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Each political note has its own anchor in case you want to link to it.
The WTO ruled against banning GMOs, but did so in a weaker way than expected.
The WTO's mission is to transfer power from states (which may be democratic) to business (which never tries to be). But sometimes even the WTO is partially held in check by strong public opposition, as is found in Europe.
Europe's policies regarding waste and hazardous chemicals are encouraging the chemical industry to shift towards less waste and less hazardous chemicals. The US should adopt similar policies.
Brazil has made a very profitable investment in using ethanol in cars, which has created a million jobs while reducing global warming.
The US could do it too, if its leaders were statesmen. Such an investment, accompanied by or incentivized by higher taxes on fossil fules, would help keep New York City from being flooded in a few decades much as New Orleans has been.
On May 18, join Cindy Sheehan for a protest at the White House and Rumsfeld's house.
One Guantanamo prisoner has tried 12 times to commit suicide.
Bush claims the authority to disregard laws--in effect, thumbing his nose at Congress and the Supreme Court.
Nepal is moving to redraw its constitution to reduce the power of the king.
Venezuela, Cuba and Bolivia have signed a trade agreement directed at opposing US influence.
Rich Chinese are wiping out wildlife for conspicuous consumption, fueled also by Chinese traditional medicine, which is often pure superstition.
Don't forget the sharks. Shark's fin has little flavor, but it is fashionable to serve shark's fin soup at Chinese banquets as an act of conspicuous consumption. As a result, sharks are being caught for their fins alone (the rest thrown back into the sea), and they are being wiped out.
China's premier admits that China is destroying its environment for economic growth.
An Iraqi refugee who became an Australian citizen, then returned to Iraq after the Australian government said it was "safe" there, was beaten up by Bush forces troops--who didn't even give him time to say who he was.
The soldier's claims that they mistook him for a supporter of Saddam Hussein is no excuse; even real supporters of Saddam Hussein should not be tortured.
18 very wealthy US families have funded a dishonest campaign for 10 years to repeal the estate tax, so that they can save billions.
Human Rights Watch says that 600 Bush regime employees are implicated in acts of torture, but only 300 have been investigated, and only 40 punished with prison sentences--mostly short.
But there is on positive step: a lieutenant colonel faces criminal charges for torture in Abu Ghraib.
This is good, but they should offer him a plea bargain if he testifies against the higher-ups that must have given the orders.
China is starting to recognize the need for environmental protection, planning a new "green city" near Shanghai.
However, they will have to work on greenhouse gas emissions if they don't want this city to go under water in a few decades.
Poor countries rejected a plan for UN reforms, saying that it was really a power grab by the rich countries to control UN spending.
The UN's problems are real, and more control over spending is needed. However, hijacking such reforms in order to get themselves more power is exactly the sort of things that the US and EU would do.
Perhaps what is needed now is for the poor countries to draw up their own plan--to implement better financial controls over the UN's money while still allowing the General Assembly to decide its budget.
When the record companies ask for nasty laws to restrict the public, they say this is on behalf of the musicians. At the same time, they screw the musicians, over and over. Now some musicians are suing.
Since the record companies like to refer to themselves as the "music industry", I call them "music factories". These factories press money into hype and call it music. Duplicity and arrogance are standard for them.
We don't need music made in factories. Let's shut them down!
Bush was warned there were no WMD, says former CIA man. Bush didn't care, because the WMD claims were only an excuse anyway.
The Burmese military rulers have started a campaign of destroying villages, forcing thousands to flee.
(This is small compared with what Bush has done in Iraq, or New Orleans, but Burma isn't as big as the US either.)
AOL blocked email to its customers from a group that criticized AOL.
AOL says it was an accident, and maybe it was. But whether accidental or not, it shows that ISPs should not be given any more power to decide what mail or web pages to deliver, or to deliver more reliably, or faster, or whatever.
Robert Fisk: the academics who exposed the Israel lobby tactics are now meeting false accusations of "anti-semitism".
As for the claim that non-Jews do the same kind of lobbying, I say that the kind of lobbying they reported on is wrong no matter who does it. No foreign country, and no business, should ever have that much influence on the policies of a democratic state--and when they do, it means that democracy is in danger.
Texaco poisoned part of Ecuador with its oil operations, callously disregarding public health to reduce its costs.
Bush, responding to foolish Americans who are angry about the price of gasoline, is trying to lower the price. I'm pleased to see that Democrats are focusing on the long view--fuel economy, etc.
Japan's parliament is planning to pass a law requiring teachers to teach "patriotism". This further undermines one of the great achievements made at the end of World War II.
Bush has taken another leaf from Stalin's book, by systematically trying to distort science to fit his goals.
The chief of Al-Jazeera's Cairo bureau has been arrested for "reporting false news" (about an explosion in Egypt).
I have no information about whether the report was really false.
Furthering his War on the Constitution, Bush is implementing a budget bill that was not properly passed by Congress.
The Bush forces benefit from unit cohesion to the point that even soldiers that condemn the war are unwilling to resist it.
This case of misplaced loyalties resembles what you might find in a street gang. The problem is how to overcome it.
US citizens: contact your representatives against the Audio Broadcast Flag bill.
(Note that the Tivo is a bad choice to cite as a positive example. It implements DRM and spies on the user.)
The IRS investigates churches that criticize Bush policy, but does nothing to churches that support Republican candidates.
This must be part of Bush's War on Integrity.
Iran's president formerly denied the holocaust. Now he recognizes it, and blames Europe for causing it and the creation of Israel. Well, it's a step forward.
Senator Feinstein, a persistent enemy of freedom on many fronts, has proposed a law to require DRM on all webcasting.
New York Mayor Bloomberg announced new plans for surprise searches in New York High Schools; students have already protested the existing search policy, which goes beyond searching for weapons.
