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Interview with Mariangela Casalucci
Italy shortly goes to the polls. This is a vital election, and the left parties, Rifondazione Comunista and Partito dei Comunisti Italiani are participating in Romano Prodi’s L’Unione coalition in an attempt to defeat Berlusconi.
Socialist Unity Network spoke to British based Italian activist, Mariangela Casalucci.
- Socialist Unity Network: Can you briefly explain your own political background?
Mariangela Casalucci I am a member of Rifondazione (…)

On the 9th of April there will be the general election in Italy.
For the first time Italians living abroad can use a postal vote to participate in the election and vote for constituency representatives, and one of the constituencies is Europe.
In this election there will be a coalition of the parties in the left (DS, Margherita, Italian Comunists, Rifondazione Comunista, Democratic Socialist and Green) called UNIONE which has as the prime mininster candidate Romano Prodi. You will find (…)

The Patriot Act and Attention Deficit Democracy by James Bovard, March 22, 2006
The American political system failed when Congress and the media recently rolled over in favor of extending the most onerous provisions of the USA PATRIOT Act. Despite stark evidence of both the law’s abuses and widespread popular opposition, Bush got a rubber-stamp extension of a law that has come to symbolize boundless government intrusions since 9/11.
The reenactment of the Patriot Act symbolizes how (…)

The bloodbath taking place in "liberated" Iraq is not the product of hubris, miscalculation , or as the DLC "neocrats" constantly maintain , a matter of "incompetence".... More evidence rolls in ... The killing fields of Bloody Iraq spring from the execution of conscious "strategery" (a combination of Strategy and Treachery ) .... The death squads are our death squads... ... ITEM : Rumsfeld’s `New Approach ’ . " ... in some cases , according to Pentagon advisors , local (…)

A soldier is hunkered down behind a shell pocked wall in Ramadi. He is shaking and obviously disturbed. He has a .45 pressed against his forehead.
His C.O. approaches him. "What are you doing?", he asks with deep concern.
"I’m going to end it" replies the soldier, "I can’t take it anymore!"
The C.O. puts his arm around the young private and says: "Have you forgotten why we’re here? We came deceived by lies, to launch an illegal war, to rape and pillage, torture and steal. We came to (…)

BAGHDAD — Aid agencies say thay have been prevented from entering the city of Samarra, in central Iraq, where a major US and Iraqi military operation is underway.
"Our convoys sent on Sunday and Monday have been prevented from entering the city by US troops and our information from inside is that families are without food, power and potable water, particularly because they cannot leave their homes," noted Abdel Hameed, a spokesperson for the Iraqi Red Crescent Society (IRCS).
This, they (…)

March 23, 2006
WASHINGTON - Even as military planners look to withdraw significant numbers of American troops from Iraq in the coming year, the Bush administration continues to request hundreds of millions of dollars for large bases there, raising concerns over whether they are intended as permanent homes for U.S. forces.
Questions on Capitol Hill about the future of the bases have been prompted by the new emergency spending bill for military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, which (…)

Arab News, March 24, 2006
One of the abiding myths about the war on Iraq is that the neocons were too stupid to realize that they would confront an unrelenting, indigenous resistance to their occupation of Iraq. Unwittingly, the story line goes, they led the US into a conflict which has now produced a civil war.
But this simply does not fit the facts. The neocons clearly anticipated such an outcome before they launched their war as Stephen Zunes documents in Antiwar.com: "Top analysts in (…)

Published on Thursday, March 23, 2006 by the Independent / UK
The debate over the health effects of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in Britain reopens today with research which suggests that infant deaths were higher in areas where rain fell as the plume of fallout passed overhead.
A study by the epidemiologist John Urquhart, to be presented at a conference at City Hall in London marking the 20th anniversary of the disaster, suggests that infant deaths may have risen by 11 per cent (…)

Published on Wednesday, March 22, 2006
Tossed a softball question during Tuesday morning’s press conference about whether he should be censured for ordering warrantless wiretapping of phone conversations "during a time of war," President Bush fell back on the lie that Americans must surrender liberties — and the rule of law, itself — in order to be made safe from terrorism.
The question, a virtually verbatim repeat of talking points circulated by the Republican National Committee, was (…)