contributions

by Katha Pollitt
I went to Radcliffe, the women’s wing of Harvard, at a time when the combined undergraduate student body was fixed at four male students for every female one. I don’t remember anyone worrying about the boys’ social lives, or whether they would find anyone to marry—even though nationally, too, boys were more likely to go to college and to graduate than girls. When in 1975 President Derek Bok instituted equal-access admissions, nobody said, "Great idea, more marital choice (…)

White House aides deny the President knew lobbyist Abramoff, but unpublished photos shown to TIME suggest there’s more to the story
By ADAM ZAGORIN, MIKE ALLEN
As details poured out about the illegal and unseemly activities of Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff, White House officials sought to portray the scandal as a Capitol Hill affair with little relevance to them. Peppered for days with questions about Abramoff’s visits to the White House, press secretary Scott McClellan said the now (…)

by Rami Khouri
Rami G. Khouri is editor at large of the Beirut-based Daily Star newspaper, published throughout the Middle East with the International Herald Tribune.
Their faces flashed across my television screen at home in Beirut Thursday evening like multiple-choice answers to a quiz show question, "Which of these three images best personifies the future values you want to define the Arab world?"
First there was Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, releasing another audio tape (…)

by Arianna Huffington
You hear it again and again around the Beltway. Hillary sitting atop the Democratic ticket in ’08 is all but a done deal. She’s got too much name recognition, too much money, too much star power to be denied. In short, the Washington Conventional Wisdom is that Hillary is unbeatable for the nomination because she is unbeatable for the nomination.
QED.
But how reliable is this piece of DC CW? According to a quick survey of the facts on the ground: not very.
Let’s (…)

By Tony Kushner
AT A RECENT family gathering, my cousin-in-law, Janice, asked me to respond to complaints she’d read over and over again about "Munich," the Steven Spielberg film I co-wrote with Eric Roth, which she hadn’t yet seen.
The movie is stirring up a lot of controversy, which I anticipated when I agreed to work on it. I even considered it a side benefit that my mishpocheh, my family, an occasionally argumentative bunch, would have fresh subject matter for the discussion part of (…)

Belafonte continues his Bush onslaught; gov’t put on trial by CLAUDIO E. CABRERA Special to Amsterdam News Originally posted 1/25/2006
Hundreds of people came together in New York City this past weekend for a historic three-day tribunal indicting the Bush administration for crimes against humanity.
The event opened Friday at Riverside Church in Harlem, where Harry Belafonte had the stage once again to voice his opinions on the Bush administration. Recent comments from Belafonte include (…)

Harry Belafonte Lashes Out; President Bush’s Answers Questions; Wildfire Blazing in Southern California; FDA Debates Weight Loss Pill
Aired January 23, 2006 - 19:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Standing by, CNN reporters across the United States and around the world to bring you the day’s top stories. Happening now, it’s 7:00 p.m. in Michigan where an icon of American industry is struggling. Ford (…)

Excerpted from the grounbreaking research "An interesting day : President Bush’s Movements and Actions on 9/11
Cooperative Research .org has compiled a most extraordinary summary of post 9/11 White House Spin. One article they dug up from the "liberal" Washington Times 10/7/2 includes the following ditty : " Bush claims Andy Card told him the following : " Here’s what you are going to to be doing , you’re going to meet so and so. BY THE WAY AN AIRCRAFT FLEW INTO THE WORLD TRADE CENTRE. (…)

Organizers planning a protest during President Bush’s State of the Union address next week say they have been denied a permit to hold the demonstration around the U.S. Capitol Reflecting Pool because that area has been reclassified as part of the security perimeter for the day of the speech.
The organizers of the Tuesday protest, called "World Can’t Wait — Drive Out the Bush Regime," say the National Park Service and the U.S. Capitol Police initially offered them the Capitol Reflecting (…)

Taken from www.valenzuelasveritas.blogspot.com
Lesley Stahl on U.S. sanctions against Iraq: We have heard that a half million children have died. I mean, that’s more children than died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the price worth it?
Secretary of State Madeleine Albright: I think this is a very hard choice, but the price—we think the price is worth it. 60 Minutes (5/12/96)
Oil, Simply Oil
The story of Iraq and its people since 1991 is one of immense tragedy, of a fate cruel and (…)