Bloomberg's attitude towards searching people is that we "all have to get used" to having no rights.
Ethiopia has kept political opposition leaders and journalists in prison for a year on absurd charges of genocide.
They could be worse--they could label these leaders "enemy combatants", as Bush has done, and imprison them for years without any charges or trial.
There is a proposal to replace FEMA with a new agency that would be able to talk directly to the president in an emergency.
This in itself might be a good idea--but keep in mind the reports that FEMA is building camps which could imprison millions of Americans.
Also, don't forget that Bush's sabotage of New Orleans began long before the hurricane hit--when he took away the funds to reinforce the levees, and spent it on aggression in Iraq.
One reason FEMA is ineffective is that Bush has been sabotaging it ever since he captured the White House.
Alexander Milinkevich, leader of the opposition in Belarus, has been imprisoned for protesting vote fraud.
Nepal's king agrees to recall the parliament he dismissed, but many of the people now want to end the monarchy.
In the US, dissent is not formally illegal--but the government has plenty of ways to prosecute anyone who dissents in a way that someone might actually see.
The government of Sudan is increasing its atrocities against non-Muslims in the south, as the UN is tied up and unable to act.
The European Parliament says that the CIA has flown 1000 flights through the EU in recent years--flights suspected of carrying prisoners to be tortured.
All governments should insist on inspecting every CIA flight for prisoners, even if the flight is run by an Air America-style front company.
It is not unusual for police to tell lies about protestors. It is nice to have a video to prove it was a lie. But it is not enough to refute the police lies. Policemen who bring false charges must be charged with perjury.
Blair has imposed a series of laws that attack human rights in the UK, and he's not through yet. Now he accuses the people who defend freedom as "out of touch with modern Britain". Which is to say, their ideas of freedom are out of fashion.
Blair is doing his best to make civil liberties unfashionable.
Wisconsin is considering a bill to prohibit companies from requiring people to get chip implants.
Egyptian police attacked a sit-in strike by judges protesting the prosecution of other judges who want to investigate election fraud.
The World Bank lied about spending money to fight malaria, and falsified results to make the non-program look like a success.
Uri Avnery: on the Israel lobby in the US: Who's the dog? Who's the tail?
Blair is planning further attacks on human rights by imposing many permanent parole-like restrictions on people who have served prison sentences.
Once in a while, a convicted murderer who has been released from prison and isn't a mobster commits another murder--but it is rare. The magnitude of this danger to citizens is so tiny that it cannot justify any harm to people's rights. The harmful effect of decreased liberty due to this plan must outweigh any good it does, simply because the scope to do good is so small.
The 10 Worst Corporations of 2005.
China is accused of removing organs from Falun Gong practitioners, then killing them.
The US Congress is drafting a bill that can endanger the neutrality of the Internet, letting ISPs large and small decide what sites can come in quickly and which ones to slow down.
The Bush regime is eliminating an internal check previously required before launching commando/terror raids against other countries--they will not ask the US ambassador first.
With this change, it will be easier for Bush to attack anyone he wants to attack. It will also be easier to make disastrous mistakes, as Bush cuts out people with local knowledge who might warn him first.
It is feasible to convert electric generation entirely to renewable energy sources in just a few decades. Building new nuclear power plants is unnecessary.
Note that if new nuclear plants were planned now, they would not be operating until 2020 or so.
Illegal logging threatens forests in many countries, but activists have been able to stop it in some places.
Slavery is formally illegal nowadays, but in fact it is a massive problem.
Iran offered negotiations in 2003 about its nuclear program, but Cheney et al. rejected them.
Karl Rove's replacement, Joel Kaplan, orchestrated a phony protest of phony citizens of Florida, as part of preventing a recount in Florida in 2000.
The lone woman who shouted criticism of Hu Jintao was not in a position to intimidate him, but she faces charges of "threatening" him. This "riot" was designed to intimidate officials, and did so. Yet the perpetrators have not been charged with a crime.
The Bush regime has released the names of 558 Guantanao prisoners. Other sources say the list is not complete.
The statement that they will release 100 of these prisoners is interesting. Though meant to sound magnanimous, it is hardly adequate: every prisoner deserves to be given a fair trial or else released.
Moreover experience with the Bush regime suggests a possible deception in that claim. I wonder how long these 100 prisoners are likely to have to wait for their "home countries" to be "ready to receive them". I wonder if the Bush regime knows this will never occur. Did it designate them for possible release precisely because it knows this will never occur? Did the Bush regime explicitly ask those countries to promise they will not be "ready", so that the Bush regime can falsely look better?
I lack the necessary resources and skill to investigate the answers. I can only pose the questions.
Blair is so servile towards Bush that he talks of supporting an attack against Iran, even though many in his own cabinet and party are against it.
A protestor in the US faces 6 months in prison for verbally criticizing Hu Jintao for China's repressive policies.
She is facing the false accusation of "threatening" Mr Hu; the Bush regime equates denunciation with threats. In China all criticism of the government is illegal. Perhaps Bush is consulting with Mr Hu about how to achieve the same result in the US.
The Bush regime isn't the slightest bit ashamed of violating treaties by keeping prisoners secretly. But the person who told the public about this faces prosecution.
Vietnam, which fought for years to escape from the explicit colonial rule of France, and the implicit colonial rule of the US, now begs for the colonial rule of Microsoft.
Although Congress killed the funding for development of nuclear weapons for attacking bunkers, Bush plans to develop it anyway.
Various lines of evidence suggest official collusion in the London subway bombings.
These arguments are not conclusive. For instance, eyewitnesses often get things wrong. And I don't see that the shooting of Menezes, bad as it was, proves anything about the bombings themselves.
