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Voice of the White House November 16, 2007 TBR News.org – November 16, 2007
“It has been a long-established custom for the President of the United States to lay a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington National Cemetery on Veterans’ Day.
This year, however, Bush did not lay the wreath but went to Texas on a vacation instead, leaving the ceremony to Vice President Cheney. Was this simple arrogance? Or stupidity? Neither. It is the story inside the White House that the (…)

When Two Wrongs Make a Right By David Glenn Cox
So here we are, living on the precipice between dark and light. Between faux prosperity and economic catastrophe. With a government that is both fascist and inept, two parties fighting for control only so that they might hijack the vehicle for their own purposes.
The people want impeachment the government says no, the people want these wars to end the government says no. The people want the end of corporate rule the government says no. All (…)

COUNTERPUNCH.ORG
November 14, 2007
Venezuelan Democracy, the Presidency of Hugo Chavez and the Great Majority of Popular Classes Face a Mortal Threat
Venezuela’s democratically elected Present Chavez faces the most serious threat since the April 11, 2002 military coup.
Violent street demonstrations by privileged middle and upper middle class university students have led to major street battles in and around the center of Caracas. More seriously, the former Minister of Defense, (…)

Attacks like these have increased recently amid reports that contraband trade in Iraqi antiquities scratched by illegal diggers from ancient sites was booming.
Azzaman, November 13, 2007
Tall Asmar, the famous ancient Sumerian settlement, has been stripped of its contents and digging implements, the Antiquities Department said in a statement.
The site in the restive and violent Diyala Province is Iraq’s most important and significant Sumerian settlement in central Mesopotamia.
Known (…)

OPEC leaders may discuss creation of currency basket to price crude
The Associated Press Friday, November 16, 2007 RIYADH, Saudi Arabia: Leaders of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries meeting this weekend in the Saudi capital are likely to discuss the possibility of creating a currency basket to price their crude, Venezuela’s oil minister said Friday.
Rafael Ramirez, the minister, said the issue will come up at a closed session in the two-day OPEC summit, Dow Jones (…)

COUNTERPUNCH
Secrecy, Intransigence and War
Last of a three-part series
Hillary Clinton’s propensity for overkill earned her and Bill the enmity of people capable of inflicting serious damage, as the Whitewater and Cattle Futures scandals duly attested. And soon, as they embarked on the 1992 presidential campaign, the same overkill reflex produced a perfect storm of bad publicity that came within an ace of finishing Clinton off altogether.
In January 1992, America was introduced to (…)

In Ron Paul Coins, Federal Agents Don’t Trust
As if Ron Paul’s supporters needed any more motivation to storm the battlements and wreak havoc on the Republican presidential primary, now comes this: the feds are trying to take away their money.
Federal agents on Wednesday raided the Evansville, Indiana headquarters of the National Organization for the Repeal of the Federal Reserve and Internal Revenue Codes (NORFED), an organization of "sound money" advocates that for the past decade has (…)

by Anthony Gregory
The man who flew the plane that dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima passed away last week at the age of 92. Paul Warfield Tibbets, Jr. did not die from war wounds or violently at the hands of other people, years before his time. He died in hospice care, in a bed, from heart problems and strokes.
In stark contrast, the more than 100,000 civilians who were killed at Hiroshima 62 years ago were burnt, melted, vaporized, in an apocalyptic act of warfare. Many died (…)

The government has asked British authorities to hand over to the Iraq Museum 654 priceless archaeological pieces that went missing shortly after U.S. invasion troops landed in Baghdad in 2003.
Azzaman, November 8, 2007
A statement by the Ministry of Archaeology and Tourism said the pieces were among the thousands of artifacts that were looted from the Museum and the British authorities were under obligation to return them.
The statement faxed to the newspaper said the artifacts were (…)

Published: Nov. 16, 2007 at 10:37 AM By LEANDER SCHAERLAECKENS UPI Correspondent
BRUSSELS, Nov. 16 (UPI) — EU security forces are gearing up to assist NATO and African Union troops in securing refugee camps in eastern Chad and the Central African Republic that are home to millions fleeing the violence in Darfur.
The area, which borders Sudan’s Darfur region, has been inundated with refugees. The United Nations estimates that at least 2 million people have been displaced and driven into (…)