Today's Stories

April 22, 2008

David Isenberg
Spinning Saddam's Linkages

April 21, 2008

Bill Quigley
The U.S. Role in Haiti's Food Riots

Uri Avnery
The Lion and the Gazelle

Dave Lindorff
The U.S. Economy and the Costs of War

Wajahat Ali
Finding Osama Bin Laden with Morgan Spurlock

Andy Worthington
Hollow Gestures at Guantánamo

Robert Jensen
The Sorrows of Race and Gender

Ron Jacobs
Clampdown at Evergreen

Dan Bacher
The Great Salmon Closure

Harvey Wasserman
Where's George?

Danny Alexander
Remembering Danny Federici

Website of the Day
Save Our Taco Trucks!

April 19 / 20, 2008

Alexander Cockburn
McCain: What Really Happened When He Was a POW?

Patrick Cockburn
A New Struggle is Beginning in Iraq

Wajahat Ali
Zinn Speaks

Andrew Wimmer
Papal Benedictions

Rev. William E. Alberts
Jeremiah Wright and America's Continuing "Separate and Unequal" Societies

David Rosen
Texas Two-Step: The Polygamy Raid and the Regulation of Sexual Life

Robert Fantina
McCain Detests War?

Ramzy Baroud
The Politics of Armageddon: McCain's Pastors and the Middle East

Saul Landau
The No Escape Clause on Iraq

Dr. Susan Block
Raelians, Aliens and Evolution

David Yearsley
Suitcase Arias and Ithacan Jazz

Phyllis Pollack
On the Red Carpet with the Rolling Stones

Jeffrey St. Clair
Booked Up

Poets' Basement
Hartz, Newberry and Khaiyat

April 18, 2008

John Ross
The Bush Legacy: Losing Latin America

Dave Lindorff
Courage and Conviction: In Praise of Bill Ayers

Dan Glazebrook
An Interview with Robert Fisk

Carl Finamore
A Look Inside the Hangars

Rannie Amiri
J Street: Do We Really Need Another Pro-Israel Lobby?

Richard Morse
A Creepy Roadblock at Midnight

Ko Young-dae
CONPLAN 8022: Inside Bush's Nuclear War Plan for the Korean Peninsula

Farooq Sulehria
A Himalayan Surprise

April 17, 2008

Michael Hudson
Hillary Joins the Vast Rightwing Financial Conspiracy

Robert Bryce
The Ethanol Apologists

Kathy Kelly
Weary of War? Don't Collaborate

Madis Senner
The Carrion Feeders' Ball: How Hedge Funds Reap Billions Off Economic Misery

Peter Morici
The G7, the Banks and GE

Ron Jacobs
Washington, al-Maliki and the Militias

William S. Lind
A Confirming Moment in Basra

James Murren
Obama's Disconnect with Small Town America

Ben Terrall
Losing Haiti

Walter Brasch
Political Log Rolling in Clinton County, PA

Website of the Day
Stealth Attack: Homegrown "Terrorism" Bill

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
The Raid on Ecuador: Underestimating Rafael Correa

Christopher Brauchli
The Turkish Invasions

Steven Sherman
Obama and the Prospects for a Renewal of the Left

Dave Lindorff
Busting Bush & Co. in New England

James Murren
Bombing Somalia

Adam Engel
Necropolis Now

Website of Day
Remember Song

March 4, 2008

Wajahat Ali
Mumbo Jumbo: Naming Names with Ishmael Reed

William Blum
How Could Hillary Have Known?

Bill Quigley
The Cleansing of New Orleans

Ralph Nader
The Prince Harry Solution

Patrick Irelan
Oil and Health in Venezuela

James J. Brittain /
R. James Sacouman
Uribe's Colombia is Destabilizing a New Latin America

Norman Solomon
The War Election

Jacob Hornberger
Hillary in Waco: the Missing Apology

Andy Worthington
Guantánamo and the European Parliament

Mike Averko
Kosovo and the Press

Website of the Day
Tex-Mex Primary

March 3, 2008

Jennifer Loewenstein
Gazan Holocaust

Alan Farago
American Politics and the Faltering Economy

Richard Gott
Colombian Deaths in Ecuador

Wajahat Ali
Who Speaks for a Billion Muslims? Analyzing the World Gallup Poll with John Esposito

Paul Craig Roberts
The Mukasey Conspiracy: a Bi-Partisan Attack on the Constitution

Robert Weissman
When Multinationals Say Adieu

Uri Avnery
Good Morning, Hamas

Martha Rosenberg
When Your Meat is a Downer

Eva Liddell
Leave the Next Dance for Bill

Michael Donnelly
Will Ferrell Does Flint

Website of the Day
Muddy Waters: Train Fare Home Blues

Subscribe Online

When Will You Confront the Blood-Stained Face of History?