But this is plenty of reason to have a thorough public investigation. Bliar's refusal to have one adds to the reasons to suspect him of wrongdoing associated with the events.
Skype censors text messages in China--and defends the practice saying it's "just obeying the law".
Skype software is non-free; in general, it takes away the other freedoms you should have as a user of software.
A review of Overthrow: America's Century of Regime Change.
Bonfire of the hypocrisies: Muslims around the world don't riot as Saudis systematically burn and destroy their history.
Colombia's President Uribe is getting in trouble for his support of death squads. His response is to condemn journalists that probe into his crimes.
A newly appointed Palestinian Authority minister leads a group that has tried to attack Israeli civilians. Israel says it will continue trying to kill him, even though he is a minister.
What about ministers in Israel that have organized and tolerated attacks that predictably will kill Palestinian civilians?
US greenhouse gas emissions continue to increase every year.
Congressman Kucinich demanded Bush explain his support for terrorist groups in Iran.
The European car manufacturers made a commitment to increase fuel efficiency, but they have not met it, because they are making larger cars instead.
When confronted with the failure, they say "We're doing the best we can, given our other priorities." (If they gave their commitment to fuel efficiency insufficient priority, that's their fault.) When people suggest a legal requirement for higher efficiency, they respond, "Self-regulation works better." But as we see it is not working. What they want is regulation they can ignore.
They must think they are talking to idiots who can't keep the whole issue in mind--or else, to sell-out politicians who only want an excuse to obey.
These run-arounds are typical of the contempt business shows to the public, and this is why self-regulation is a foolish policy for an issue important for public safety. We will know that democracy is strong when we officials respond derisively to the suggestion of replacing crucial regulations with self-regulation.
Bush has received the Jefferson Muzzle award for opposition to freedom of speech.
A suicide bombing, not carried out by Hamas, was seized on by Israel as an excuse to condemn Hamas while escalating its own campaign of violence.
Can anyone find me the figures of how many Palestinians have been killed by Israelis in the past 6 months or year, and how many Israelis by Palestinians?
The Smithsonian Institution has sold all film rights to use of its collections, en masse, to Showtime. The Smithsonian spokesman defends this policy by calling it "a signed contract" that must therefore be obeyed--evading the issue of whether it was proper, or even legal, to sign it at all.
The protests for democracy in Nepal continue even though police have shot and killed protestors again.
I think there is a good chance of establishing democracy in Nepal. Reestablishing democracy in the US seems more difficult.
Berlusconi refuses to recognize his election defeat, and the outgoing president of Italy has decided to delay the formation of the new government for his successor.
I think the motive for Berlusconi's delaying tactics has to do with the law Berlusconi adopted to protect himself from prosecution for corruption. His law shortened the period of time during which the prosecution and all appeals must be carried out. The deadline in his case comes later this year. I think he is trying to deny the opposition time to pass a new law to reverse his law.
Human Rights Watch says it has evidence tying Rumsfeld directly to torture in Guantanamo, and calls for a special prosecutor to investigate him.
The retired generals criticizing Rumsfeld reflect the views of many generals on active duty, who are afraid his policies are crushing the morale of the US Army.
Although Rumsfeld has been in charge of details, the broad outline of what he has done (torture in Guantanamo, invasion in Iraq) is what Bush told him to do. Indicting him will be a step towards justice, but replacing him alone won't solve the problem.
Destroying the morale of the US Army is a good thing, as long as the US government remains evil. Bush may be replaced by a Democrat, but that Democrat will probably continue to support low-wage treaties that transfer power from democracy to global business--such as NAFTA, CAFTA and the WTO. And the US Army will serve to threaten and potentially overthrow democratic governments that resist lesser pressures to betray their citizens to globalization. I despair of ever seeing a US government that can be trusted with its military power.
Refugees seeking asylum in the UK are regularly imprisoned for years. Many of them are now on hunger strike because they are desperate. But I think that Blair's sadism will not care if they die.
A hunger strike convinced India's Supreme Court to insist that poor people whose lands are to be flooded by a dam get real compensation.
East Timorese endured torture and massacre by Indonesian forces until they won independence. Now their own police have copied that behavior.
Greenpeace says that the casualties from Chernobyl have been greatly underestimated, and predicts 250,000 cases of cancer, and around 200,000 total deaths.
US nuclear plants, and the government agency that is supposed to regulate them, have systematically underestimated the danger and probability of nuclear accidents.
Blair is planning to drop the practice of compensating victims of miscarriage of justice.
This is a reflection of his general position that his government should not be held responsible for its mistakes.
The number of refugees around the world is decreasing, due to fewer wars. But the countries that refugees can flee to are treating them worse and worse, so as to drive them away.
What the war in Iraq is doing to Iraq's children.
Al Gore is campaigning again--to halt global warming. And he has made a movie about it.
I am not sure I could support Al Gore for a public office. He is clearly better than Bush, but he supported the subordiation of democracy to global business, which was done by the Clinton/Gore administration.
There is a report that the Bush regime is supporting an Iranian exile group, which is officially labeled as "terrorist", to carry out acts of terror in Iran.
A retired US officer confirms this story.
Comparing Bush with Nixon: two cases for impeachment.
The Lancet calls for more research on psychedelic drugs, saying that the demonization of these drugs has shut off an important area of medical research.
Bush is keeping two innocent men prisoner in Guantanamo because they "might face persecution" if they were returned to China. Guantanamo isn't persecution?
Greg Palast: Why Rumsfeld Should Not Resign.
One of Macchiavelli's suggestions for how princes should deal with conquered countries is to appoint a governor who would be nasty, and crush all resistance; then sack him and cast oneself as the friend of the people.
Important Afghan governors and officials are linked with drug smuggling and/or the Taliban.
