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  • FORGIVE MY CYNICISM
    19 November 2005 par (Open-Publishing)
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    FORGIVE MY CYNICISM
    By Peter Fredson
    November 19, 2005
    I was not always cynical of American politics, civics, and public service. Indeed, I thought highly of “American Values” such as patriotism, honor, honesty, keep one’s sworn word, doing one’s duty to country, and serving honorably. Although I knew that the words “Liberty” and “Democracy” had multiple meanings for philosophers and linguists, to me they were fairly straight-forward. Indeed they were master symbols of Americanism (…)

  • Iraq Cannot Be Won
    19 November 2005 par (Open-Publishing)
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    By Rep. John Murtha
    A conservative senior House Democrat and Purple Heart-decorated Vietnam veteran describes the U.S. presence in Iraq as an ’occupation,’ and calls for immediate troop withdrawal.
    Following is the transcript of a speech by conservative Democratic Representative John Murtha of Pennsylvania on October 17. Murtha is the ranking Democrat on the House Appropriation Committee’s defense panel.
    I just spoke to the Democratic Caucus and told them my feelings about the war. And (…)

  • Scooter Libby’s Doomed Defense
    19 November 2005 par (Open-Publishing)
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    by Elizabeth de la Vega
    Shortly after Vice President Cheney’s former Chief of Staff, I. Lewis ("Scooter") Libby, was indicted for obstructing justice and making false statements to a government agent and a grand jury, Libby’s attorneys suggested that they would use the standard he’s-a-busy-man-who-can’t-remember-everything defense. But now, with Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward’s revelation that a senior Administration official other than Libby told him, in mid-June 2003, that Joseph (…)

  • WHAT PEOPLE SHOULD KNOW ABOUT BUSH
    19 November 2005 par (Open-Publishing)
    2 comments

    WHAT MANY PEOPLE DON’T KNOW
    By Peter Fredson
    November 18, 2005
    It is on the record that many of the GOP war hawks, that still insist war on Iraq was necessary, were draft dodgers. They sought deferments from military service until danger of losing blood or limb was over, or they joined a National Guard unit which rarely forced them to quit a job. So, with this vast military experience, most of the GOP Senators pontificate at length about war strategy, casualties, preemption, Shock and (…)

  • International outcry greets allegations of police abuse
    18 November 2005 par (Open-Publishing)
    2 comments

    – Ministers launch inquiry after detainees found Shia paramilitaries now control force, say Sunnis
    by Ewen MacAskill and Rory McCarthy in Beirut Michael Howard
    Seif Saad, an Iraqi guard, showed no remorse yesterday for the detention and alleged abuse of 173 prisoners in Baghdad. "We placed sacks on their heads and tied their hands behind their backs," he said of their arrests, but, as far as he was concerned, they were suspected terrorists.
    He was standing in a watchtower overlooking (…)

  • The Big Lie Technique
    18 November 2005 par (Open-Publishing)
    7 comments

    by Robert Scheer
    At a time when approximately 57 percent of Americans polled believe that President Bush deceived them on the reasons for the war in Iraq, it does seem a bit redundant to deconstruct the President’s recent speeches on that subject. Yet, to fail to do so would be to passively accept the Big Lie technique—which is how we as a nation got into this horrible mess in the first place.
    The basic claim of the President’s desperate and strident attack on the war’s critics this past (…)

  • Science Fiction Writer Octavia Butler on Race, Global Warming and Religion
    18 November 2005 par (Open-Publishing)

    We speak with Octavia Butler, one of the few well-known African-American women science fiction writers. For the past thirty years, her work has tackled subjects not normally seen in that genre such as race, the environment and religion. [includes rush transcript] The Washington Post has called Octavia Butler “one of the finest voices in fiction period. A master storyteller who casts an unflinching eye on racism, sexism, poverty and ignorance and lets the reader see the terror and beauty of (…)

  • USING ILLEGAL LABOR TO CLEAN UP AFTER KATRINA
    18 November 2005 par (Open-Publishing)

    By Roberto Lovato
    Halliburton and its subcontractors hired hundreds of undocumented Latino workers to clean up after Katrina — only to mistreat them and throw them out without pay.
    Arnulfo Martinez recalls seeing lots of hombres del ejercito standing at attention. Though he was living on the Belle Chasse Naval Base near New Orleans when President Bush spoke there on Oct. 11, he didn’t understand anything the ruddy man in the rolled-up sleeves was saying to the troops. Martinez, 16, (…)

  • Vine Deloria Jr. passes after a life of seminal work
    18 November 2005 par (Open-Publishing)

    by Jim Adams
    TUCSON, Ariz. - Vine Deloria Jr., the intellectual star of the American Indian renaissance, passed on Nov. 13, after struggling for several weeks with declining health. His immeasurable influence became immediately apparent in an outpouring of tributes from all corners of Indian country.
    ’’I cannot think of any words I could possibly say that even begin to capture the significance of this man and his work among Native people and on our behalf for the past half century,’’ (…)

  • Is AFL-CIO’s International Solidarity Center A Subsidiary of the U.S. State Department?
    18 November 2005 par (Open-Publishing)

    By Harry Kelber
    In 1997, the AFL-CIO established the American Center for International Labor Solidarity to develop organizing strategies for international campaigns and cooperative relations with labor federations in other countries.
    Solidarity Center replaced the four regional institutes under former President Lane Kirkland , whose staffs, operating in some 80 countries, had been involved with CIA agents to destabilize democratically-elected governments in the Dominican Republic, Brazil (…)