This list of suggested nonviolent ways of sabotaging an organization from within.
was published by the US government during World War II. People are suggesting it may be useful against the fascists who took over the US government by attacking its election system.
*With 47% approval rating [the wrecker] is only president to have sub-50% reading at start of term, Gallup poll indicates.*
This makes sense given that, according to Greg Palast's investigation, less than half of the votes that US voters tried to cast were for the wrecker.
Greg Palast: *Trump lost. That is, if all legal voters were allowed to vote, if all legal ballots were counted, Trump would have lost the states of Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Georgia. Vice-President Kamala Harris would have won the Presidency with 286 electoral votes.*
*Harris cheated out of 3,650,000 votes by these Jim Crow tricks. 4.7 million voters purged. 3.2 million registrations rejected. 2.1 million mail-in ballots tossed.*
Greg Palast reports the details: if not for aggressive Republican voter-suppression, Harris would have won the popular vote and the electoral college.
The current US government is fraudulent and illegitimate at multiple levels.
Special counsel Jack Smith believes that the corrupter would have been convicted of various crimes related to trying to steal the 2020 election, if his grabbing the presidency had not got him off the hook.
Greg Palast claims that the corrupter would have lost in 2024 if not for new efforts at voter suppression.
Will we get our democracy back?
Greg Palast reports on the views of attendees at the fascist's rally: they are convinced that they will rebel if he loses.
I think they are nerving themselves to start shooting.
I hope that, if they start actually pointing guns at people, US troops will not hesitate to use guns to vanquish them. In their way of thinking, they are entitled to shoot people who won't support them, and if you aren't ready for a gunfight, that implies they should bully you. They will bully the US army if commanders seem hesitant to order "Fire!"
But if they see that the Army is prepared to return fire if they shoot, they may still hesitate to start actual shooting.
Greg Palast: Texas Republicans are threatening to jail Houston's election officials for facilitating voter registration.
They fear that the Democrats will win Texas if disprivileged groups find it easy to vote.
RFK Jr abandoned his campaign for president and endorsed the corrupter. In my book, that endorsement makes him an enemy of democracy.
Greg Palast talks of investigative journalism with RFK Jr, and how the latter subsequently forgot all about what the two had done.
Some examples of RFK Jr's promotion of wild disinformation.
Another analysis of the danger of a Republican coup by arbitrarily rejecting vote count results.
See also Greg Palast's warning.
Greg Palast: Republicans in Georgia's state government gave themselves the power to reject, arbitrarily, the vote of any county. It is already looking at canceling Atlanta's votes in the next election.
How can the US prevent this method of stealing the election?
Greg Palast reports that The (original) Keystone oil pipeline ruptured in 2022 (and caused a substantial oil spill) because of improper construction, which was not detected because the safety inspection tool's software had been modified so as to overlook "small" flaws in pipelines.
Palast says that such modification is a common practice. It seems that pipeline companies they have decided to ignore flaws that, although "small", can lead eventually to oil spills.
Greg Palast warns that the bullshitter's campaign to make it hard for blacks to vote is working very effectively, and Republicans are still working hard at it.
Former Texas governor Connally talked with Middle Eastern leaders in 1980 trying to convince Iran to hold on to the US embassy hostages, so that Reagan would win the 1980 election.
This is according to Ben Barnes, who worked for him and accompanied him on the trip.
Officials of various countries have affirmed, over the years, that Reagan made a deal with Khomeini to refuse to free the US embassy hostages before the 1980 presidential election. Here is Greg Palast's report on Ben Barnes.
It accuses him of a lot of nastiness, but doesn't answer the questions it raises: why did Barnes not say this before, and why does he say it now? But, it doesn't cast much doubt on his recent statement.
As for calling "Dubya" a "draft-dodger". that term should not be used. I rebuke Dubya for many wrongs, including the crime of starting a war of aggression against Iraq. But there is nothing wrong in trying to escape from being conscripted into an unjust war.
That includes the Vietnam War, which the US ramped up based on fabricating the fictitious "incident" in the Gulf of Tonkin.
And it includes Putin's invasion of Ukraine. We should support Russians who are doing whatever it takes to avoid fighting in the Putin forces.
Greg Palast conjectures that Putin grabbed Ukrainian children and gave them to Russians to raise in order to boost the fraction of Russians that will be white orthodox Christians.
Greg Palast reports on evidence about the Jan 6 insurrection that was not followed up, or not collected. Why didn't the state identify every rioter and search their cell phones?
It is especially disturbing (though not surprising) that some capitol thugs showed their support to the insurrectionists, before the actual insurrection.
Greg Palast asserts that Putin was chosen by the oligarchs, then winning public support (while he needed it) through the Chechen war that killed lots of civilians and lots of Russian soldiers.
I think Palast can be trusted, but I would be more certain of the claims if they came with references to demonstrate some of the cited points.
Greg Palast's take on the Ukraine situation.
Greg Palast reports on how Exxon bribed Nursultan Nazarbayev, and an individual pleaded guilty, but was then let go by the judge.
A rally for the wrecker and his Big Lie was widely announced, but under a hundred people joined in.
Author Greg Palast points out that larger rallies by progressives are often ignored.
Greg Palast: *Power outage in New Orleans: Is Ida or Entergy to blame?*
Greg Palast says that the lasting blackout of much of New Orleans was the result of malingering by the power company, Entergy. He says that the company profits from the losses caused by hurricanes, so it has stubbornly refused to take the necessary precautions to reduce damage.
Greg Palast describes the conspiracy of oil companies to turn off the expensive precautions that they had agreed to, in order to get permission to ship oil out of Valdez, Alaska.
More about the frauds that led to the oil spill.
I am very interested what Greg Palast has to say, but I would prefer if the articles were shorter, and more focused on the crucial facts and the crucial conclusions they demonstrate.
*To Stop an Electoral Coup, Study What Went Wrong in the 2000 Florida Recount.*
Keep in mind that the only reason this recount was necessary is because the Republicans had cheated massively through voter suppression, as revealed by Greg Palast.
Georgia kicked over 310,000 voters off the registration list on the grounds that they had moved. Supposedly it did this based on data from the USPS. Greg Palast's team checked properly with the USPS and found out that 197,000 of them should not have been deleted.
This is an example of voter suppression. The current governor of Georgia stole the election in 2018 by voter suppression like this.
Greg Palast: Republicans may be planning to refuse to certify the elections in some states, using uncounted postal ballots as an excuse. Use early voting instead of postal voting.
That is what I did for the Massachusetts primary on Sept 1, and that is what I plan to do for the general election too.
ACLU of Georgia and Greg Palast: *…the State had likely removed in 2019 the voter registrations of nearly 200,000 Georgia citizens on the grounds that they had moved from the address on their voter registration application. However, none of these citizens had moved,…*
When mail-in ballots make it through the USPS, the gauntlet is not finished. Many localities and states are not prepared to handle large quantities of postal ballots.