The planned Iranian oil trading market is not ready to open, and probably won't trade only in euros when it does open.
So maybe this isn't a path to ending global US hegemony.
Israel has destroyed the crops of the Bedouin of the Negev. Israel refuses to recognize their rights to their ancestral lands, so it calls all their farming "illegal".
A merger of two offices in the "Defense" Department could have the effect of providing a police force that could be used secretly to investigate protestors.
Prohibition of cocaine makes cocaine so profitable that it finances civil war in Colombia, even as it destroys the rainforests there.
Israel is firing artillery close to homes in Gaza, in effect holding the civilian population hostage for occasional firing of qassam rockets at Israel. (Qassam rockets are capable of killing people, but very rarely hit anything.)
Gay men in Iraq are being systematically murdered by Shi'ite fanatics.
The UK High Court ruled that the "control orders" for house-arrest without trial are unfair and violate the Human Rights Act. However, Bliar remains determined to destroy human rights no matter what it takes.
A British computer cracker is fighting extradition to the US on the grounds that the US cannot be trusted to give him a trial. The US has refused to make a promise, and expects to be trusted, like a deadbeat that expects credit to be granted without question.
Police are fond of calling animal rights activists "terrorists" when they threaten property. But when hunters threaten the lives of reporters who want to film the treatment of animals, what's that?
In a rare positive step for human rights, Burundi has abolished a general nighttime curfew.
South Park was censored from showing a picture of Mohammed, showing the weakness of freedom of expression in the US.
6 retired generals now call for replacement of Defense Secretary Rumsfeld. They say that the war was "mismanaged", disregarding the question of whether it was justified at all.
Bush as usual, simply ignores the opposition.
Iran is becoming increasingly isolated, and increasingly stubborn, in the stand-off over its apparent plan to develop nuclear weapons.
I do not trust Iran's statements about "peaceful uses only", any more than I would trust Bush. At the same time, I can't see how a nuclear-armed Iran is any worse than a nuclear-armed US. Both are ruled by religious fanatics that spit on human rights. The US won't even promise not to use its own nuclear weapons to launch a war.
It appears that fetuses cannot feel pain, especially not before 6 months. And antiabortionists agree, when pressed, that the question of whether a fetus can feel pain is rationally irrelevant to the ethics of abortion. So why do they push for laws that concern this irrelevant possibility?
The reason is, they simply want to associate abortion, (whether rationally or irrationally, they don't care), with something people won't like.
Remember the "mobile biolab trailers" found in Iraq? Even as Bush talked about how they were Saddam's fabled bioweapons program, the Pentagon knew it was not true.
Canada's new government wants to scrap the Kyoto agreement because Canada has not come close to meeting the targets. That, of course, is because Canada has not tried very hard. Actually trying to reduce greenhouse gas emission might be uncomfortable.
The talk about "long term measures" is probably an excuse never to actually begin doing anything. They'll wait for Vancouver to be drowned.
Biodiversity "hot spots" are now threatened with mass extinctions, because species hurt by climate change will have nowhere to move to.
Some 15000 people now suffer medical problems traced to the fumes from the burning World Trade Center, and they are suing the government for lying to them and saying it was safe to breath.
Teachers in the UK took a stand against privatization of the educational system.
Many activities are best done by the state, and privatizing them is typically an excuse for a few to enrich themselves to the detriment of the public.
The European Union suspended aid to the Palestinian Authority, demanding that its elected HAMAS government abjure violence and recognize Israel.
This sounds legitimate when considered in isolation--but it is not legitimate to make these demands of the Palestinian Authority and fail to hold Israel to the same standard.
Dr Kendall-Smith was sentenced to prison, by a judge who was obviously hostile; but he refuses to apologize. (He does plan to appeal the decision.)
The prosecutor's claim that soldiers cannot "pick and choose" orders to obey is flat-out wrong: military law says that soldiers are required to identify illegal orders, and reject them. But this judge refused to consider the question of the illegality of Bush's war.
The Iraqi puppet government was established by the Bush forces. Just like the Russian puppet governments that once ruled in Eastern Europe, this one is not really given a choice about whether to "ask" for their "help" from the Bush forces.
New Orleans rebuilding rules require many buildings to be raised by amounts up to three feet. That is a small step in the right direction, but totally inadequate; sea level is projected to rise by up to 20 feet in this century.
200 lawyers protested for democracy in Nepal. 3 of them were shot.
A new "anti-terrorist" laws in the UK makes it a crime to say things that "glorify terrorism", a term that could include any support for violent "regime change" anywhere in the world.
If this law were applied fairly, Bush and Blair would be arrested. We can be sure it will not be applied fairly.
In Slovenia, a human rights monitor faces charges with a prison sentence for "slandering" the country--by reporting video of shootings by the police.
Berlusconi's opponents won the election, just barely. Will they be able to undo the law he designed to enable him to evade prosecution for corruption? And break up his media monopoly?
A jury in the UK ruled that Tom Hurndall "was shot intentionally with the intention of killing him" by the Israeli army.
In El Salvador, women have been sentenced to up to 30 years in prison for having abortions, and doctors are legally required to save fetuses even at the expense of the mothers' lives.
The French government bowed to massive protests and agreed to withdraw the law that weakened young workers' rights.
Did the Federal Reserve know about the London bombings before they occurred? There are other suspicious points in the official story.
Berlusconi's regime committed one last blow for torture, by blocking the Italian prosecutors' request to extradite and prosecute the CIA kidnapers who sent Mr Hassan to Egypt to be tortured.
British courts are in disagreement about deportation to Zimbabwe, whose dictator forced tens of thousands of people out of the capital by razing their housing.
Does anyone know why these people "can only be identified as AA and LK"? Is the UK government protecting their privacy, or is it gagging them?