What About the War, Pope Benedict?

By RAY McGOVERN

Pope Benedict XVI arrived in Washington last week against a macabre backdrop featuring reports of torture, execution, and war.  He chose not to notice.

Torture:  Fresh reporting by ABC from inside sources depicted George W. Bush’s most senior aides (Cheney, Powell, Rumsfeld, Ashcroft, Rice, and Tenet) meeting dozens of times in the White House during 2002/03 to sort out the most efficient mix of torture techniques for captured “terrorists.”

When initially ABC attempted to insulate the president from this sordid activity, Bush abruptly bragged that he knew all about it and approved.  That comment and the action memorandum Bush signed on Feb. 7, 2002 dispelled any lingering doubt regarding his personal responsibility for authorizing torture.

Execution:  Meanwhile, the Supreme Court with a majority of judges calling themselves Catholic, was openly deliberating on whether one gram, or two, or perhaps three of this or that chemical would be the preferred way to execute people.  Always colorful prominent Catholic layman Antonin Scalia complained impatiently, “Where does it say in the Constitution that executions have to be painless?”

Scalia did not seem at all concerned that the pope might remind him and his Catholic colleagues about the Church’s teaching on capital punishment; i.e., the cases in which the execution of the offender is an absolute necessity “are very rare, if not practically non-existent.”

It was enough to bring this student of German history (and five-year resident there) vivid memories of frequenting those places where precisely these kinds of torture and execution policies were conducted at similarly high levels by Hitler’s inner circle--yes, including judges.

War:  Can the pope possibly be so suffused with his peculiar brand of theology that he is oblivious to what happened when he was a young man during the Third Reich.

Is it possible that papal advisers forgot to tell him that the post-WW II Nuremberg Tribunal described an unprovoked war of aggression, of the kind that the Third Reich and George W. Bush launched, as the “supreme international crime, differing from other war crimes only in that it contains the accumulated evil of the whole?”  Could they have failed to tell the pope he would be hobnobbing with war criminals, torturers, and the enabling cowards in Congress who refuse to remove them from office?

For this Catholic, it was a profoundly sad spectacle--profoundly sad.  Not since WW II, when the Reich’s bishops swore personal oaths of allegiance to Hitler (as did the German Supreme Court and army generals) have the papacy and bishops acted in such a fawning, un-Christ-like way.

During the Thirties, with very few exceptions, the bishops (Catholic and Evangelical Lutheran) collaborated with the Nazis.  Meanwhile, Hamlet-like Pius XII kept trying to make up his mind as to whether he should put the Catholic Church at some risk, while Jews were being murdered by the thousands.

Albert Camus

In 1948, in the shadow of that monstrous world war, the French author/philosopher  Albert Camus accepted an invitation from the Dominican Monastery of Latour-Maubourg.  To their credit, the Dominicans wanted to know what an “unbeliever” thought about Christians in the light of their behavior during the Thirties and Forties.  Camus’ words seem so terribly relevant today that it is difficult to trim them:

“For a long time during those frightful years I waited for a great voice to speak up in Rome.  I, an unbeliever?  Precisely.  For I knew that the spirit would be lost if it did not utter a cry of condemnation.

“It has been explained to me since, that the condemnation was indeed voiced.  But that it was in the style of the encyclicals, which is not all that clear.  The condemnation was voiced and it was not understood.  Who could fail to feel where the true condemnation lies in this case?

“What the world expects of Christians is that Christians should speak out, loud and clear, and that they should voice their condemnation in such a way that never a doubt, never the slightest doubt, could rise in the heart of the simplest man.  That they should get away from abstraction and confront the blood-stained face history has taken on today. (emphasis added)

 “It may be… that Christianity will insist on maintaining a compromise, or else on giving its condemnations the obscure form of the encyclical.  Possibly it will insist on losing once and for all the virtue of revolt and indignation that belonged to it long ago.

“What I know--and what sometimes creates a deep longing in me--is that if Christians made up their mind to it, millions of voices--millions, I say--throughout the world would be added to the appeal of a handful of isolated individuals, who, without any sort of affiliation, today intercede almost everywhere and ceaselessly for children and other people.” (emphasis added)
(Excerpted from Resistance, Rebellion, and Death: Essays)

Sixty years ago!

Perhaps the Dominican monks took Camus seriously; monks tend to listen.  Vatican functionaries, on the other hand, tend to know it all--and typically caution the pope to be “discrete.”  You saw that this past week with the pope in Washington and New York, as he forfeited the opportunity to follow the biblical injunction to speak truth to power--to speak out clearly, as Camus insisted, with whatever moral authority he could summon.