In addition, as Greg Palast has informed us, local officials have opportunities to discriminate in rejecting postal ballots, and they use them.
I decided to use early voting rather than postal voting.
Greg Palast inquires why the US indicted Steve Bannon but not his co-conspirator Kris Kobach.
Greg Palast's suggestions for how to stop Republicans from taking away your vote this year.
Greg Palast: if your state permits it, bring your postal ballot to an authorized election office, and bypass the post.
I have been supporting calls to Congress to give the USPS enough funds to deliver ballots with the usual speed. But Democrats in Congress have no way to do that if Republicans are determined to block it, and they are.
But even if it were possible to provide extra funds, that might not help.
The supposed shortage of funds was the excuse, not the cause, for the mail slowdown. We now know that Republican saboteurs have planned other ways of slowing down mail delivery ever since May. Giving the USPS more funds would not stop them from sabotaging it. Indeed, I don't see how anything could stop them from intentionally mismanaging mail delivery except to replace them with honest people. The wrecker will not allow that, and Democrats cannot force it.
I think the only solution is to bypass the post office. I have decided to do early voting, not postal voting.
A friend of mine plans to go to Florida and join organized efforts to pick up voters' ballots and bring them to the election authority.
Can anyone point me at a list of which states permit non-postal delivery of ballots?
Greg Palast's recommendations for ensuring your ballot does get counted.
The first step is now: make sure you have not been "purged" from the voter's list, while there is still time for you to register again if necessary.
Greg Palast explains several ways that Republicans have blocked people from voting in recent elections.
That in addition to gerrymandering, which affects the election of legislative bodies but does not function through voter suppression.
Greg Palast covers the protests, including one in LA in which a thug threatened to kill him, but perhaps didn't really mean it.
The Supreme Court found a strained excuses in 2000 to hand supposed victory in Florida to Dubya. It could do the same sort of thing this year.
It was only later that Greg Palast showed how the Republicans had stolen the election before election day, by systematically preventing elegible black voters from voting.
Greg Palast reports on corruption by Mnuchin, corruption by the Koch brothers, and corruption by the conman, as well as others.
Greg Palast: Absentee ballots in the US place many obstacles in the voter's way, and the votes of people from marginalized groups are more likely to be blocked.
Thus, switching to voting by mail will not automatically assure that all registered voters get to vote.
Greg Palast warns that Mueller seems to be targeting Wikileaks for publishing real and important news — bona fide Democratic National Committee emails that show it was corrupt.
The left candidate, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, won the presidential election in Mexico.
What he says is good, but people tell me he hasn't gone much into details. Meanwhile, some of the deals described here may play into the hands of business.
His acknowledged victory demonstrates that the right wing didn't rig the election. That in itself is a step forward for Mexico, since several presidential elections have been stolen in the past 20 years, including once from López Obrador.
Greg Palast says that right-wingers are stealing elections for the Mexican Senate, though.
Greg Palast: A Koch-funded company tracks people's everyday actions through other companies' digital surveillance, to determine how to influence them politically.
This company would not be able to use that data if the other companies did not collect it. We must legislate to prohibit collecting data about people's daily activities.
Ralph Nader explains how the Democrats have weakened themselves by not fighting for important ideas.
Dubya's campaign leader in Florida, Katherine Harris, arranged to rig the election in Florida.
This was reported by Greg Palast.
His article was published in London in January 2001, but appeared in the US only on September 12, when most Americans were distracted by a more blatant but not as ruinous attack on the US.
Greg Palast explains why the recounts are essential: so many ways that ballots can be counted wrong, or rejected entirely.
Why it is very important to vote for Jill Stein for president.
One additional point that this article could have made is that Dubya wouldn't have even come near winning Florida in 2000 if not for disenfranchizing around 50,000 blacks, as revealed by Greg Palast.
Greg Palast's suggestions for Bernie Sanders and his movement for a political revolution.
Azerbaijan has denied entry to Emma Hughes because the human rights organization she works for has criticized the regime's association with BP, and the use of the European Games (which Azerbaijan is hosting in conjunction with BP) to distract attention from repression.
Greg Palast has reported on that relationship.
Amnesty International has been totally excluded from Azerbaijan before these games.
It seems absurd to permit Azerbaijan to be a candidate for hosting "European" games, even if its government were a beacon of freedom. It is no more part of Europe than neighboring Iran is. Would they allow Japan to host the European Games? South Africa? Brazil?
Greg Palast's full report on a secret Republican scheme to block 2 million minority group members from voting by falsely accusing them of registering in two states.
The trick is being sloppy and treating false matches (nearly all of them) as real matches.
Many Republican-dominated states are using other measures to stop college students from voting.
Greg Palast: oil companies destroyed the swamp that protected New Orleans from hurricanes, and an oil company shut down the research center that tried to warn people of the danger.
Greg Palast reports Chris Christie's financial connections with the Koch brothers.
Greg Palast: the Nelson Mandela Barbie doll.
Greg Palast: How Larry Summers and Geithner bullied 165 countries into eliminating their equivalents of Glass-Steagall through the WTO.
And Obama is closely connected to their gang.
Greg Palast explains the dishonest scheme that triggered the financial crisis, and the small part in it played by the only participant that is being prosecuted.
I see no need to use the smear term "frog" to refer to someone who is French. And what's wrong with garlic, anyway?
Greg Palast explains the dishonest scheme that triggered the financial crisis, and the small part in it played by the only participant that is being prosecuted.
I see no need to use the smear term "frog" to refer to someone who is French. And what's wrong with garlic, anyway?
Greg Palast explains the dishonest scheme that triggered the financial crisis, and the small part in it played by the only participant that is being prosecuted.
I see no need to use the smear term "frog" to refer to someone who is French. And what's wrong with garlic, anyway?
Greg Palast: My big fat Greek minister.
Greg Palast interviews Karzai's advisor, Yahya Maroofi, about the prospect of peace with the Taliban.
There is no reason why the Taliban and the US have to be enemies. They are likely to continue oppressing Afghan women, and if I imagine myself magically transformed into an Afghan women, I would be thinking about how to kill Taliban. However, the other parties in Afghanistan are not much better, not enough to continue the bloodshed over.
Democracy activists in Azerbaijan get little support from the West.
Greg Palast has described how the government of Azerbaijan works hand in hand with international oil companies. That's why the US cooperates with Azerbaijan's dictator, and tries to destabilize Venezuela.
Greg Palast says that oil companies blocked the privatization of Iraq's oil in order to keep the price up.
If so, it was probably a good deed. If oil were cheaper, we would be burning more of it. However, no war was required to achieve this goal.
US citizens: you can
get
Greg Palast's last book in PDF, with no EULA,
and pay whatever amount you wish.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-03 because the
old
link was broken.]
I'm told the site works fine with Javascript disabled (though it says that it won't work).
Romney made 15 million from the rescue of the automobile companies.