The Taliban have taken over part of Pakistan, which is effectively in rebellion.
There are large protests in Nepal, demanding democracy, and the police shot and killed some protestors.
Bush and Cheney committed several felonies when they withheld material information from the Plamegate grand jury.
On the day of the London subway bombings, a company was running an response exercise that involved fictitious bombings at the same place.
Since this would be an incredible coincidence, if it were just a coincidence, it strongly suggests that the UK government had a part in organizing the actual bombings.
Iraq's developing civil war has made it the most dangerous place in the world.
AT&T secretly gave the NSA total access to all its customers' phone calls and internet traffic.
A new peace group made up of former Israeli and Palestinian fighters has to brave the prohibitions of the Israeli government merely in order to meet.
Megacorporations are pushing for strong action against global warming in Australia, too.
It is good news that these private entities that enjoy unjust power, to the detriment of democracy, are starting to support the measures necessary to prevent global catastrophe. We should not take that as granting any legitimacy to their power. (Meanwhile, it is opposition from other megacorporations that has prevented action from being taken until now, and still prevents it in the US.)
The US military is preparing to put many kinds of weapons in space. Meanwhile, it collaborates with NASA to spy on civilian peace groups.
Il Ducino is on the defensive against opposition galvanized by a new campaign against the Mafia.
The US witch hunt against progressive teachers is proceeding on many fronts in parallel.
The EU put a travel ban on 31 officials of Belarus, including the president, after he stole an election and persecuted protestors.
Why don't they do this to Bush and his ministers?
Another plan to impose software patents on Europe: by instituting a new special court with hand-picked judges for all patent issues.
Proved: that Bush knowingly lied about Saddam Hussein's nuclear weapons plans. And then there was a carefully orchestrated coverup and scapegoat campaign so he would not be caught.
A panel of scientists ridiculed Blair's plans to build new nuclear power plants, pointing out that it is wind power or solar power are much more practical, as well as avoiding many grave problems.
Surely Blair's advisors know that; they must have some ulterior motive to build new nuclear plants. Some corrupt deal with business, I would suppose.
Many large US companies asked Congress to put limits on CO2 emission. They are starting to recognize that we are staring disaster in the face.
Through 1990, increasing air pollution canceled out global warming. But now the air pollution is being reduced, and the result is to increase global warming.
Could we cancel out global warming by causing a mini-nuclear-winter? Maybe it could be done without nuclear explosions. Is it feasible to blast tons of dirt up where it will block enough sun to cancel out the CO2?
Massachusetts adopted a law requiring every resident to carry health insurance.
I support universal heath care, but this way of doing it is wasteful, (since it doesn't cut insurance company profits out of the loop) and probably injurious to people's privacy, given the weak laws that the US has to protect the privacy of medical records.
The Bush-run Iraqi government is cutting the food budget by 25%. Many Iraqis are poor and depend on government food rations, but the Iraqi government is required to hand its money to Bush.
Bush directly approved the plot to discredit Ambassador Wilson by blowing the cover of his wife, Valerie Plame.
Thus, Bush has become the Leaker in Chief.
Aid to Africa: comparing action with talk.
Exposing Valerie Plame was discussed by officials in a meeting "in Cheney's office". (Does this imply that Cheney was present?)
Soldiers injured in basic training are kept in basic training--even for years, as they get incompetent surgery. They are treated like prisoners and worse, even being forced to stand at attention on crutches. Some go crazy, and some die from this.
Three professors who were seized in Africa and handed over to the Bush regime give a glimpse into Bush's secret prisons and their cruelty.
Here's the full Amnesty International report.
The film Sir, No Sir describes the resistance within the US Army that helped end the Vietnam War. I wish I could see it.
A UK inquest concluded that a British journalist was murdered when he was gratuitously shot by an Israeli soldier. His family calls it a "war crime". Israel decided not to prosecute the soldier.
Blair wants to "update" the Geneva Convention to permit pre-emptive war--now that the US (with its faithful sidekick, the UK) is the only country powerful enough to do that.
Thai prime minister Thaksin has resigned. His snap election, designed to give the opposition no chance to campaign, didn't wash.
Two British grannies face charges of terrorism for crossing the boundary of a military base.
A campaigner faces jail for anti-war tea party outside Parliament.
This is part of Bliar's war on dissent.
Robert Dreyfuss: Lebanon as a model for understanding Iraq today.
The US and some European countries are inflating their foreign aid figures by counting debt forgiveness to the puppet government of Iraq--which is really a handout to Bush.
An unknown parrot and an unknown mouse, found on Camiguin Island in the Philippines, are likely to be extinct when humans finish deforesting the island.
What do Nelson Mandela, Moses and George Washington all have in common?
A British court rejected an opportunistic attempt to extend copyright powers, in which the authors of nonfiction book sued claiming that the Da Vinci Code infringed their copyright by using historical ideas presented in their book. Copyright is not supposed to cover ideas, such as theories of history.
In the area around Chernobyl, now uninhabited, wildlife has made a comeback.
Wild animals rarely live long enough to get cancer from the radiation. But I wonder what happens to trees after 100 years of radiation.
Scientists have grown bladders from humans' own cells for transplantation into them.
If this can be extended to other organs, the Chinese executioners will lose their markets.
Poor women in India are bought and sold as sex slaves, due to the comparative shortage of women that results from selective abortion.
This is the flip side of the custom of demanding doweries from brides--both being reflections of a general attitude that treats women more or less as property. The sex ratio that results from selective abortion is just a scapegoat.
The term "feticide" plays into the hands of antiabortionists, and its use in any circumstances is a threat to women's rights.
Charles Taylor, who sent Liberia and Sierra Leone into civil war, is now on trial for war crimes.