Catholics All Around

Think back to last week and the many prominent Catholics who flocked to see the pope--many of them officials with considerable influence in the Judiciary and Legislature, with important players in the Executive Branch as well.

There they were, with their families, the five Catholic Supreme Court justices, fresh from detailed deliberations on how best to implement state-sponsored killings, executions that are banned by virtually every civilized country.

Justice Scalia audibly salivated over how much noxious chemical should be shot into the veins of a “condemned,” and how quickly.  (For those with strong stomachs, C-SPAN captured the proceedings.)

I am embarrassed to acknowledge that, like me, Scalia is the product of a Jesuit education (Xavier H.S. in Manhattan and Georgetown College).  Despite his advocacy of “soft” torture techniques like driving nails under fingernails, Scalia continues to be lionized by many Jesuits and bishops alike.

In the House

Speaker Nancy Pelosi, erstwhile doyenne of the Archdiocese of Baltimore and now San Francisco and minority leader John Boehner (R, Ohio)--also a Catholic--seem about to allocate another hundred billion dollars to death and destruction in Iraq and Afghanistan for the most reprehensibly crass of political purposes--the coming election.  Congressman Jim McGovern (D, Massachusetts) last week tried to guild the lily, noting that Pelosi now insists that, in McGovern’s words,  “We’re an equal branch of government; we’re no longer a cheap date.”  Right.

Sadly, it appears that Pelosi’s key functionaries on House Appropriations (both of them Catholics) will cave in once again.  It is not as though they do not know the right thing to do.  Just six months ago Appropriations chair Dave Obey (D, WI) declared, “I have no intention of reporting out of committee anytime in this session of Congress any such [funding] request that simply serves to continue the status quo.”

Subcommittee chair John Murtha (D, PA) put it even more strongly a year before Obey did, and came close to calling the occupation of Iraq a lost cause--which, of course, it is.  But it is not politic to say that before the election.  Never mind the troops on the front lines.

Obey and Murtha caved last time.  I will find it particularly devastating if Obey caves again now, for I have always considered him among the best legislators in Congress.  And since he is from Wisconsin, Obey recognizes better than most others the McCarthy-ite demagoguery coming from the likes of Texas Republican Michael Burgess, to the effect that anything short of giving the president all the war funding he demands is “basically giving aid and comfort to the enemy.”

Pelosi also has been unusually candid in admitting that it is electoral politics, pure and simple, that explain her resistance to holding President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney accountable for high crimes and misdemeanors via the orderly procedure given us by the Founders for precisely this purpose--impeachment in the House; trial in the Senate.

If, as widely expected, the war funding goes through, several hundred more American troops are likely to die before some common sense can be injected into U.S. policy next year--not to mention how many Iraqis.

Iraq is a shambles.  Two million Iraqis have fled abroad; another two million are internal refugees.  Am I the only one who finds macabre the raging debate as to whether the attack and occupation of Iraq has resulted in a million or “only 300,000” Iraqis dead?

Apparently, the pope did not have any opinion on the Iraq war.

But Torture?

Surely the pope would speak out against the kind of torture for which our country has become famous: Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo, CIA “black sites”--the more so, since Jesus of Nazareth was tortured to death.  The pope chose silence, which presumably came as welcome relief to five-star torturer’s apprentice, Gen. Michael Hayden, now head of the CIA.  The White House has made clear that Hayden is ready to instruct his torturers to water board again, upon Caesar’s approval.

Hayden proved his mettle when he was head of the National Security Agency.  He saluted smartly when the president and vice president told him to disregard the Foreign Intelligence and Surveillance Act and his oath to defend the Constitution.  One of Hayden’s predecessors as NSA director asserted that Hayden should have been court-martialed.  Pelosi was briefed both on the illegal surveillance and the torture, but did nothing.

Having demonstrated his allegiance to the president, Hayden was picked to head the CIA.  The general likes to brag about his moral training and Catholic credentials.  At his nomination hearing, he noted that he was the beneficiary of 18 years of Catholic education.

And all the while it was quite clear he was positively lusting to be in charge of water boarding and other torture techniques--whatever you say, boss.  I was somewhat crestfallen after adding up my own years of Catholic education--only 17.  Clearly I missed “Enhanced Interrogation Techniques 301.”

Keep It General; Focus on Others’ Sins

Saturday at the UN, the pontiff pontificated on “God-given human rights” and “massive human rights abuses,” but pretty much left it at that.  The Washington Post reported that the pope was “short on specifics and long on broad themes.”

But there was one specific.  Here in the U.S., the pope seemed to prefer to dwell again and again on the pedophilia scandal--to the exclusion of much else.  He is to be applauded for meeting with victims of clergy sexual abuse and expressing deep shame, but he got a free pass from the media in disguising his own role in trying to cover the whole thing up.