Greg Palast presents what the Democratic presidential candidate ought to have said in reply to Romney.
How John Paulson arranged with Goldman Sachs to swindle other banks and got away with it, and now is paying millions of those winnings to help Romney.
If you want to buy the book, please don't get it from Amazon. Other links include
http://www.indiebound.org/book/9781609804787
but even better, you can ask a local independent bookstore to order it.
Chicago teachers have gone on strike because
the
city is planning to fire them if they teach in schools where students
do badly (because they are poor).
[Reference updated on 2018-03-02 because the
old
link was broken.]
Greg Palast explains
how
the scheme works.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-02 because the
old
link was broken.]
Greg Palast: the euro was conceived so as to provoke a crisis which would be an opportunity to roll back social and workers' protections across Europe.
Greg Palast describes how BP financed a coup in Azerbaijan to take control of the country's oil, and what life there is like under the corrupt Aliyev family that is allied with BP.
Compare this with Iran's history, the overthrow of Mossadegh which led to the oppressive Shah — whose oppression inspired the reaction that led to the even more oppressive Islamic Republic.
The Unlearned Lessons of the BP Disaster.
[Reference updated on 2018-02-24 because the
old
link was broken.]
This doesn't include the lessons to learn from BP's concealment of a previous smaller disaster caused by the same corner-cutting practices, which Greg Palast is revealing.
Greg Palast reports on falsified safety records at the Shoreham nuclear power plant on Long Island.
There is some confusion in what he says about the strength of the earthquake in Japan. An earthquake at 9.0 on the Richter scale involves 10 times the shaking amplitude as a 8.0 earthquake. Anyway, it was actually the tsunami that caused the nuclear disaster. (Of course, underwater earthquakes often cause tsunamis.)
But this does not invalidate the overall point. Wikipedia says a study in 2008 warned that Fukushima Daiichi could be damaged even by a 7.0 earthquake, but it was ignored. TEPCO also refused to take precautions against large tsunamis despite being warned. This sustains Palast's main point.
Greg
Palast criticizes the BP settlement.
[Reference updated on 2018-02-24 because the
old
link was broken.]
The software that oil companies use to inspect pipelines has been rigged to overlook some problems. These problems can cause deadly explosions.
Here's Greg Palast's own statement.
Piers Morgan, as editor of the London Mirror, published fabricated accusations against Greg Palast to undermine his exposé of Labour Party corruption.
Greg Palast: make the Republicans pay the debts they contracted under Bush.
The US has finally killed Osama bin Laden. I don't consider his death any loss, but I don't expect this will do much harm to al Qa'ida. The only way this might have any important effect is psychologically: for instance, if al Qa'ida can use him as a martyr, or if Obama seizes this excuse to withdraw troops from Afghanistan.
Greg Palast's book, Armed Madhouse, has the following joke.
So Osama walks into this bar, see, and George Bush says, "Whad'l'ya have, pardner?" and Osama says, "Well, George, what are you serving today?" and Bush says, "Fear," and Osama says, "Fear for everybody!" and George pours it on for the crowd. Then the presidential bartender says, "Hey, who's buying?" Osama points a thumb at the crowd sucking down their brew. "They are," he says — and the two of them share a quiet laugh.
Greg Palast investigated the Chevron-Texaco spills in Ecuador and reports on the dead children — and on proof that the company tried to destroy evidence.
Greg Palast: BP has tremendous influence over the government of Azerbaijan, and probably had a hand in the coup which put the current king/president's father in power. The influence was enough to get Palast arrested for filming BP installations.
Greg Palast: PBS, funded by Chevron, put the blame for the big spill solely on BP, so people won't worry that any other company might be dangerous too.
Greg Palast: BP has a policy of neglecting safety in order to save money. BP's negligence caused the disaster in Prince William Sound, and negligence caused the Gulf of Mexico leak to become a disaster too.
Greg Palast: the undeclared purpose of Arizona's "show us your papers" law is to stop poor Hispanic citizens from voting.
Greg Palast: the undeclared purpose of Arizona's "show us your papers" law is to stop poor Hispanic citizens from voting.
Greg Palast reports: Before "progressive" congressman Eric Massa resigned, he got in bed with a vulture capitalist fund that wants to convert the US into its collection agent. It is vicious when the US government attacks poor countries, but it is not a rare event. (See today's note about the US and Aristide.) Indeed, it's a major part of the US Trade Representative's job. The corruption goes deeper than an individual congresscritter here and a senator there; it is fundamental to the system, as long as business has political power.
Greg Palast explains why associating the Taliban with the 9/11 attacks is stretching the facts. His article only states part of the uncertainty. We can't even be sure that the Saudis accused of carrying out the attack were the real attackers, or that the Bush regime was not involved. Bush tried to block the investigation, then weakened it and corrupted it.
Obama caved in to Big Pharma and presents it as a victory. After secret negotiations — violating his pledge to make them public — he convinced Big Pharma to increase prices by 2% less over the next 10 years. He did this by surrendering the negotiating power that could have saved 40% or more. Palast's article doesn't clearly say that the savings Obama achieved would be spread over 10 years, but but that is asserted here.
Obama cannot achieve meaningful health care reform because he is aiming too small.
Obama caved in to Big Pharma and presents it as a victory. After secret negotiations — violating his pledge to make them public — he convinced Big Pharma to increase prices by 2% less over the next 10 years. He did this by surrendering the negotiating power that could have saved 40% or more. Palast's article doesn't clearly say that the savings Obama achieved would be spread over 10 years, but but that is asserted here.
Obama cannot achieve meaningful health care reform because he is aiming too small.
Greg Palast: stealing oil from poor Indians is a global practice for oil companies.
US citizens: How to prevent the Republicans from stopping you from voting.
Report: Voting problems in several swing states.
Greg Palast has been saying for years that the Republicans will try to steal this election by any possible means. Problems like these offer easy opportunities
Obama, who wasn't very liberal to begin with, is taking more conservative positions to get elected.
What bothers me most is advocating the death penalty. That is a setback I didn't expect.
If Greg Palast is right, these concessions are all futile, since the Republicans have sewn up the election regardless of how people vote.
19 years after the giant Exxon Valdez spill, which was not a mere accident since it happened because Exxon broke safety regulations, Exxon has defied the court and refused to pay damages. Now it hopes that Bush cronies on the Supreme Court will spare it from ever paying.
Palast mispronounces the digraph "xx". The correct pronunciation is like German "ch" in "ach".
The investigation
of the firings of US attorneys is getting hotter.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Greg Palast says these firings were part of the Republicans' plan to rig the 2008 election.
Iraqi refugees turn to sex trade in Syria.
Projecting
a future movement to "live unplugged".
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
Norway has adopted a law that government information must be distributed in open formats.
Sudan has accepted 2000 Palestinian refugees who were stuck for months at the Iraqi border.
