterbalance
to the corporate-dominated Democratic and Republican candidates,
even now, after a concerted and well financed, 8-year corporate-Democrat
smear campaign against him. I know of no other person in American
history who, after doing so much for our people, has withstood
such a sustained campaign of malicious character assassination.
But a single viewing of the documentary, "An Unreasonable
Man," reminds us that Nader is a political pugilist who's
been through the worst corporate America and its two parties
can throw at him, and he's still standing! What's even more amazing,
he's still ready and willing to serve our cause, to serve the
American people, as he has been unfailingly for more than 40
years. Americans who have been fooled by the triangulators usually
fail to understand that when you stand up to the warmongers and
corporate criminals, you will always elicit a violent reaction.
A test of political maturity and determination so crucial to
our success is how well we are able to inoculate ourselves from
the slings and arrows of these political opponents. Is it any
wonder that the people who most fervently support the Democratic
Party war funders are also the most likely to turn to hate speech
against our most effective social reformer?
I expect the hate merchants
to throw their best punches at Nader and anyone else who dares
to suggest the emperor has no cloths. That's no surprise. What's
been more surprising in the last 8 years is the number of otherwise
honest progressives who have chosen to avoid objecting to the
Democratic Party's ad hominem crusade against America's preeminent
civic reformer. The damage they have inflicted on Nader's reputation
harms us all. Their every success is a blow to the entire effort
for political reform, peace and prosperity. In warfare an enemy
strikes at your leadership, and wise armies protect their generals
knowing as much.
But it's not too late. We have
the ability to turn this situation around if we chose to, and
by turning it around for Ralph Nader, I believe we can redeem
our own fortunes as well. To start that process, we need to shine
a light on the corporate-Democrats' subterranean hate campaigns,
aimed at selected leading reformers, but designed to damage our
movements. The honest progressives, laborites, populists, Greens,
civil libertarians, radicals and reformers of this country have
the power to stand up and say, once and for all, "Ralph
Nader is not the problem, untrustworthy Democratic and Republican
politicians are." In fact, Ralph Nader represents everything
positive about our movements for social change and has for decades
acted as a leader, a catalyst and an organizer for those movements.
Often when you hear the axiom,
"the left is like a circular firing squad," it turns
out to be a false analogy. The so-called "leftists"
we supposedly fire upon are revealed to be fakers, not the genuine
article. Like wolves in sheep's clothing, they talk the people's
talk, but walk the corporate walk. Listen to Sens. Clinton or
Obama on any given day, and then compare that to their votes
in Congress. Their votes to fund Bush's war on Iraq are well
publicized, and contrast critically with what they say about
the war. But you would find the same incongruity between what
they say and how they vote on just about any economic, labor,
peace or social justice issue. And the contrast with Ralph Nader's
4-decade record of public service is instructive. Only the most
dishonest person would claim that Ralph Nader is not a genuine
reformer on behalf of the people. We truly become a "circular
firing squad" when we allow others to fire on him without
coming to his defense, which is the best way we can come to our
own defense. We are no better than those who stand aside and
watch a violent crime against a helpless individual if we don't
speak out against it. And when we stand by and watch the innocent
mugged and raped in our communities, our communities suffer by
becoming the victims of spreading crime.
One thing that decades of experience
in the labor movement has taught me is that "solidarity"
with your co-workers, co-thinkers and co-activists is useless
if it is only a hollow phrase. For it to be successful, solidarity
must be an act of courage, not just a rallying cry. It must represent
a willingness to band together and defend the weakest or the
strongest among you when they are attacked. The current weakened
state of the labor movement undoubtedly has something to do with
the fact that "solidarity" frequently appears in the
speeches of labor leaders, but seldom as a strategy or tactic
in our day to day labor rights struggles. Given Ralph Nader's
record of promoting successful pro-labor legislation and movements,
the way the leadership of organized labor has joined in the corporate
smear campaign against him is doubly unconscionable, although
it is not universal among them. There have been some exceptional
labor leaders who stuck by Nader in the true sense of the term
"solidarity."
