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 Latest Headlines
By Rob Kall
Waiting For Obama... in The Fields of Oz  After Obama was elected, many liberals, Democrats and progressives found themselves in the same situation as Dorothy, the lion, tinman and straw man when they wandered onto the poppy field of Oz, soporifically cursed by the wicked witch of the west, even with the gleaming Emerald City in plain sight. By lila york
the DSK set-up. IMF Chief Caught in a Honey-Trap  The arrest of IMF Chief and potential French presidential candidate,Dominique Strauss-Kahn, is rife with a fishy smell. Mike Whitney looks into the background and possible motives for a set-up reminiscent of Eliot Spitzer's take-down. By Kevin Gosztola
New US International Cybersecurity Strategy Aims to Institute 'Rule of Law' on the Internet  The United States officially launched its international cyber security strategy in a White House event on Monday, May 16. But, at no time during the launch of the strategy was WikiLeaks mentioned. Not even Clinton bothered to mention it, despite the fact that she heads a State Department that had their department's classified information leaked. By Phil Rockstroh
Leaving a Church of Free-Market Miracles  It is a common (unspoken) fear of the men I grew up around down south that if they were to let go of what little they clutch, nothing would arrive to replace what would be lost. By Mikhail Lyubansky
Beauty May Be In Eye of Beholder But Eyes See What Culture Socializes  Kanazawa's claims aside, there is no single "objective" standard of beauty. The adage that "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" is incomplete. Sure, there are individual differences. The point is that there are also group differences, not in attractiveness (as Kanazawa claims), but in cultural messages about what is and is not attractive. By Richard Clark
America's Middle Class & the Banksters Who Are Helping Decimate It
Corporate stealing has become a kind of national pastime for the financial elite, and Goldman Sachs is far from the only company getting away with it. If the Justice Department fails to give us a chance to judge this case, and if Goldman skates without so much as a trial, it will confirm once and for all that the law in America has become subjective, and that crime is now defined not by what you did, but by who you know. By Michael Collins
Strong Unions - The Worst Nightmare for the Financial Elite  It's time for a strong union movement for the benefit of workers and everyone else who wants a decent wage and benefits program. By Jesselyn Radack
The New Yorker's Damning Dissection of "Leak" Prosecution of Thomas Drake  Former National Security Agency (NSA) official Thomas Drake faces some of the gravest charges that can be brought against an American: trial under the Espionage Act for allegedly "retaining" classified information. Thankfully, The New Yorker has put this case under a miscroscope and revealed this criminalization of whistleblowing to be the government covering up for its own sins of secret domestic surveillance. Rob Kall: There's A Bottom Up Tidal Wave Underway. Will You Surf It?  There's a bottom up revolution going on. Our world, culture, business, brains, ways we work, relate and see things are all transitioning from top down to bottom up, from centralized to decentralized, from an information era to a connection era. This is not something you can ignore or avoid. It is a tidal wave that is changing everything. If you don't get it and ride the wave it will knock you over and leave you behind. By Ranjit Goswami
For A Change, A Case On American Values
Regaining faith in 'American values' - by the handling of the case involving Dominique Strauss-Kahn. Supreme Court gives police a new entryway into homes  The justices in an 8-1 decision said officers who loudly knock on a door and then hear sounds suggesting evidence is being destroyed may break down the door and enter without a search warrant. Residents who "attempt to destroy evidence have only themselves to blame" when police burst in, said Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. 10 Indications The United States Is A Dictatorship  It's not fair to say Barack Obama is the first dictator of The United States, but rather he is part of a continued expansion of executive power that is now so great that by all measures America can no longer be called a Land of the Free ruled by We the People. We stand no chance of reversing this forced march by false democracy until we understand where we are headed, who is leading us there, and for what purpose. By Stephanie Westbrook
Pizzarotti should follow in Deutsche Bahn's footsteps  The Italian firm Pizzarotti feigns ignorance on its involvement in the A1 train line linking Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, crossing the occupied Palestinian territories. For Our Top 400 Taxpayers, a Near-Record Year, by Sam Pizzigati  Earth provides enough to satisfy every man's need, but not every man's greed. Mahatma Gandhi By Jim Hightower
A battery of elected ideologues opens fire on those who serve the public  The Powers That Be don't like us thinking in terms of class war, or even using the phrase. But from the ever-expanding wealth gap to the relentless downsizing and offshoring of American jobs, from the Supreme Court's enthronement of corporate political money to the state-by-state offensive on worker power--what else can it be called? By Mac McKinney
Syrian President "Papa Doc" Assad's Torture State  The reactionary Syrian regime of Bashar Assad has embraced torture whole-heartedly in its attempt to crush the Arab Awakening in Syria. The rest of the world must take a stronger stand against this or live with the sordid consequences. By kenneth sibbett
Patting Down Babies~Bin Laden Wins Anyway