The "Homegrown Terrorism" act would set up a new system of censorship, and set up rules under which
the
heroes of American democracy would have been called "terrorists".
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
The Bush regime has a pattern of stretching laws to extend its power. We dare not assume it will not stretch this power too. Nor can we assume a Clinton regime would be any better.
The
occupation of Iraq and the war in Afghanistan are costing 15 billion dollars per month.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
New
York State plans to upgrade and unify its efforts to control invasive species.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
It would be more effective in the long run to increase precautionary measures against introduction of invasive species. But that runs into opposition, because these measures are inconvenient.
In
the short term, this benefits Musharraf, who now has no plausible rival for power.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
If Musharraf declined to provide security for Bhutto, that does seem to make him partly responsible. Even if he did not organize the assassination, he knew there would be more attempts.
Rush Holt's bill to fund a move to paper ballots has revealed disagreements about how to make election vote counting honest.
Meanwhile, Greg Palast says that the way Republicans intend to steal the 2008 election is by systematic fraudulent challenges to Democratic voters, so as to disenfranchise or scare them.
Most
Arab countries, and Iran, severely filter the Internet.
They also arrest and punish people who criticize the government.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
The Bush forces in Iraq don't filter the Internet, but they have killed a number of journalists.
Two
British diplomats were expelled from Afghanistan
after talking with warlord groups allied to the Taliban.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
The
Hindu fanatics who usually attack Muslims now have attacked Indian Christians.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
There is a serious issue at the root of this. Upper-cast Hindus treat the Dalits (formerly called "untouchables") like trash, and Hinduism openly supports this cruelty. Thus, many Dalits think of converting to some other religion in which all are treated as equals. Often they choose Buddhism, following Dr. Ambedkar, but sometimes they choose Christianity. Either way, they face violent opposition from upper-caste Hindus that want to maintain them in subjection.
It could be easier just to declare themselves Atheists. However, I think they need the support of some larger community to make their rejection of Hinduism effective. And some forms of Buddhism are Atheist.
Lots of companies try to convince you to buy by saying they give some money to charity. But you can't necessarily trust them.
I've always been suspicious of statements that "a portion of what you pay will be given to XYZ". What portion will they give? .0000001 percent?
Greg
Palast interviews President Correa.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
Australia's new government discarded the plan for a national ID card.
J.
Edgar Hoover asked President Truman to imprison over 12,000 Americans without trial.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
Who
should judge the judges?
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
The
war in the Congo has killed 7 million people.
Many of them are women who were raped and mutilated as an act of political terrorism.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-20 because the
old
link was broken.]
Is this war fueled by diamonds? Something must be keeping it going.
The Senate blocked the plan to give phone companies retroactive immunity for illegal spying on Americans.
But Bush will try again.
Novelist Jonathan Lethem writes about how
art
depends on copying and imitating other art, and what that means for copyright.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
This is a good analysis of the basic issue of copyright today. I brought up related points in a more abstract way in another article, but he says it better.
However, the propaganda term "intellectual property" led Lethem to try to involve in patent law in a subject where it is not relevant at all. He recognized and denounced the bias in the term; but he did not recognize the other mistaken supposition it carries: that copyright and patents are similar issues and should be treated together. They are not similar; the points he raises about copyright don't relate to patent law at all.
In an unusual show of wisdom,
fishermen
decided to protect clownfish in Australian reefs where the population
has already been hit by global warming.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
If all fishermen were that rational, we would not have to worry about sweeping the oceans clean of fish.
Israeli
PM Olmert rejected a truce in Gaza
while announcing the intention to keep taking Palestinian land.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
Richard Dawkins will take
the
fight against religious irrationalism to the enemy's home ground.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
Some right-wing Israelis, and a few unusually wealthy and unusually right-wing American Jews, have
great
influence in US politics. How do they respond if you talk about
this? If you say this phenomenon is good, they welcome your approval.
But if you criticize the phenomenon, they say you're making it all
up because you're anti-Semitic.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
The US military is
training
soldiers to be religious fanatics.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
Does this remind you of Al Qa'ida?
Bush continues his War on the Environment by trying to stop California
from enacting stronger emissions standards.
California will sue.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
The Republican Party
used dishonest false-flag phone calls to corrupt the 2002 New Hampshire senate election.
Then the Corruption
Department delayed the investigation, so that Bush and his supporters
would not have to pay the price in 2004.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
Homeless men who have frozen to death sleeping the streets of Paris have ignited a scandal.
I'd expect that lots of homeless men freeze to death in the US, but we don't read about it because our society (or our media?) are more callous. In other words, France has a ways to sink before it reaches our level.
Martin Luther King's family has won a lawsuit against people who
conspired to kill him - vindicating their belief that the
official conclusion that James Earl Ray killed King,
acting alone, was false.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
Cheney is personally responsible for imposing Halliburton's mandatory arbitration policy, which prevents Jamie Leigh Jones from suing that company for rape (or for imprisoning her).
Cheney is probably also partly personally responsible for the law-free zone that protects the Halliburton employees who raped her, and the others who locked her up when she complained, from being prosecuted.
The Paris conference to donate money to the Palestinian economy can't achieve much
unless Israel releases its grip.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
Removing idle functionaries from the public payroll is generally a good thing, when there is a private economy in which people can get work. In a place such as Palestine, where opportunity is very limited, government handouts to those functionaries play the role of a welfare system. Cutting it off might not be an improvement.
The first step towards peace between Israel and Palestine is
to stop the organized crime of the "settlers",
who systematically terrorize and rob Palestinians.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-21 because the
old
link was broken.]
Meanwhile, Greg Palast says that the way Republicans intend to steal the 2008 election is by systematic fraudulent challenges to Democratic voters, so as to disenfranchise or scare them.
Greg Palast: Fear of Chavez is Fear of Democracy.
The UK Labour Party's fundraiser is in trouble for accepting possibly illegal contributions. In 1998, Greg Palast caught him on tape proposing to help businesses buy laws.
Help fund Greg Palast's investigative journalism.
Greg Palast presents evidence that Abu Risha was not a real Iraqi tribal leader, just a stooge Bush paid to pretend to be one.
Palast draws the conclusion that Al Qa'ida in Iraq is just a front for extortion by the tribal sheikhs. If that is true, that would mean one additional argument used by Bush to continue the occupation is entirely bogus. However, that argument is misguided even if Al Qa'ida in Iraq is real, because Iraqis will kick it out when the occupation ends.
Greg Palast's investigative fund needs money. Palast informed us about how the Bushmen stole the 2000 election, how they planned in advance to steal the 2004 election, and how they are now planning to steal the 2008 election.
US presidential candidates get away with lies in the debates, because the
mainstream media don't comment on the truth of what they say.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-19 because the
old
link was broken.]
In the spirit of Krugman's point, we should note that Dubya did not get within "chad-and-butterfly range" of winning the 2000 election. As Greg Palast discovered and published, Katherine Harris stole the election for Bush by disenfranchising tens of thousands of Black voters in Florida.