The war in Sierra Leone killed some 50,000 civilians. The War in Iraq has probably killed three of four times that, by now, and it was started based on lies through and through. Bush should be the next to stand trial.
Argentina's president says that Argentina's invasion of the Falkland islands was a cowardly act of dictators.
I hope to hear a US president someday say the same thing about Iraq.
Diplomats witnessed the Israeli Army attack peaceful protestors in Bil'in, after viewing the olive trees and the wall that cuts them off from their trees.
Many Americans would see a scandal in the DHS spokesman who has been arrested for proposing sex to a 14-year-old girl through the Internet.
I too see a scandal, but not the same one. I think the scandal is that this man is going to face a prison sentence when he has not done wrong to anyone.
Sometimes adults are in a position of power over teenagers (or even children) and use that power to pressure them into sex. That is wrong because it is coercion. Sometimes they manipulate or trick inexperienced people into sex they didn't want. That's not right because it is not honest.
But this man seems to have done none of those things. He was chatting with a stranger, clearly not dependent on him in any way. The report gives no reason to think he was pressuring or tricking her. For all we can tell, he was making an honest request. Supposing his interlocutor had been a real girl, if she had not wanted to have sex with him, she would have had no trouble saying "no thanks". And supposing she had voluntarily had sex with him, presuming that they used a condom and suitable contraception, it would have done no harm to either of them.
MI5 was directly involved in sending some UK residents to Guantanamo.
Freedom of Expression: No Ifs And Buts.
How unbridled capitalism threatens your health.
Solving this problem does not mean communism or a "command economy". There is no need to abolish inequality, just reduce it.
RAWA, the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan, says: Defense of Abdul Rahman Misses the Mark!
A Just Peace Or No Peace, says the newly elected Hamas.
I don't support all of what Hamas asks for, but I agree with the basic point: the world must demand that Israel stop its violence and give back the land it has seized outside its borders, just as strongly as it demands that Palestinians stop their violence.
Women in Iraq had more rights when Saddam was in power.
Africa is depleting its soil through overuse.
An Islamic charity that Bush spied on, disregarding the law, is suing the US government to make it stop.
Former Majority Leader Tom Delay has called it quits.
However, the harm he did through redistricting in Texas lives on.
Bruce Lehman, the former US patent commissioner, seems to have admitted that the WTO's "TRIPS" agreement was a bad idea.
Officially, TRIPS stands for Trade-Related Intellectual Property somethingorother. But since the term "Intellectual Property" is misleading and should never be used, I prefer to call it "TRIPES", for "Trade-Restricting Impediments to Production, Education and Science".
Niger has forbidden the BBC to report on hunger there.
Meanwhile, Sudan blocked a UN official from visiting Darfur.
Bush forces propaganda fed to the press in Iraq is regularly based on lies, says an insider.
Dr Susan Wood resigned from the FDA in protest, after political interference in its decision about non-prescription sale of emergency contraception.
The need for a prescription is especially dangerous since many pharmacists refuse to fill prescriptions for emergency contraception, leaving women unable to prevent pregnancy.
I read elsewhere that some phramactists have even destroyed these prescriptions.
In Mosul, the "Iraqi police" commit acts of terror on two sides: for Bush, and against Bush.
Businesses are planning to build "green buildings" that don't produce greenhouse gases.
However, 2050 is too late for this to be the solution to global warming.
China's consumption of wood is destroying the ancient forests of Asia.
Jill Carroll, journalist hostage, was freed by her captors after 3 months. She does not know why they captured her, or why they freed her.
Olmert plans to withdraw unilaterally from a few settlements, as an excuse to make most of them a permanent land-grab. He demands that the Palestinians agree to renounced violence and carry out old agreements.
Will Israel agree to end its violence and carry out old agreements?
The UK is considering putting brakes on economic growth, because "No amount of economic growth is going to pay for the cost of the damage caused by a new and unstable climate".
The battle over ID cards in the UK continues, as a compromise delays the requirement until after the next election.
Whether to impose mandatory ID cards will be one of the main issues of that election.
Closing in on proof that Bush knowingly lied about Iraqi weapons plans.
If we can prove he directly lied, will it do any good? It is proved that Bush lied to us all about spying on us, and even the Democrats in Congress show little will to denounce Bush this.
Bush is privatizing the development of nuclear weapons.
One can envision that this will increase the pressure to develop them, and reduce the already weakened barriers to using them in wars of aggression.
The Bush regime's arguments to the Supreme Court in regard to imprisonment in Guantanamo reveal its total contempt for the concept of human rights--and its willingness to be as dishonest as necessary to crush them.
To save the Amazon rainforest, greater efforts will be needed.
An Indian doctor was sentenced to prison for telling a pregnant woman that the fetus was female.
This misguided law, based on confusedly blaming the practice of selective abortion for the long-standing prejudice against women, will increase population growth and perpetuate poverty.
The Internet approach to recycling all sorts of things.
Iraq Veterans Against The War held a joint protest march with survivors of Hurricane Katrina. Some veterans begged Iraqis to forgive the horrible things they did in Iraq.
The facts cited demonstrate that the practice of killing Iraqis haphazardly, and then lying about it, was widespread in the Bush forces. One former soldier says he got "instructions" to do so. I wonder who gave those instructions.
A Republican candidate used a faked photo to "prove" that Baghdad isn't violent.
Protesters outside the neoliberal "World Water Forum" say that water wars are already deadly for the poor.
Bush's attempts to promote "freedom and democracy" in Iraq has given them a bad name in the Arab world.
If all the apples you've seen are rotten, you might be skeptical that there is such a thing as a good one.
