contributions

By Robert Thompson
A respectable lady went into a Bordeaux supermarket and stuck labels on dates which had come from the "State of Israel", on which it was pointed out that the state of origin of the fruit was founded on racist principles and asking customers to boycott anything coming from there. This strategy was well-known and popularly supported by people protesting against the apartheid of the former South African régime.
The Manager of the supermarket called the Police and the lady (…)

by Margaret Whitman
This is what I don’t understand. Doesn’t cheating in a debate warrant an investigation? Shouldn’t we be concerned that president might not be able to speak for himself? We have all seen the obvious bulge in Bush’s jacket at the debates by now and have heard the silly excuses from the white house and Bush campaign. To see Bush’s actions in the first debate only confirm what everyone was already thinking. The man is listening to someone and repeating afterward. No (…)

By Jack Walters In the annals of sales and salesmen, perhaps the most effective sales closing technique ever devised is the “Ben Franklin” close, also known as the “Balance Sheet” close. Used by salesman for decades, the essence of this sales technique is that it brings the prospect to a buying decision. By way of history, here’s how it all started: Old Ben advised an English scientist friend how to make an important personal choice his friend otherwise couldn’t seem to (…)

“We control political forces, we control moral forces we control economic forces, therefore we are a full-blown Corporative state.” - Benito Mussolini [1]
By William Bowles
The database state
Six million video surveillance cameras, bioemetric ID cards, transnational data interception laws and ’joined up’ government. Add to this the privatisation of key state functions, all mediated by global IT corporations that are also the indispensable link in the weapons, media, pharmaceuticals and (…)

by Naomi Klein
Next week, something will happen that will unmask the upside-down morality of the invasion and occupation of Iraq. On October 21, Iraq will pay $200-million in war reparations to some of the richest countries and corporations in the world.
If that seems backwards, it’s because it is. Iraqis have never been awarded reparations for any of the crimes they have suffered under Saddam, or the brutal sanctions regime that claimed the lives of at least half a million people, or (…)

by Naomi Klein
In a shattered postwar Iraq, there are rich pickings to be had - and for US businesses at least, it promises to be a risk-free bonanza. Naomi Klein joins those at a trade show jostling for a stake
It’s 8.40am, and the Sheraton Hotel ballroom thunders with the sound of plastic explosives pounding against metal. No, this is not the Sheraton in Baghdad, it’s the one in Arlington, Virginia. And it’s not a real terrorist attack, it’s a hypothetical one. The screen at the front (…)

By Stewart Acuff National AFL-CIO Organizing Director exclusive to portside*
With the message "Give back our hard-earned money! Take back your overtime pay cut!," several thousand workers on Wednesday, October 5, delivered hundreds of thousands of postcards to the Bush/Cheney office headquarters in 17 battleground cities against the Bush overtime pay cut, even taking over their offices in several cities. These workers are enraged about the fact that the Bush Administration’s overtime pay (…)

By Alan Wirzbicki
WASHINGTON — Supporters of President Bush are less knowledgeable about the president’s foreign policy positions and are more likely to be mistaken about factual issues in world affairs than voters who back John F. Kerry, a survey released yesterday indicated.
A large majority of self-identified Bush voters polled believe Saddam Hussein provided "substantial support" to Al Qaeda, and 47 percent believe that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction before the US invasion. (…)

By Jeremy Hudson
Patricia McCook and Jackie Butler have accepted a mission created when their husbands refused a fuel convoy order in Iraq last week.
"He can’t speak because he has to live that life in the military right now," Patricia McCook said of her husband. "I’m his voice on the outside, and there is nothing the military can do about it."
"It’s our job now," Jackie Butler said. "It’s our duty."
Their husbands - Sgts. Larry McCook and Michael Butler, both of Jackson - and 16 (…)

The crisis situation in Haiti continues to deepen. The A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition - along with the Haiti Support Network and progressives in the Haitian community - initiated the Emergency Campaign to Support the Haitian People. Many people are joining as volunteers to help support an effective political response in Haiti and here in the United States in solidarity with those resisting a wave of repression. We are also sending humanitarian assistance in the form of much-needed medicines.
In (…)