I believe in the power of the
"come back." Maybe I read too many novels, but in the
case of Ralph Nader, I look as objectively as I am able to at
the numbers, the positives and negatives, and I continue to conclude
that a Nader 08 presidential campaign offers a better chance
for the progressive left to make a serious "come back"
than any other opportunity we have available to us today. If
the honest progressives stand up to the triangulators and war
funders, the fake friends of labor, women and oppressed minorities,
and say, "hey, we can do better-we have to do better,"
we will have what it takes to run a powerful, insurgent, Nader
reform campaign for president, and together we can accomplish
what seems impossible. If we allow ourselves to be browbeaten
by the fraudulent peace candidates, the triangulators, the corporate-controlled
politicians and the hate merchants, we might as well give it
all up and acknowledge that the faceless corporate powers have
won, our republic is as dead as the Roman Republic on the day
Julius Caesar crossed the Rubicon, and we'd better start practicing
our goose step.
We've arrived at the leading
edge of a historic watershed, a unique period in which the American
people are obviously alarmed over the coming economic crisis;
outraged over the mortgage debacle that was engineered by the
Federal Reserve, Congress and the last two presidents; angered
by an unrestrained corporate crime wave that has wiped out the
pensions of millions and put millions more out of work; dismayed
by the deregulation and privatization that has sold our nation
off to the highest bidder; and, feed up with a costly corporate-inspired
war that has siphoned off the funds needed to avert domestic
catastrophe. We are equally weary of the bumbling destructive
Bush administration and the backboneless Democratic Congress
that enables the bumbling Bush. We've not seen such incompetence
in the White House and Congress since the 1920s! And we are ready
to change course and seek out real solutions.
The polls showing historic
low ratings for the president and Congress are key indicators
that the American people are approaching a breaking point. As
a people, we have declared our independence in ever greater numbers
and expressed our discontent with the direction in which the
president and the Congress have taken us. Nearly half of us (48
percent in a 2006 CNN poll) have expressed support for a mass
third party. In a more recent NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll
taken from Dec. 14-17, 2007, 76 percent characterized the American
two-party system as having either "real problems" in
need of repair or as "seriously broken." A Fox News
poll in July 2007 found that " more than twice as many voters
think it would be good for the country if an independent candidate
were to win the White House in 2008 than think it would be bad
(45 percent good, 19 percent bad). In addition, there is rare
partisan agreement on the issue as 42 percent of Democrats and
44 percent of Republicans think electing an independent candidate
would be good for the country, as do 56 percent of self-described
independents." The Fox poll also found that 67 percent would
consider voting for an independent, "including more than
6 in 10 Democrats and Republicans."
Americans are still unsure
of how to fit into our new role as a nation in rebellion. Those
who last lived through such a time as adults are now in their
late 50s, 60s, 70s and 80s. It will take time for us to grow
sea legs, to relearn the lessons of our forefathers and foremothers
about how to reform corrupt government and recreate the balance
we once had between the rights of the people and the rights of
commercial business. But I am convinced that enough of us are
ready to make history this year with a Ralph Nader campaign,
enough of us at least to offer a successful incentive to the
major party candidates to be better and act better, and that's
why I've urged Ralph Nader to run. And you can be ready as well,
as long as you first learn to defend one another from the "divide
and conquer" strategy of America's corrupt corporate elite.
If you are able to recognize that the Democratic Party slander
campaign against Ralph Nader is part and parcel with other corporate
strategies, like their union busting strategy or their subtle
use of racism, sexism and classism to divide us from one another,
then you'll be ready too. As a first step, please visit http://www.naderexplore08.org.
Chris Driscoll, a science, environmental and technology
trade journalist, was the 2006 Populist Party nominee for Governor
of Maryland. He also serves as the state chairman of the Populist
Party of Maryland.
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