Bush is trying to reject the outcome of the Iraqi elections, which gave Sh'ites and Kurds the power, and this is contributing to increased conflict with the Shi'ites.
Bush's policy of trying not to exclude Sunnis from power could be a just policy, taken in isolation. But the only reason he has got the Shi'ites not to rebel (much) is that they expected to take over power.
In Germany, file sharing has been made a felony. This is what happens when governments take the side of companies against the public.
This article uses the propaganda term "piracy" to refer to sharing; please do not adopt that practice.
The German "music industry" has said cruel things to the public, such as
'If you plan to continue protesting about future audio media releases with copy protection, forget it; copy protection is a reality, and within a matter of months more or less all audio media worldwide are copy protected. And this is a good thing for the music industry. In order to make this happen we will do anything within our power - whether you like it or not.'
The music factories deserve to be completely wiped out for attacking the public's freedom.
The Bush forces killed 37 worshipers in a mosque, after the resistance shot at them from somewhere else in the neighborhood. The result is to increase conflict between the Shi'ites and the Bush forces.
Iraq has become an unstable roller coaster. I don't think Bush can stay on top of it for long.
Brian Haw, who has protested the conquest of Iraq for 3 years, has been arrested, completing Bliar's repression of all protest held where Parliament can see it.
Europe is coming to recognize that it has failed to cut greenhouse gas emissions from transportation. Improvements in energy efficiency have been cancelled out by growth in volume.
The Bliar regime does not torture, but it has now been proved to participate in torture campaigns, such as providing questions for foreign torturers to ask.
UN arms embargoes have been a failure, frequently ignored.
An Afghan man who was sentenced to death for converting to Christianity seems likely to be freed, but the law that denies people religious freedom will not be abolished.
Pakistan has sentenced several people to death for "blasphemy", while Malaysia makes it illegal to convert from Islam to any other religion. Muslims who dislike it when people connect their religion with violence should work to end Islam's violence towards people that don't want to be Muslims.
The MPAA (Malicious Power Attacking All) is trying to claim that use of Bittorrent is illegal.
Sharing music and movies on the Internet ought to be explicitly legalized. Sharing is friendship; to attack sharing is to attack friendship.
The US Supreme Court is hearing a case about trying Guantanamo prisoners in military courts.
A million people are now protesting in France against the law that undermines workers' rights.
600 rallied in London for freedom of speech, including but not limited to the freedom to print cartoons that make fun of Mohammed. One of them faces criminal charges for "offending" someone; I read elsewhere this was for carrying a sign with one of those cartoons on it. This illustrates how fragile freedom of speech is in the UK.
China has put a tax on wood, to discourage deforestation. And on luxury cars that use a lot of energy.
Chopsticks don't have to be disposable--that is a modern practice. They can be washed just like forks.
A man placed under punitive sanctions in the UK, without trial of course, says he would rather face torture in than subject his family to this continued punishment.
I sympathize with his desire to spare his family; but if he lets the UK use them as hostages to make him accept torture, what side has won? I think a person's duty is to make sure that terrorists who take hostages do not gain anything thereby. Especially when the hostage takers work for a government.
Three Christian Peacemaker Teams hostages in Iraq were freed by a raid by the Bush forces, based on information from a prisoner who was connected with the kidnapers.
I am very curious about the motive for the kidnaping. Perhaps the ex-hostages will be able to tell us.
Water Activists Turn On The Taps And Turn Up The Pressure.
Given the scarcity of water, I think that some sort of market for water is needed to bring about conservation--especially when the water is used by business. But every person should have a guaranteed right to a certain amount of water per day, gratis.
A big utility privatization in Thailand was canceled by a court decision.
A play made from the words of Rachel Corrie, who was killed by Israeli forces as she protected a Palestinian's house from demolition, has had great success in London. In New York, however, people do not dare produce it.
Perhaps they should make a movie of it.
An Israeli soldier who shot a girl of 13 was prosecuted, but not very hard. Instead of punishment, he will now receive compensation, around $17,000.
How the Israel Lobby shapes US foreign policy, including Bush's conquest of Iraq.
I disagree with one minor point: it is incorrect to conclude that oil was not a major reason for Bush's war of conquest, merely because support for Israel was a major reason. People often have multiple reasons for doing one thing, and there's plenty of evidence that Bush wanted to control the oil.
Here's an Israeli reaction to the article.
I learned about both from an Israeli peace group.
Israel continues its policy of demolishing Arab houses. In the past, sometimes houses have been demolished with people inside them. This time, they threw children out the window first.
The US public wants its beef tested for BSE. Creekstone Farms wants to test its cattle for BSE. The US government says it is not allowed to do so.
Glacial earthquakes in Greenland's ice sheet have more than doubled in ten years--a sign that the ice sheet is starting to break up.
A group of Iraqi exiles face the threat of persecution by supporting the Iraqi resistance, and calling for the Bush forces to pull out of Iraq.
Bush's mother found a clever way to give his brother a gift and evade gift taxes. She gave it to a charity, with a requirement to spend it on licenses for proprietary software distributed by his company. In other words, an unethical "product" which actually costs him next to nothing to "produce".
Bush's latest "signing statements" indicate a Humpty Dumpty approach to laws: they mean whatever he says they mean.
Iran, Iraq Crises Converge Despite U.S. Hardliners.
It will be hard for Bush to attack Iran while depending on Iran for cooperation in regard to Iraq--cooperation which could be canceled at any time. However, it would be a shame if Iran helps Bush to subjugate Iraq in exchange for not itself being attacked.
The Australian government secretly intervened to shut down a web site that satirized the Prime Minister.
The satire is still available.
If Melbourne IT is serious about the excuses that they give for having turned off the domain name, then now that they know the facts, they should turn it on again--right? They can easily verify that it does not in fact do phishing. Have they tried to check?