Krugman doubts that the US can survive four more years of Bush-quality leadership. I don't think that the US has survived 6 years of leadership with Dubya's level of patriotism. The US is not a collection of people, nor its physical infrastructure. The US is a system of government based on human rights. When Bush crushed basic human rights, with the support of most Democrats in Congress, he destroyed the US. The question now is whether the US can be resurrected.
I see little hope for it. The Republican candidates gloat about the destruction of human rights, while the Democratic candidates -- aside from Kucinich -- pay little attention to the question.
Congress is starting to look at Greg Palast's evidence of felonious disenfranchisement of voters in 2004.
Greg Palast: Monica Goodling testified that Torture Gonzales' chief of staff lied to Congress. He denied his knowledge of a felonious Republican scheme that disenfranchised many Black voters in 2004. And Palast has proof of it all.
Greg Palast: Naked neo-cons: Perjury and the Big, Bad Wolfowitz.
Greg Palast says: Bush's firing of prosecutors is part of an attempt to bias the 2008 elections.
Nigeria's ruling party rigged the elections there.
The opposition has denounced the elections as fraudulent and calls for a new election.
The US elections in 2000 and 2004 were also rigged, and Greg Palast says they are working on rigging the next election already.
As part of Bush's plan to reduce US attorneys to slavish obedience, he appointed a man who helped Bush steal the 2004 election, using a scheme to systematically disenfranchise Black voters who are homeless, away at school, or in the armed forces.
Greg Palast argues that this scheme was a felony: this man should be a defendant, not a prosecutor.
John Murtha, proposing to forbid Bush from sending more troops to Iraq, said on mainstream media: "The invasion itself is what causes the sectarian violence. It's the occupation [that] causes the violence."
I'm really glad that the wall forbidding people to say that the war is wrong has been punctured.
Greg Palast says: instead of letting Bush have one more fix of troops, ask Saudi Arabia and Iran to work out peace in Iraq.
I have recommended similar things.
Greg Palast documents the
government actions that are keeping Blacks from returning to New Orleans
-- political manipulation of disaster.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-28 because the
old
link was broken.]
The city of New Orleans should not be rebuilt in the same place, because that is asking for future disaster. They can't keep raising the levees as the sea rises. But the city should be rebuilt, on higher ground -- moving the parts that were not flooded this time.
This will cost money, but it will be money well spent.
Greg Palast: The Baker Boys: Stay Half the Course.
palast@gregpalast.com: How They Stole The Mid-Term Election.
It appears that these methods weren't enough to give Republicans victory, but they may have retained several congressional seats that the Republicans would have lost in a fair election.
Greg Palast analyzes US war propaganda. It leads readers to identify with Bush soldiers while dehumanizing the Iraqi civilians they kill.
Greg Palast teaches Americans to recognize situations where the right thing to do is "cut and run".
Hugo Chavez's Address to UN: After Bush speaks, it smells of sulfur.
Greg Palast interviews Hugo Chavez.
Charges against Greg Palast were dropped. He faced possible imprisonment for photographing an oil refinery.
Journalist Greg Palast faces Federal criminal charges--for taking a photo of an oil refinery whose exhaust pollutes the air right next to a camp for New Orleans refugees.
These bans on photography, which have also been applied to public places such as bus stations, are inexcusable acts of tyranny. (They are also unlikely to hinder real terrorists, who could easily arrange to avoid being spotted taking their photos-- but this is a secondary issue.)
Greg Palast reports on how Bush has prosecuted the class war against Americans.
Greg Palast reveals how Republican cronies were paid for producing a "plan" for evacuating New Orleans, but no one can find any copy of it. Louisiana's best hurricane expert complained that poor people without cars were being ignored, so they threatened his job. He refused to be silenced, but they ignored him anyway.
Although I agree with Palast's point that we shouldn't let this "natural" disaster excuse the wrongdoing, I disagree with his way of putting it. It would be more rational to say that a hurricane had to arrive sooner or later, so the lack of preparation (remember that Bush cut funds to strengthen the levies in order to pay for war in Iraq) was sure to cause its harm sooner or later.
Greg Palast speculates that the Bush regime and Iran share an interest in nuclear worries that drive up the price oil.
Greg Palast: Obrador shows what US democrats should have done when Bush stole two elections.
Dan Rather critized Bush's personal war-avoidance record, and was pilloried. Greg Palast has published even stronger charges, and stronger evidence; Bush refuses even to respond.
Dan Rather criticized Bush's personal war-avoidance record, and was pilloried. Greg Palast has published even stronger charges, and stronger evidence; Bush refuses even to respond.
Comments on Greg Palast's new book, Armed Madhouse.
Iraqi women are being attacked, even killed, by religious fanatics
for not dressing and acting as the fanatics demand.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-25 because the
old
link was broken.]
Bush did not plan for this, but it was his conquest, creating a situation where political Islam was a central part of opposition to his occupation of Iraq, that paved the way for it.
Greg Palast traces the rise of Islamic fanatics in the Iraqi resistance to the Bush regime's determination to take Iraq's oil.
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.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-24 because the
old
link was broken.]
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.
Greg Palast: OPEC and the economic conquest of Iraq
High oil prices encourage conservation and reduction of CO2 output. I don't think they are bad at all.
Greg Palast explains why there is no serious investigative journalism
in mainstream US media. The standard practice is to kill any
investigation based on evidence from a confidential source if a
government representative privately denies the claim.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-29 because the
old
link was broken.]
E. J. Dionne condemns Bush's assault on media independence.
A previous note has a link to Greg Palast's article about Newsweek's cave-in.
Greg Palast reports that oil companies have beaten out the neocons,
and convinced Bush to drop the plan to privatize Iraq's oil.
[Reference updated on 2018-04-29 because the
old
link was broken.]
Meanwhile, he presents evidence that Bush began planning the attack--and the privatization--shortly after taking office. More proof that 9/11 was just an excuse for what he wanted to do anyway.
Greg Palast wishes Dan Rather, and American journalism, "rest in peace".
Greg Palast, who broke the story on how Bush blocked some 50,000 Florida voters from voting, now reports on additional voter-suppression practices.
It is clear that the Republican Party hired people to brainstorm every possible way they could block Democrats from voting. By my book, this makes them the enemies of Democracy.
Greg Palast evaluates the Bush-Kerry debate.
I think it's not just Saudis that need to be investigated carefully for connection with the 9/11 attacks, it's the Bushmen's cover-up.
Greg Palast:
Has Johnnie been good?
[Reference updated on 2018-05-06 because the
old
link was broken.]
Greg Palast reflects
on the capture of Saddam Hussein.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-13 because the
old
link was broken.]