While still Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, he headed The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith--the Vatican office that once ran the Inquisition.  In that capacity he sent a letter in May 2001 to all Catholic bishops throwing a curtain of secrecy over the widespread sexual abuse by clergy, warning the bishops of severe penalties, including excommunication for breaching “pontifical secrets.”

Lawyers acting for the sexually abused accused Ratzinger of “clear obstruction of justice.”

Very few American bishops have been disciplined.  And when Bernard Cardinal Law was run out of Boston for failing to protect children from predator priests, he was given a cushy sinecure in Rome; many believe he should be behind bars.

In an interview with the Catholic News Service in 2002, Ratzinger branded media coverage of the pedophilia scandal “a planned campaign…intentional, manipulated, a desire to discredit the Church.”

It is nice that the pope has now changed his tune.  And nicer still for him as he found himself in the congenial atmosphere of Washington, where it has been a very long time since powerful miscreants have been held accountable.

So What Did You Expect?

I do wish my friends would stop asking me that.

While it was good that the pope addressed the pedophilia issue head on, it seemed as though he and his politically astute advisers made a considered decision to devote inordinate amounts of time and energy to the abuse.  An all-too-familiar side-benefit of this focus on below-the-belt sexual issues enabled the pope to speak in glorious generality on other major issues--war, torture, capital punishment--in all of which, as we have seen, many of “the faithful” are deeply engaged--embarrassingly engaged.  Or am I the only one embarrassed?

I had hoped--naively, it turned out--that the pope might encourage his brother bishops to find the courage to state plainly what 109 bishops of the Methodist faith, George W. Bush’s tradition, declared on Nov. 8, 2005:

“We repent of our complicity in what we believe to be the unjust and immoral invasion and occupation of Iraq.  In the face of the United States Administration’s rush toward military action based on misleading information, too many of us were silent.

“We confess our preoccupation with institutional enhancement and limited agendas while American men and women are sent to Iraq to kill and be killed, while thousands of Iraqi people needlessly suffer and die.”

I had thought that perhaps the U.S. Catholic bishops could adopt the kind of resolution that 125 Methodist bishops signed on Nov. 9, 2007.  Speaking truth to power, the Methodists called for an immediate withdrawal of troops from Iraq and the reversal of any plans to establish permanent military bases there.

The Methodist bishops’ resolution noted:  “Every day that the war continues, more soldiers and innocent civilians are killed with no end in sight to the violence, bloodshed, and carnage.”  Bishop Jack Meadors summed up the situation succinctly:

“The Iraq war is not just a political issue or a military issue.  It is a moral issue.” (emphasis added)

Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem

Visiting Yad VaShem, the Holocaust museum in West Jerusalem last summer, I experienced painful reminders of what happens when the church allows itself to be captured by Empire.  An acquiescent church, it is clear, loses whatever residual moral authority it may have had.

At the entrance to the museum, a quotation by German essayist Kurt Tucholsky set a universally applicable tone:

“A country is not just what it does--it is also what it tolerates.”

Still more compelling words came from Imre Bathory, a Hungarian who put his own life at grave risk by helping to save Jews from the concentration camps.  Explaining why, Bathory said this:

“I know that when I stand before God on Judgment Day, I shall not be asked the question posed to Cain:  ‘Where were you when your brother’s blood was crying out to God?’”

Bush, Bible, and “Religion”

According to former President George H. W. Bush, George W. has “read the Bible straight through--twice.”  Perhaps he skipped by that passage too quickly; or maybe he is highly selective with respect to whom he considers his brothers.

No excuse for Benedict, though; he knows better.  And yet he opted to squander his glorious chance to speak out and make a difference.

Methodist bishop Meadors is right; the war is a moral issue.  But President Bush has refused, time and time again, to meet with his Methodist bishops.  And now he has the imprimatur of the pope.

The bottom line is challenging: to the degree that right and wrong, moral and immoral considerations are to be injected into discussions about war, executions, torture--well, let’s face it.  There is only us.

Are we up to it?  Shall we punt, like Benedict?  Shall we behave like “obedient Germans,” waiting, as if for Godot, for top-down moral guidance we know in our hearts will never come?

Augustine wrote:

“Hope has two beautiful daughters: their names are anger and courage.  Anger that things are the way they are.  Courage to make them the way they ought to be.”

The Founders gave us incredibly precious gifts we dare not fritter away.  I sense a lot of anger; I am confident we can summon the necessary courage.  What about you?

Ray McGovern works with Tell the Word, the publishing arm of the ecumenical Church of the Saviour in inner-city Washington, DC.  He is on the Steering Group of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS). He is a contributor to Imperial Crusades: Iraq, Afghanistan and Yugoslavia, edited by Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair (Verso).

This article first appeared on Consortiumnews.com.