The article uses the propaganda term "intellectual property", a term that should never be used, because it misleadingly implies that copyright law, patent law, trademark law, and various others, are variations on a theme. In fact, these laws have nothing in common, in terms of what they forbid you to do. See this article.
This event illustrates why the hoopla about "internet governance" is a distraction. It is merely a matter of which governments control which parts of a complicated system for maintaining domain names. The ".org" domain is one of those officially controlled by ICANN for the US, but this did not stop the Australian government from taking away Neville's satirical domain. He used an Australian company to manage the domain.
The Global Good Neighbor initiative.
Founder of Liberation Theology says: A New Ethics is Needed to Save Life on Earth.
The Basque independence group Eta, known for bombings of civilian targets, has agreed to stop fighting permanently.
FBI agent Samit's testimony at the Moussaoui trial shows that the FBI management was dead set against investigating suspected terrorists before 9/11. It even blocked Samit from notifying the FAA.
How religion kills: the Bush regime is keeping millions of young people around the world ignorant about safe sex practices, in the name of the perverse idea of sexual abstinence.
The US military's top generals wanted in 1962 to launch a war with Cuba by attacking the US or friendly countries and blaming it on Cuba.
That was published in 2001. Now it has been admitted that the Gulf of Tonkin incident was faked--so the spirit of Operation Northwoods did live on in Vietnam.
Farmers in India struggle under impossible debts that make them effectively slaves to the moneylenders.
It's not too much better in the US. The Alliance for Fair Food campaigns to improve the working conditions and pay of farm laborers in the US, who are paid very little for working very hard.
Bush wants to allow tax preparers to sell your tax return.
Research now suggests sea level will rise 6 meters, around 20 feet, in this century, putting many of the world's major cities under water.
Torture in Iraq was not limited to Abu Ghraib, but secrecy protects Task Force 6-26 from proper investigation.
There are massive protests in Ecuador against signing a "free trade" treaty with the US.
These treaties put limits on democracy while keeping wages down. The leaders who want them are working for global business, not for their own people. I hope the opposition drives this president out of power.
The Bliar regime has been forced to take the part of al-Rawi, their former agent who is imprisoned in Guantanamo because they disowned him.
It will be a good thing to win his freedom, but what about the other 500 prisoners being tortured in Guantanamo?
Operation Swarmer-- a P.R. exercise in Iraq.
There are many reports that the Bush forces massacre civilians and lie to excuse it. Evidence has been found to prove this in two cases, which has led to investigations.
What remains to be seen is whether the Bush forces take this crime seriously and punish it seriously.
As the Labour Party's loans from millionaires are revealed, the public rightly concludes it is just as sleazy as as its predecessor.
The dishonesty of these secret loans obscures the deeper issue: how can a party which receives loans from tycoons possibly represent labor? If its policies are such as to make tycoons want to lend it money, they surely don't strongly support those tycoons' employees.
Organs from people executed in China are being sold for transplant purposes.
This could lead China to start executing people in order to sell their organs, as in Larry Niven's stories.
The idea of "fair trade", often seen in certain food products such as coffee, is now being applied to cotton clothing.
To make this really effective, it has to be a legal requirement.
Uzbekistan has made the UNHCR close its office there, after the UNHCR warned that deporting refugees there could lead to their being tortured.
The Bliar regime has been forced to take the part of al-Rawi, their former agent who is imprisoned in Guantanamo because they disowned him.
It will be a good thing to win his freedom, but what about the other 500 prisoners being tortured in Guantanamo?
Operation Swarmer--a P.R. exercise in Iraq.
As the Labour Party's loans from millionaires are revealed, the public rightly concludes it is just as sleazy as as its predecessor.
The dishonesty of these secret loans obscures the deeper issue: how can a party which receives loans from tycoons possibly represent labor? If its policies are such as to make tycoons want to lend it money, they surely don't strongly support those tycoons' employees.
Hundreds of people from the political opposition have been murdered, or disappeared, by the US-backed president of the Philippines, who labels them as "terrorists".
Disaster recovery funds in the US are a boondoggle for the middlemen, while the people who really do the work get just a pittance. And Bush has made it even worse.
Uri Avnery: How Olmert sent the army to attack Jericho for his election campaign.
Bush's plan to promote conservation of petroleum: by making his cronies rich at your expense.
UK victims of house-arrest without trial suffer a life of constant threats. They required to phone every night between 3am and 4am, and if they can't wake up to do so, the police raid the house. Long-term sleep deprivation is a form of torture.
The US Supreme Court will rule on a patent covering doctor's thought processes. The appeals court ruled that doctors commit patent infringement "merely by thinking".
Even economics recognizes that present day "free trade" policies are really recipes for low wages.
I tend to think these suggested remedies will not be sufficient, however.
Several states sued the US government to overturn an absurd Bush interpretation of environmental law, and won.
A European Union project for requirements for corporations' social responsibility has been hijacked by the corporations whose conduct it is supposed to regulate.
It's not clear whether the Three Gorges Dam is an ecological disaster or a benefit, but people have been imprisoned for criticizing it.
Pacifist teachers in Japan still resist government pressure to sing the militarist national anthem, but their numbers are dwindling under harsh pressure.
A Chinese dissident, kept for 13 years in a mental hospital, proves to be sane. Several prominent Chinese dissidents have been released recently as part of a campaign to distract attention from the thousands that are still imprisoned.
Senator Feingold introduced a resolution to censure Bush.
I think it is already time to call specifically for impeachment.
A RAF doctor who claims the invasion and occupation of Iraq are illegal seems likely to face a court martial.
The US is guilty of many violations of treaties on labor rights.
Arctic sea ice melted drastically last summer. The new ice this winter is small and thin.