A news report says
Bush was misled by members of his cabinet who said that the war in Iraq would be a walkover,
and that warnings from
intelligence agencies were kept away from him.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Bush even had warning that Iraq would use suicide bombers, but apparently ignored it. As Bush proposes new laws to give the government agencies more power to collect information from and about us, he's clearly aiming where the enemy is not.
What we really need are laws against officials that refuse to listen to the information that these agencies collect.
Some countries are jealous about being left out of the "axis of evil".
The bluefin tuna population off the US East Coast is under 1/10 of what it was in 1970, so fishing is restricted. But the restrictions are not working to protect the tuna's numbers, because tuna move between the US shores and Europe.
A secret police unit in Serbia has been disbanded after its members were accused of selling drugs and murdering the Prime Minister of Serbia.
A reporter at the San Francisco Chronicle has been suspended because
he was
arrested with 1400 others at an anti-war protest.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Oil workers in Colombia are planning a general strike, fighting against privatization plans.
Bombardment by Bush forces
cut off the supply of drinking water in
Basra, so
much of the populace is fleeing in desperation.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Police in Colombia are attacking shanty-towns whose inhabitants
have nowhere to go.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Bush is Acting Like a Judicially-Selected Dictator.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
3 million protestors opposed the war in Spain on March 22.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
The Al-Jazeera web site has been down for days because of a barrage
of spam coming from Americans who object to its coverage of
unpleasant facts about the war.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
The higher the US officials, the less honest they are about the situation in Iraq.
In yet another attack on civil liberties, the UK plans to take DNA samples from everyone who is arrested. This provides a fairly straightforward way to produce a national DNA registry for improves surveillance of all citizens. After all, it's easy to arrest people; it's not unusual to be arrested just for being near a protest.
A TV reporter was arrested in DC just for filming the police arresting the driver of a truck.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Robert Fisk says that Iraqi officials are
giving more information about the war than the US,
and in general the Iraqi information is
accurate.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
The New World Order means,
"The
Anglo-Saxons Are Coming".
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Halliburton, Cheney's former oil company (which still pays him),
has got a big contract for rebuilding Iraq after the Bush-Cheney
administration destroys it.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
The WTO and the US war machine.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
As Secy of Defense Rumsfeld criticizes Iraq for violating the Geneva convention on treatment of prisoners, let's not forget the US violations he is personally responsible for.
Salmon farms in Scotland are passing diseases to wild salmon, whose numbers are in sharp decline.
A media company is paying for pro-war rallies in the US.
OCAP members organized a protest campaign by high-schoolers in Ontario against a new standardized test. When the test was leaked before it was used, members of OCAP were threatened with imprisonment.
If they elected a monkey as President of the United States, Tony Blair would ingratiate himself and do its bidding...
Considering the photos of Curious George, I monkey as president might not be such a big difference.
Uri Avnery's thoughts about the war.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
The islamist government of Kelantan, in Malaysia, has taken a small step towards respect for human rights. Instead of banning traditional art forms, now it only censors them for unislamic elements.
Benetton
plans to insert radio tracking chips in all its clothing.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Robert Fisk reports on how the war looks in Baghdad.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Antiwar protests continue, as even Americans resist the idea that they should support war merely because there is one.
Advice for consumers on how to resist being influenced by advertising.
A warning to Brits (and Americans): don't be drawn into blindly "supporting our troops". Intelligent, thoughtful support is not blind.
Before Rachel Corrie was killed by an Israeli army bulldozer operator, she wrote a series of emails to her family that explain the cruelties that she hoped to prevent with her presence.
Police arrested nonviolent antiwar protestors in San Francisco.
Ethiopia faces famine again. The cause: overpopulation.
Witnesses say that Rachel Corrie was deliberately killed by the driver of an Israeli bulldozer.
Normally when I cite someone else's writing, I reference his site which shows who wrote it. I cannot do that here: if I publish the name of the Serbian who sent me this letter, I would be putting him in danger.
Carlos Fuentes
presents arguments for Mexico to resist US pressure and
not support the US war resolution.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
A lawsuit threat from US Foodservice has
silenced a site where people had posted criticism of it.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
CAPPS II, the new system to collect and correlate many kinds of personal information about all airline passengers, is running into criticism in the Senate.
Israeli fighters
trying to destroy a Palestinian house killed an American woman
who was there trying to protect
the house from demolition.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Like Dubya, Terry Jones (formerly of Monty Python) is losing patience with his neighbors.
After Congressman Hansen criticized the IRS and other agencies, the US
government began a campaign to convict him of crimes that were
fabricated. He was eventually vindicated by the Supreme Court, after
spending years in prison and suffering torture that mutilated his feet and destroyed his teeth.
[Reference updated on 2018-09-07 because the
old
link was broken.]
An economic system out of control--how global business concentration
drives the world
towards unsustainable practices.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Palestinians and Israelis are concerned that Sharon may use
the US attack on Iraq as
cover for even worse repression against Palestinians.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
When Israeli fighters destroyed the house of a family of a dead
terrorist, they also destroyed the housing of 7 other families,
and killed the mother of one of them.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Public libraries are starting to warn the public about how the PAT-RIOT authorizes the government to secretly spy on everyone.
Some studies report that growing certain GM crops is good for wildlife, probably because of the reduction in pesticide use.
A participant in drafting a new constitution for the EU says it is developing into a threat to democracy.
The DOD is trying again to get a
blanket exemption from environmental protection laws,
so it can pollute at will.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Israeli fighters with bulldozers destroyed an apartment building because Palestinian fighters had entered it to fire at the Israelis. The Palestinians who lived in the building, who did not participate in the fighting, are now homeless.
Jimmy Carter
rejects the Bush regime's plans to attack Iraq.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
The Boy Scouts of America are running into protests for expelling Atheists.
Repression of dissent in the US: police start a fight with students at
a peaceful protest, a journalist records this, then the journalist
gets arrested.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Palestinians and Israelis expect Sharon to use the expected US-Iraq war as the cover and excuse for massive crimes.
How Israeli troops
attacked a team of medics who were trying to aid a wounded man.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
I reported on Susan Barclay's success in resisting first extralegal deportation and then legal deportation from Israel. Now she is being threatened with deportation again.
Edward Said, who denounced Saddam Hussein back when Kuwait and the US were supporting him, demolishes Bush's supposed intention to bring democracy to Iraq--and various other lies.
If you are blacklisted by the new US system for labeling air travelers
as a security risk, there will be no way you can try to clear your name,
no way to even confirm that you are on the list.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Will Bush hand Iraq over to a religious fanatic?
The filtering programs that US law requires libraries to install on their internet browser terminals "to block porn" actually block a lot more than porn. For instance, they make image searching nearly impossible.
Majority Senate Leader Frist has an Iraq war poll on his website.
Right now the majority of the respondents are pro-war. So spread
the word to go to his website and respond to the poll, and
change the percentages.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
It's common for Israeli troops to kill Palestinians and say, when confronted, "We were shooting at militants attacking us" or "Palestinian fighters killed them."
