contributions

In CBS Memos Coverage, Media Ignored - Or Even Denied - Credible Evidence That Bush Failed To Fulfill National Guard Duty January 12, 2005 The media is allowing conservatives to use the release of the Independent Review Panel report examining CBS News’ 60 Minutes Wednesday’s September 8 broadcast of questionable memos to claim that the report disposed of all remaining questions that have been raised about President Bush’s service in the National Guard. In fact, substantial evidence exists, (…)

Limbaugh Dumped For Liberal Show Daniel Barlow January 12, 2005 BRATTLEBORO - A southern Vermont-based radio station will trade in the rhetoric of Rush Limbaugh and other conservative talk show hosts for the liberal commentary of Air America next week.
WKVT-AM 1490 in Brattleboro will replace four of its weekday syndicated conservative talk shows on Jan. 17 with programs from the fledgling liberal radio network Air America, which launched in March.
The station will be the second in (…)

The invasion of Iraq was just a preview of the untold misery and destruction to come under U.S. occupation.
By Dahr Jamail
The devastation of Iraq? Where do I start? After working 7 of the last 12 months in Iraq, I’m still overwhelmed by even the thought of trying to describe this.
The illegal war and occupation of Iraq was waged for three reasons, according to the Bush administration. First for weapons of mass destruction, which have yet to be found. Second, because the regime of (…)

By Manuel Valenzuela
Marching Boots of Mass Psychosis
It is in times of fascism rising that armies of ignorance are once more resuscitated from the bowels of a society bordering on the edge of mass psychosis. The America at the dawn of the twenty-first century is no exception, for an army of fascism is being born inside its womb, its growing power in numbers and ideology granting freedom of action to immoral despots and juntas of warmongering greed addicts. Contrived through the mass (…)

By Wayne Besen
Conservative commentator Armstrong Williams is embroiled in a scandal where the Bush administration paid him $240,000 to promote No Child Left Behind. Democrat Rep. George Miller, who is on the House Education Committee, said the arrangement using taxpayer’s money was “probably illegal.” When Williams said he represented values, we never knew he meant the value of his bank account.
As someone who has met the slippery Williams, I’m not the slightest bit surprised that he (…)

Three recent stories (Jan 05) highlight just how bad Iraq is- that some soldiers would rather go to prison or die than return to the carnage that is the US occupation. A 19-year-old US Marine committed “suicide by cop” rather than return to Iraq.
Raya was finally gunned down as he ran towards a group of officers, and apparently reached for a second weapon.
Julia Cortez Raya told the newspaper that her son served in Fallujah.
She said: “He came back different.”
Marine Lance Cpl. (…)

At the beginning of their recent attack on Fallujah, U.S. Marines and Iraqi National Guard troops stormed Fallujah General Hospital, closing it to the city’s wounded and confiscating cell phones from the doctors. A senior officer told The New York Times the hospital was "a center of propaganda."
Interviews with hospital personnel (which had revealed the extent of civilian casualties in an aborted April invasion) would not be a problem this time.
As the invasion proceeded, air strikes (…)

By Jenny Booth
Forcing naked Iraqi prisoners to pile themselves in human pyramids was not torture, because American cheerleaders do it every year, a court was told today.
A lawyer defending Specialist Charles Graner, who is accused of being a ringleader in the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal, argued that piling naked prisoners in pyramids was a valid form of prisoner control.
"Don’t cheerleaders all over America form pyramids six to eight times a year. Is that torture?" said Guy (…)

War Crimes Roundtable
As the Abu-Ghraib prison scandal began to pierce through the public consciousness, Contributing Editor Mark LeVine brought together four leading experts on international and American constitutional law to explore the implications of the scandal and the larger issue of the violations of international and American law that have become part of the fabric of the US-led occupation of Iraq.
The extent of the daily violations of international law, including systematic war (…)

First a brief forward from POAC co-editor Jack Dalton. I received an email a few moments ago from Kevin’s wife Monica. In it she has told me a total of 22 people in Sgt Benderman’s unit have refused to deploy to Iraq. 17 have gone AWOL and 2 have attempted suicide. The status of the remaining 3 is unknown at this time. We at the POAC fully support the decision to refuse deployment to Iraq which has been made by Sgt Benderman, and the others in his unit.
I am Sgt Kevin Benderman and: (…)