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  • Mark Weisbrot: Hidden turbulence could send economy into a recessionary tailspin in 2006
    1 January 2006 par (Open-Publishing)
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    By Mark Weisbrot
    WASHINGTON — Will the U.S. economy do as well in 2006 as it did in 2005? That may well depend on whether we can make it through another year without any of the current economy’s big imbalances and unsustainable trends coming back to bite us. The median forecast for Gross Domestic Product growth in 2006, according to Bloomberg News’ latest survey of 71 economists, is 3.4 percent. This is a little less than estimates for 2005, although a significant slowing from last (…)

  • An Open Letter To the Congress of the United States
    1 January 2006 par (Open-Publishing)
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    by Monica Benderman
    .... at the exclusion of the few courageous members who are willing to stand on their own and speak the truth... with all due respect.
    What are you afraid of? That without your office you are nothing? That it is your elected office that makes you who you are, and if you lose it, you will be nothing more than a common citizen again? Perhaps that is what has to happen, for you to realize that even in office, you are a common citizen. You are failing us - time to go (…)

  • Happy New Year! What, no terror alerts?
    1 January 2006 par (Open-Publishing)
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    If anybody needs any more proof of how phony the Bushies’ war on terror is, all one had to do was go out on New Year’s Eve or watch the festivities in NY or elsewhere.
    Everywhere, people were reveling, partying and generally having a grand time. What was missing from this year’s festivities were the fascist federal government’s phony terror alerts.
    What, were the terrorists taking a vacation? The right-wing loonies will tell us that our beneficient federales are doing such a bang-up job (…)

  • Happy New Year! MSNBC Poll Says 86% Favor Impeachment
    1 January 2006 par (Open-Publishing)

    Happy New Year! MSNBC Poll Says 86% Favor Impeachment MSNBC poll now, at this link, with 184,866 responses (as I write this)...... The online question: "Do you believe President Bush’s actions justify impeachment?"
    The 184,866 responses:
    "Yes, between the secret spying, the deceptions leading to war and more, there is plenty to justify putting him on trial. 86%
    No, like any president, he has made a few missteps, but nothing approaching ’high crimes and misdemeanors.’ 4%
    No, the man (…)

  • POLITICS-IRAQ: US-Shiite Struggle Could Spin out of Control
    1 January 2006 par (Open-Publishing)

    by Gareth Porter*
    WASHINGTON, (IPS) - The George W. Bush administration has embarked on a new effort to pressure Iraq’s militant Shiite party leaders to give up their control over internal security affairs that could lead the Shiites to reconsider their reliance on U.S. troops.
    The looming confrontation is the result of U.S. concerns about the takeover of the Interior Ministry by Shiites with close ties to Iran, as well as the impact of officially sanctioned sectarian violence against (…)

  • A Fight for the Future
    1 January 2006 par (Open-Publishing)

    by JOSHUA B. FREEMAN
    Editor’s Note: Bus and subway workers in New York City agreed to return to work and to the bargaining table Thursday as negotiators for the Transport Workers Union and the Metropolitan Transit Authority worked on a final settlement after a two-day strike that immobilized the city. Joshua B. Freeman examines the history and issues at stake: the fight against the lie that abstract, neutral economic necessity, not the ideas and interests of the rich and powerful, are (…)

  • Their two cents: Protesters hang up on tax for Iraq war
    1 January 2006 par (Open-Publishing)

    By Beth Potter
    Peace activist Bill Sulzman in Colorado Springs protests the war in Iraq by refusing to pay the federal excise tax of about 50 cents on his monthly phone bill.
    Sulzman also recruits others who are against U.S. military involvement in Iraq to stop paying the tax, which was first adopted in 1898 to pay for the Spanish- American War.
    The tax raises about $5 billion a year, which activists say goes to fund war efforts. The Internal Revenue Service won’t confirm that the (…)

  • Interfaith leaders invoke morality in healthcare debate
    1 January 2006 par (Open-Publishing)

    By Scott S. Greenberger, Globe Staff
    Let the politicians and lobbyists argue about copayments and premiums. The Rev. Hurmon Hamilton and Rabbi Jonah Pesner are waging their fight to expand healthcare coverage on a different, higher plane.
    ’’We don’t have anything in the game but the people we represent," Hamilton said on a windswept corner outside his Roxbury Presbyterian Church. ’’When we’re out there, we really are concerned about the 750,000 people without healthcare, and a large (…)

  • Constitution loses in Haiti election fight: analysts
    1 January 2006 par (Open-Publishing)

    By Jim Loney
    MIAMI (Reuters) - Haiti’s constitution is being violated by both the U.S.-backed interim government and by the candidacy of a Haitian American millionaire running strongly in the polls in a long delayed election, analysts say.
    "The government has not been paying much attention to the constitution," said Brian Concannon, a U.S. lawyer who worked in Haiti and helped prosecute military leaders accused of a peasant massacre.
    The first round of voting in the troubled Caribbean (…)

  • Note to Health Care Reform Activists: Public Employee Health Benefits to Evaporate
    1 January 2006 par (Open-Publishing)

    by Andy Coates
    According to two recent articles, one in the New York Times and one in the Wall Street Journal, the federal Governmental Accounting Standards Board has begun to require municipalities — states, counties, cities — to account for how much it will cost them to provide all the health care promised to present and retired public employees. This process, to be completed over the next 3 years, has already started in states like Alaska, Delaware, and Maryland and cities like Duluth, (…)