All Americans are proud of our military for flying into Pakistan and killing Osama Bin Laden. I am glad the last face he seen was an American soldier. But, we have to get over the fear of a terrorist behind every tree and start living again.Yes, we need to be remain vigilant and we need to keep our eye on the ball. But patting down babies and little old women for bombs is just dumb. TSA agents need to us common sense, again! By Bob Patterson
Zen and the art of being a Kerouac wannabe
What if people don't need "stuff"? By William P. Homans
Out In The Garden It's Another World  A metaphor, a lesson, packaged as a backyard phenomenological observation. We can (and should!) learn a lot from ants. By Tom Engelhardt
Nick Turse, Obama and the Mideast Arms Trade
This is the week when President Obama is to give a major speech to "reset" his administration's policies in the new Middle East of the Arab Spring. Only problem, as Turse writes: "All signs indicate that the Pentagon will quietly maintain antithetical policies, just as it has throughout the Obama years." By Roger Shuler
Could the Koch Brothers' Money Express Run Afoul of the IRS?  The IRS is looking closely at nonprofit advocacy groups. By Dave Lefcourt
We Are at War All Over The World
Leave no doubt; we are at war all over the world. A classified executive order AQN Ex Ord or Al Qaeda Network Executive Order was signed by then Sec'y of Defense Donald Rumsfeld in 2004 and now expanded by Pres. Obama. It allows "US Special Forces to move to denied areas or countries beyond official battle zones and to operate lethally and unilaterally in any country around the globe. We are at war everywhere. By Stephen Lendman
Killing Rachel Corrie Twice
Breaking Gaza's siege Latest Articles
THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY
The Federal Reserve in collaboration with the giant banks has created the greatest financial crisis the world has ever seen. The foolish notion that unlimited amounts of money and credit created out of thin air can provide sustainable economic growth has delivered this crisis to us. August To June. Teach Our Children Well  "One Class" plus "One Year" equals more than the sum of these parts. Through twenty-six eight to ten year olds, and a Teacher, the Whole Child concept is understood. here is much that makes up a Whole Child, a Whole Classroom, and a Whole Life. Haiti: Time to remember Kandyo, the Malfini and Mongoose  US/UN False Benevolence in Haiti.Farmer was running for the Executive Director position at USAID that Rajiv Shah now holds. As the head of USAID, Shah, is being blasted about USAID 's failures. If Shah is a failure in Haiti, so is Farmer as Deputy UN Envoy - the consolation prize given by the Clinton/Obama Administration to Farmer when his nomination to head USAID did not fly. Sunday Bloody Sunday in Palestine  The Arab Spring has reached Israel's illegal borders. The world needs to make Israel follow international law in order to stop and prevent yet more violence and suffering. The Amazing Federal Reserve Reality TV Show
You're Fired! How many of us would like to say these famous words to lawmakers, policymakers and CEOs? The Federal Reserve is one of the most powerful organizations in the U.S. government. Yet few of us really understand what they do, why they do it and how they get away with it! The agency is shrouded in mystery, smoke and mirrors. In the wake of increasing public suspicion and criticism, the Fed is changing its stripes. The Reason We May See $5 a Gallon Gas.
Unless congress keeps a leash on the speculators we will see the price of gas at historic levels before summers end. T-Minus Six Days and Counting...  According to Harold Camping, the 89-year-old founder of Family Radio, the Rapture (really, this is the one, no kidding!) is scheduled for this Saturday May 21st at 6PM. A Closer Look at the Ongoing Wisconsin Recount  I got interested in the WI Supreme Court recount because I was appalled that the Waukesha County Clerk could fail to report an entire city's vote total-over 14,000 votes!-and just say oops and not have anyone look into it.If you or I failed that colossally at our job,we would be fired.I want to know what happened.People are angry over this.We have a right to oversee the voting system and make sure it is fair and functional. The Obama Deception: Why Cornel West Went Ballistic  West, who did 65 campaign events for Obama, believed in the potential for change and was encouraged by the populist rhetoric of the Obama campaign. He now nurses, like many others who placed their faith in Obama, the anguish of the deceived, manipulated and betrayed. Can Americans Be Unplugged?  As the fable continues, try to rescue from the Memory Hole the fact that we were presented with a death without a corpse and that Washington has no explanation for why an unarmed, undefended, frail man, who was a font of terrorist information, was murdered and not captured.  Best News Links from the Web
International Monetary FundRSS Related articles, background features and opinions about this topic. * Print *  Dominique Strauss Kahn was an unusual choice for head of the IMF, but his re-structuring of the world's monetary guardian organization drew considerable praise from many sides. The rape allegations against him however now jeapordize direly needed negotiations to stabilize the EURO, which is under attack by reckless international speculators. Strauss Kahn, who intended to run for president in France, has many powerful enemies, and rumors state that Sarkozy warned him to "never ride alone with a woman in an elevator again." Will we ever know what really happened? FDL: Waking the Dead  Are citizens whose deaths are caused by societal malfeasance then killed non-violently? A sheriff with a gun on his hip serving foreclosure papers to an elderly widow is that violence or non-violence? Four or five hundred workers displaced so that share holders might earn an extra penny per share and a government that not only condones this behavior but encourages it. How is this in anyway different other than format from Pol Pot? How is depriving workers of a chance to make a decent living in anyway different other than format from killing off the buffalo? The compassion of a government in Washington is the same as it was for the Native Americans when it answers, tough! Too bad and sucks to be you! Kloppenburg Responds to Shameful 'Journal Standard' Editorial Mocking Need for WI 'Recount'
