contributions

by George Soros The war on terror is a false metaphor that has led to counterproductive and self-defeating policies. Five years after 9/11, a misleading figure of speech applied literally has unleashed a real war fought on several fronts — Iraq, Gaza, Lebanon, Afghanistan, Somalia — a war that has killed thousands of innocent civilians and enraged millions around the world. Yet al Qaeda has not been subdued; a plot that could have claimed more victims than 9/11 has just been foiled by the (…)

By Nadim Shehadi
What is the logic that will emerge from this war? If Israel can exist only by destroying the neighborhood, then it’s time to declare it a failed state. The Zionist dream has turned into a nightmare and is not viable. If the future holds more of the same, then the time has come to reconsider the whole project. Every state has a duty to defend its citizens, but also it has a duty to provide them with security and the two are different. The prospects are for more destruction, (…)

by Mary MacElveen
I have been speaking of what is a warranted fear as opposed to an unwarranted one and as I read this statement from the extremist right-wing-nut, Dick Cheney in which, concerning Ned Lamont’s win in the Conneticut Democratic primary, he stated that he found it "disturbing."
The rightist vice president then went on to say “the al Qaeda types, they clearly are betting on the proposition that ultimately they can break the will of the American people in terms of our ability (…)

by Ivan Eland
In the frenzy surrounding the exposed plot to simultaneously blow up ten airliners flying from Britain to the United States, one line of inquiry being pursued by investigators should make the Bush administration very nervous. British and Pakistani law enforcement officials are examining whether the British plotters of Pakistani descent received money from an Islamic charity, Jamaat ud Dawa. The charity has been used as a front for a militant group fighting for the separation (…)

By Carole King, CAROLE KING is a singer, songwriter and longtime conservation activist.
WHILE OUR attention is on other parts of the world, an insidious movement is underway at home to privatize nationally owned land. Its proponents are using federal "quid pro quo" bills, which typically include just enough wilderness designation to get a buy-in from selected conservation groups. Roughly 250,000 acres have been privatized through such legislation since 2000.
One such bill is the proposed (…)

The film’s bleak vision of a world divided between shanty-towns and trailer parks at one end, and unimaginable luxury at the other, is not far off the mark.
By Barbara Ehrenreich
Everyone knows that the new big-screen "Miami Vice" is "darker" than the old one, meaning that the light-hearted, wise-cracking Don Johnson and Philip Michael Thomas have been replaced by the brooding, inarticulate Colin Farrell and Jamie Foxx, who favor dingy blues and grays over their predecessors’ lavender (…)

by Robert Fisk
The real war in Lebanon begins today. The world may believe - and Israel may believe - that the UN ceasefire due to come into effect at 6am today will mark the beginning of the end of the latest dirty war in Lebanon after up to 1,000 Lebanese civilians and more than 30 Israeli civilians have been killed. But the reality is quite different and will suffer no such self-delusion: the Israeli army, reeling under the Hizbollah’s onslaught of the past 24 hours, is now facing the (…)

Taken from www.valenzuelasveritas.blogspot.com
Freefall
The towers fell upon their own imprints, floor after floor cascading down upon the next in an avalanche of concrete, glass, steel and flesh, in the process pulverizing everything, and everybody, between them, over 200 combined stories of human ingenuity flattened in the span of seconds, their reign over gravity and the skies eviscerated, falling down to the land of mortals not with the chaos of randomness and malevolent physics but (…)

Mexican Electoral Fraud Wins Round One - Round Two Now Begins - by Stephen Lendman
It was no surprise on Sunday that the Mexican Federal Electoral Institute (IFE) ruled its partial recount of about 9% of the ballots cast in the disputed presidential election held on July 2 showed ruling National Action Party (PAN) candidate still the winner. In doing so, the IFE ignored the clear evidence of election irregularities and blatant fraud uncovered by losing Party of the Democratic Revolution (…)

Iran threatens to withdraw from IAEA
Iran warned on Sunday that it would withdraw from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) if its "inalienable rights" are deprived of, the official IRNA news agency reported.
"If depriving Iran of its inalienable rights is the result of its membership in international organizations, including the IAEA, our withdrawal from such bodies is well justified," parliamentary speaker Gholam-Ali Hadad-Adel was quoted as saying.
He reiterated Iran’s (…)