contributions

Does secretary of state think anyone is buying her spiel, asks Maureen Dowd
by Maureen Dowd
Our secretary of state’s tortuous defence of supposedly non-existent CIA torture chambers in Eastern Europe was an acid flashback to Clintonian parsing.
Just as Bill Clinton pranced around questions about marijuana use at Oxford during the ’92 campaign by saying he had never broken the laws of his country, so Condoleezza Rice pranced around questions about outsourcing torture by suggesting that (…)

Humiliation for Bush as last-minute twist means an isolated US is forced to sign up for future talks on global warming
By Andrew Buncombe in Montreal and Geoffrey Lean
The fight against catastrophic global warming scored its greatest success to date yesterday, when negotiators from more than 180 nations unexpectedly agreed to develop far-reaching measures to combat climate change.
In the process, the delegates to the climate summit in Montreal dealt a humiliating blow to President (…)

by Naomi Klein
It was the "Mission Accomplished" of George W. Bush’s second term, and an announcement of that magnitude called for a suitably dramatic location. But what was the right backdrop for the infamous "We do not torture" declaration? With characteristic audacity, the Bush team settled on downtown Panama City.
It was certainly bold. An hour and a half’s drive from where Bush stood, the US military ran the notorious School of the Americas from 1946 to 1984, a sinister educational (…)

The Kilinailau Islands—also known as the Tulun Islands, or the Carteret Atoll—which lie four hundred miles from the coast of Papua New Guinea, are tiny, low, and impoverished. Their fate, thanks to global warming, has long been a foregone conclusion. In 1995, most of the shoreline of Piul and Huene washed away, and the island of Iolasa was cut in half by the sea. Saltwater intrusion has now reached the point where islanders can no longer grow breadfruit, and have to rely on emergency food (…)

By Michelle Fawcett
When I moved to NYC to start a Ph.D. program at NYU in 2000, my biggest concern was not the rigors of graduate study or the challenge of moving to another new city alone. It was the fear of being unable to survive economically.
Sure, I was going to work in addition to being a student: as a graduate assistant, or GA, for my department. GAs work as research assistants (RAs) or teaching assistants (TAs).
The work of an RA might include co-editing an article with a (…)

It is estimated by the police that over 100,000 workers took to the streets of Dublin the Irish capital. While tens of thousand of workers brought the main cities and towns across the country to a complete stand still as they took to the street both in solidarity with the Irish Ferries workers and against the wide spread exploitation of migrant workers. Workers are outraged at the use of migrant workers particularly from Eastern Europe to undermine the wages and conditions of all workers. (…)

Taken from: www.valenzuelasveritas.blogspot.com
Eden Defined
Such a spectacular and magnificent entity is the planet we call Earth, a wonderment of natural beauty and symbiotic balance yet to be surpassed by the creative genius of humankind. It is a planet teeming with the colors of life, its oceans and continents gems of existence, an overabundance of beating hearts and flowing energy. The planet we call our only home is a living, breathing, dynamic cocktail of universal energy, for (…)

Victim’s anger: Dyan French, who stayed in New Orleans during the hurricane and its aftermath, gives evidence to the congressional committee. She claimed the city’s levees were purposely bombed.
By Eunice Moscoso, Washington December 8, 2005
VICTIMS of hurricane Katrina have told a US congressional bipartisan select committee that they were held at gunpoint, treated like criminals and left to sleep next to dead bodies.
They said the Government at all levels failed to protect them as (…)

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Monday stuck by comments casting doubt on the Holocaust that drew censure from the U.N. Security Council and widespread condemnation by world leaders.
Ahmadinejad, echoing statements he made in Saudi Arabia last week, was quoted by state television and the semi-official ILNA news agency as accusing the West of using the Holocaust as an excuse to favor Israel.
"If the killing of Jews in Europe is true and the Zionists are (…)

Bush Tolls Liberty Bell at Philadelphia
By Peter Fredson
December 12, 2005
We all know that the Bush propaganda people are good at presenting our tyrannical, impatient, petulant, irresponsible, egomaniacal President as honest, candid, transparent, hard-working, efficient and highly moral.
We all know this is stage-management, with good background lighting, with sacred or patriotic backdrops, with captive audiences, surrounded by the largest security forces and agents in our history. (…)