The Journal Sentinel's three paragraph, anti-democratic (small "d") pot-shot last week --- which may as well have been written by the campaign of Justice Prosser, criminally-inclined candidate who the paper endorsed (even as they failed to disclose that point in their editorial) --- was riddled with evidence-free assertions, and mocked the very idea of a "recount" as a "waste of time", on the grounds that they believe "nothing will change in the election for state Supreme Court."The paper failed, sadly, to note that more than 2,600 votes have, so far, been discovered as originally mistallied by the state's woeful computerized tabulation systems (and that's with hand counts performed in only 31 of the state's 72 counties)and the inability to confirm, thanks to the blatant violations of chain of custody, that thousands of votes being counted are actually the same as those originally cast. Israel's border massacre and human rights hypocrisy
The Obama administration's reaction to Israel's massacre Sunday of unarmed Palestinian protesters on its borders underscores the hypocrisy of those ascribing "humanitarian" motives to Washington's predatory policy in the region. 4 US soldiers killed in blast in Afghanistan  Four American soldiers serving with NATO forces in Afghanistan died Monday in an explosion in the country's south. An official said they were hit by an improvised explosive device. He spoke on condition of anonymity because relatives of those killed were still being notified. The latest deaths make a total of 16 NATO service members killed so far this month, and 167 so far this year. Gaddafis Named as International Criminal Court Suspects  Colonel Gaddafi dodged a bullet back in 2004 when Professor David Crane, Chief Prosecutor at the Special Court of Sierra Leone between 2002-05 that charged Liberian warlord Charles Taylor with war crimes, was pressured by Bush, Blair and their Neocon circle of friends to drop his plans to co-indict Muammar Gaddafi as the master-mind behind Charles Taylor's murderous attacks on civilians in Sierra Leone, despite evidence that implicated Gaddafi in the mutilation, maiming and slaying of more than one million people in that hapless country. Even Taylor demanded to know why the Colonel wasn't in the dock with him. Now however, Gaddafi is a stone's throw away from being indicted for crimes against humanity as three ICC judges consider ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo's request for arrest warrants against the Colonel, his son Saif and his intelligence chief Abdullah Senussi. N.Y. State Investigates Banks' Role in Fiscal Crisis
The New York attorney general has requested information and documents in recent weeks from three major Wall Street banks about their mortgage securities operations during the credit boom, indicating the existence of a new investigation into practices that contributed to billions in mortgage losses. Special Education Means No Education For Many Youth Of Color by Ernest Saadiq Morris, Urban Youth Justice  Is Special Education the Ed Reform-era dumping ground for Black Youth? "Special education warehousing of Black youth and other youth of color is rampant in too many urban school districts. Special education warehousing is the disproportionate removal of youth of color from general education classrooms through referrals to special education classrooms that segregate them from the student population...This practice is similar to the post-Brown v. Board era practice of discriminatory labeling of Black and Latino students as mildly retarded in order to dump them in segregated classrooms -- in an attempt to avoid the legally required integration of public schools." Jeb Bush's education ideas draw national attention
With the help of Bush's Foundation for Excellence in Education, governors and lawmakers in at least 17 states -- mostly, though not all, Republican -- have explored legislation based on the "Florida model." That includes grading schools on a A-to-F scale based on standardized test scores, making reading a requirement of advancing to the fourth grade, and giving parents and students private-school vouchers and online courses. How federal worker pensions might be targeted
After years of fighting for and against it, the White House and congressional negotiators are seriously discussing the possibility of forcing at least some federal employees to pay more towards their retirement pension. Donald Trump: I won't run for president  Reporting from Washington and New York -- Donald Trump, whose public flirtation with a presidential run has overshadowed the early stages of the Republican primary race, announced Monday that he will not be a candidate in 2012. He said that he believes that had he run, he could have won. At least 12 killed as Israel fires on Palestinian protesters  The surging tide of popular unrest in the Arab world reached Israel's borders Sunday for the first time as thousands of Palestinian refugees and fellow Arab protesters attempted to cross tightly secured frontiers from Syria, Lebanon and the Gaza Strip.
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