The US is torturing prisoners in Afghanistan.
A US citizen faces a year in prison for walking in a mall
wearing a shirt advocating peace.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Assassinations, shadowing and death threats continue against union organizations in Colombia.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Sharon's plans for Palestine amount to taking the Palestinians' land and imprisoning them in small Bantustans--or should we say, ghettos?
The US has already started the attack against Iraq, from the air. Doing this without any fanfare suggests that Bush wants to slide into war unnoticed--typical behavior for a government with something to hide.
Greg Palast reports on the leaked, secret FBI document that
told agents not to investigate the bin Laden family and
their connections with terrorism.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Israeli agents tried to deport Susan Barclay, one of the international volunteers to protect human rights in Palestine, disregarding the fact that she had a court hearing coming up about whether she should be deported.
Demolition of Palestinian housing is continuing at a high rate. Sometimes Israeli soldiers destroy houses in which suicide bombers live. This is collective punishment, in violation of treaties to protect the population of occupied countries.
Is the US government
lying about the arrest of Al-Qa'ida "mastermind"
Khalid Sheikh Muhammad?
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
A US bombing raid in Afghanistan killed 17 civilians last month.
John Kiesling resigned from the US diplomatic service to protest Bush
administration policies, saying that "Our fervent pursuit of war with
Iraq is driving us to squander the international legitimacy that has
been America's most potent weapon of both offense and defense since
the days of Woodrow Wilson."
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Police in Atlanta are always at the ready to protect businesses like
Taco Bell from the danger of...being criticized by leaflets.
Even if it take stretching the law to do it.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Venezuelan President Chavez has
arrested the leaders of the general strike
that lasted through December and January.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Antiwar protestors were arrested in Minneapolis just
for handing out leaflets.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Microsoft's gift to the next Enron: software designed to save documents so that only authorized people inside a corporation can read them--and even they can't transmit the text to anyone else. Future would-be whistleblowers will find that the whistle makes no sound.
Fanatics of various faiths, including Bush (Christian), Sharon (Jewish) and the Taliban (Muslim), are spreading so much hate and distrust that even groups that are dedicate to peace and understanding feel the strain among their members.
The Algerian government has "disappeared" at least 7,000 people in its civil war against Islamists. The Islamists were expected to win an election, so the government canceled the election.
Bush even had warning that Iraq would use suicide bombers, but apparently ignored it. As Bush proposes new laws to give the government agencies more power to collect information from and about us, he's clearly aiming where the enemy is not.
What we really need are laws against officials that refuse to listen to the information that these agencies collect.
Some countries are jealous about being left out of the "axis of evil".
The bluefin tuna population off the US East Coast is under 1/10 of what it was in 1970, so fishing is restricted. But the restrictions are not working to protect the tuna's numbers, because tuna move between the US shores and Europe.
A secret police unit in Serbia has been disbanded after its members were accused of selling drugs and murdering the Prime Minister of Serbia.
A reporter at the San Francisco Chronicle has been suspended because
he was
arrested with 1400 others at an anti-war protest.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Oil workers in Colombia are planning a general strike, fighting against privatization plans.
88 members of the oil workers' union have been assassinated in recent years.
Bombardment by Bush forces
cut off the supply of drinking water in
Basra, so
much of the populace is fleeing in desperation.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Meanwhile, Al Jazeera's reporter in Basra shows how civilians there are being killed by these bombardments.
Police in Colombia are attacking shanty-towns whose inhabitants
have nowhere to go.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Bush is Acting Like a Judicially-Selected Dictator.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Some people seem to think that Bush won the election because of Nader, but this isn't true. Bush did not win the election--in particular, not in Florida--and the reason he came even close to winning there was because his Katherine Harris arranged to stop tens of thousands of blacks from voting.
3 million protestors opposed the war in Spain on March 22.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
The Al-Jazeera web site has been down for days because of a barrage
of spam coming from Americans who object to its coverage of
unpleasant facts about the war.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
The higher the US officials, the less honest they are about the situation in Iraq.
Opposition to the war, in the US and the UK, is even more important now than it was before the war started--because this is the only thing holding the administration back from bombarding cities and killing civilians by the thousands. And if Bush wins, he will be tempted to let Iraq turn to chaos and call it "success", as in Afghanistan.
In yet another attack on civil liberties, the UK plans to take DNA samples from everyone who is arrested. This provides a fairly straightforward way to produce a national DNA registry for improves surveillance of all citizens. After all, it's easy to arrest people; it's not unusual to be arrested just for being near a protest.
A similar proposal is just one of the dangerous provisions of "Son of
patriot", which is Dubya's
plan for the next attack on freedom in the US.
[Reference updated on 2018-02-17 because the
old
link was broken.]
A TV reporter was arrested in DC just for filming the police arresting the driver of a truck.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Robert Fisk says that Iraqi officials are
giving more information about the war than the US,
and in general the Iraqi information is
accurate.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
The New World Order means,
"The
Anglo-Saxons Are Coming".
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Halliburton, Cheney's former oil company]
administration destroys it.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Meanwhile Dubya's choice for the man to rule Iraq for the US, supposing the US conquers Iraq, has links to a right-wing group connected with Cheney and with Israel.
The WTO and the US war machine.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
As Secy of Defense Rumsfeld criticizes Iraq for violating the Geneva convention on treatment of prisoners, let's not forget the US violations he is personally responsible for.
Salmon farms in Scotland are passing diseases to wild salmon, whose numbers are in sharp decline.
A media company is paying for pro-war rallies in the US.
OCAP members organized a protest campaign by high-schoolers in Ontario against a new standardized test. When the test was leaked before it was used, members of OCAP were threatened with imprisonment.
If they elected a monkey as President of the United States, Tony Blair would ingratiate himself and do its bidding...
Considering the photos of Curious George, I monkey as president might not be such a big difference.
Uri Avnery's thoughts about the war.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
The islamist government of Kelantan, in Malaysia, has taken a small step towards respect for human rights. Instead of banning traditional art forms, now it only censors them for unislamic elements.
Benetton
plans to insert radio tracking chips in all its clothing.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
These chips are not designed for tracking individuals, but they can be used for that purpose easily enough. They contain unique identifying numbers. Once a centralized tracking agency finds out which numbers are in your clothing, it can identify you every time you pass by a scanner. Connecting the numbers with you is easy if you buy clothes by credit card, but they can also build the data base in other ways. This won't be terribly effective if only Benetton uses the chips--but if the system works well for them, it could be adopted by all companies in five years time.
It would be useful to develop a reliable method of frying these chips with ordinary household equipment. I wonder if a microwave oven can do it.
I think it would be useful for the public to put pressure on Benetton to permanently deactivate the tracking chip when they sell a garment. If you return the garment, they can attach a new one.
Robert Fisk reports on how the war looks in Baghdad.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
I'm glad to learn that the US is not bombing facilities such as the water and electrical supply. Even if this is only for reasons of calculation, it could spare millions of civilians much suffering.
