contributions

International Antiwar Movement Builds at UK Conference
By KEVIN ZEESE
Andrew Murray the Chair of the Stop the War Coalition opened the conference describing it as an "historic event" that brings together peace activists from around the world. Indeed, I was part of a sizable delegation of activists from throughout the United States. And the conference also included delegates from across Britain, Iraq, Iran, as well as from Pakistan, India, the Philippines, Canada, Poland, Greece, Italy, (…)

Iraq’s current political process will not solve the crisis. Only a US and British pullout and a UN sponsored poll can do that
by Harith al-Dari
Iraq has a long history of civilisation that has contributed both knowledge and wisdom to humanity. For many centuries, Islam also immunised Iraq against religious or sectarian strife and protected its population from the oppression that peoples of the ancient world had been subjected to. Generation after generation of Iraqis succeeded in (…)

By Courtney E. Martin
Anti-choice activists are boycotting the American Girl doll series this holiday season, but strong sales expectations suggest the girl-power message is prevailing with shoppers. The high price of the dolls, however, means they aren’t for everyone.
American Girl dolls
(WOMENSENEWS)—It’s that time of year again, when some shoppers are roaming the aisles of local toy stores in a somewhat desperate search for gifts that don’t send archaic gender messages to their (…)

By Monte Reel
SANTIAGO, Chile — Everyone in the audience was dressed in dark blue or black. Some wore clerical collars, and most had heavy silver crosses dangling around their necks. But Michelle Bachelet wore an electric pink jacket that sent a clear message: She was a candidate for president, not sainthood.
"I’m agnostic. . . . I believe in the state," Bachelet told several groups of evangelical ministers last week. "I believe the state has an important role in guaranteeing the (…)

By Victor Grossman, Berlin
There was virtually untroubled joy in September, when the new "Left", consisting of two cooperating parties, received 4.2 million votes, 8.7 percent of the total, enabling it to send the unprecedented number of 54 representatives to the Bundestag. But the road to unity of the two had many bumps to overcome, and the weekend congress of the Left Party-PDS in Dresden aimed at overcoming many of them. The going was not always smooth, but a big step forward was taken (…)

Conservative Christians Say Fighting Cuts in Poverty Programs Is Not a Priority
By Jonathan Weisman and Alan Cooperman
When hundreds of religious activists try to get arrested today to protest cutting programs for the poor, prominent conservatives such as James Dobson, Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell will not be among them.
That is a great relief to Republican leaders, who have dismissed the burgeoning protests as the work of liberals. But it raises the question: Why in recent years (…)

by John Nichols
Sometime in the mid-1990s, after it had become quite clear that Bill Clinton’s presidency would deliver rather less than had been hoped, and when it was becoming clear that Newt Gingrich’s control of the House would deliver rather more than had been feared, I penned a review of a then-recently published collection of former Sen, Eugene McCarthy’s poems. In it, I lamented the lack of poetry in the politics of the moment and suggested that America would be far better served (…)

By David Bacon
It’s time to say no.
Every new Republican proposal for immigration reform in Congress makes the prospect for winning legal status for the nation’s 12 million undocumented residents more remote. At the same time, Congress appears ready to pass measures that will increase border deaths, lead to wholesale violations of workers’ rights, and give the country’s largest corporations a huge new bracero program.
Supporters of immigrant and workers’ rights face a moment of truth. (…)

G.W.B’s Consistency
By Peter Fredson
December 21, 2005
Say what you will about George W. Bush, he is remarkably consistent. Of course he is remarkably wrong, but that does not affect his dogmatism. His indoctrination into dogma by American fundamentalists probably is responsible for his determination to “stick to a course” even if it is wrong.
He has a simplistic view of reality, confined to dull and hazy black and white tones, good vs. evil mentality imparted to him by people who (…)

by Jason Galde
We need to ask ourselves one essential question. Are we really living in a Democracy that is deserving of that noble title?
When machines are devised by corporations and used by our government that can be purposefully hacked without a trace to alter the Democratic process, are we living in a true Democracy? The Diebold Corporation doesn’t make mistakes like that by accident. Let us not forget that they are the ones who make the ATM machines that you get your pocket (…)