Saddam Hussein being a dictator, and one who kills often, it would be worth hundreds of lives--even innocent people's lives--to overthrow him, if only we could be confident that the people of Iraq wanted to be liberated (who knows?) and that the replacement would really be much better. But anyone appointed by Dubya is unlikely to be much better. We can get a good idea of the sort of ruler that the US is likely to impose by looking at the last ruler the US supported in Iraq. His name: Saddam Hussein.
Beyond the issue of this war is the threat posed by unchecked US
power. Bush convinced Americans to support war against Iraq with a
series of repeated falsehoods claiming that Iraq was behind the 9/11
attacks. (All real evidence says Iraq had nothing to do with them.)
If he could do this once, why not again?
Is there any country the US could not create an excuse to attack?
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
What demands will the US seek to impose on a world through fear of US attack? A simple look at Dubya's business associates suggest they will be designed to benefit the Enrons of the world.
Antiwar protests continue, as even Americans resist the idea that they should support war merely because there is one.
It's possible that the fighting against Saddam Hussein's forces will be over quickly, but what happens afterward is another story. A newspaper I saw today reported that an administration figure (perhaps Rumsfeld but I don't remember) said things would go in Iraq after the war would go as they have in Afghanistan. Things in Afghanistan are not going well.
See also
Dubya's War Glossary.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
We will surely hear calls to support the war in the name of "supporting the troops". When leaders say this, they are hiding behind their subordinates. But Bush can't hide from us this easily. His campaign stole the election by stopping tens of thousands of citizens of Florida from voting at all, and he should resign.
Meanwhile, one of the ways this war will hurt the US is through its tremendous cost. Since the war is being fought for the sake of oil companies, it seems to me that whoever succeeds Bush should make the oil companies pay the full cost of the war.
Another cost to the US will be the tremendous antiamerican sentiment around the world. In some sense the oil companies should bear that cost, too--and people can make this happen. Imagine if everyone around the world were to buy smaller cars, or electric cars, and renewable electric plants, all because they hate the oil companies for having their pet president start a war. Wouldn't that be great? If you hate Bush, build a windmill. Eventually we may see Bush fighting windmills like Don Quixote.
Advice for consumers on how to resist being influenced by advertising.
A warning to Brits (and Americans): don't be drawn into blindly "supporting our troops". Intelligent, thoughtful support is not blind.
Before Rachel Corrie was killed by an Israeli army bulldozer operator, she wrote a series of emails to her family that explain the cruelties that she hoped to prevent with her presence.
Police arrested nonviolent antiwar protestors in San Francisco.
There is evidence that the city has appointed a special police squad to investigate and arrest protestors.
Ethiopia faces famine again. The cause: overpopulation.
Aid for Ethopia has to include birth control, or the population will be limited by famine.
Witnesses say that Rachel Corrie was deliberately killed by the driver of an Israeli bulldozer.
Normally when I cite someone else's writing, I reference his site which shows who wrote it. I cannot do that here: if I publish the name of the Serbian who sent me this letter, I would be putting him in danger.
There are 318 prisoners in Serbia now. A number of them doesn't have relation with murder of Djindjic, but the same persons are passing extreme torture. It is very interesting that this information can be seen in Serbian (http://www.b92.net/news/indexs.php?order=hrono&dd=16&mm=03&yyyy=2003 but not in English at the main Serbian information agency, B92. Of course, even in Serbian, there are no information about torture...
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the old link was broken.]Through that time no one can publish anything about the present situation which includes political proscription and police brutality. A lot of people had experience with police torture, some of them with police brutality, and, also, some of them with masked gendarmes (special police forces) in military uniforms and military weapons.
In descriptive words: If I send this letter to media I'll be instantly arrested!
Anarchist leader Ratibor Trivunac was arrested for writing that Djindjic was "a criminal killed by other criminals", although he clearly had nothing to do with the killing. He has been freed since.
Carlos Fuentes
presents arguments for Mexico to resist US pressure and
not support the US war resolution.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
I don't think we know whether the Mexican government resisted.
A lawsuit threat from US Foodservice has
silenced a site where people had posted criticism of it.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
If we want freedom of the press to cover criticism of a corporation, we need laws that effectively protect web sites from harrassment lawsuits.
CAPPS II, the new system to collect and correlate many kinds of personal information about all airline passengers, is running into criticism in the Senate.
Israeli fighters
trying to destroy a Palestinian house killed an American woman
who was there trying to protect
the house from demolition.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Like Dubya, Terry Jones (formerly of Monty Python) is losing patience with his neighbors.
After Congressman Hansen criticized the IRS and other agencies, the US
government began a campaign to convict him of crimes that were
fabricated. He was eventually vindicated by the Supreme Court, after
spending years in prison and suffering torture that mutilated his feet and destroyed his teeth.
[Reference updated on 2018-09-07 because the
old
link was broken.]
One torture method is carried out under the pretense of moving the prisoner from one prison to another, strapped to a seat for hours in the back of a truck. As soon as he arrives in the new prison, he is moved again. Hansen was moved all around the country in this way. Sometimes prisoners die from this.
I found this report almost incredible even given my distrust for the US government, so I looked for additional references before posting it. See this.
The persecution of Congressman Hansen took place across decades, under both Republican and Democratic presidents.
An economic system out of control--how global business concentration
drives the world
towards unsustainable practices.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Palestinians and Israelis are concerned that Sharon may use
the US attack on Iraq as
cover for even worse repression against Palestinians.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Israel's is making large numbers of Palestinians homeless, and seeks
to and cutting them off from all income. It seems the plan is to
make it impossible for Palestinians to live,
as a means of ethnic cleansing.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
When Israeli fighters destroyed the house of a family of a dead
terrorist, they also destroyed the housing of 7 other families,
and killed the mother of one of them.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Many people will be especially horrified by the killing of a pregnant woman. I disagree--in a world menaced by overpopulation, having children is no virtue. Killing that pregnant woman was no worse than killing you or me would have been.
Public libraries are starting to warn the public about how the PAT-RIOT authorizes the government to secretly spy on everyone.
Note that these provisions of the PAT-RIOT act are not limited to bookstores and libraries. They apply to all business records, including your credit card purchases and your telephone calls. An article in the New York Times, about a year ago, revealed that the FBI is collecting phone records for whole neighborhoods as a block.
Even your past and present whereabouts are an open book to the FBI if you carry a cell phone, since the system records its location at all times whenever the phone has power (not just when you make a call). I generally don't use my credit card for retail purchases, and I refuse to carry a cell phone.
Why call it the PAT-RIOT act? The "PATRIOT" in the law's name is not really a word; it is an acronym, the initials of seven other words. Thus, splitting it is not really changing the name of the bill, just clarifying its presentation.
See http://www.aclu.org/SafeandFree/
for more information
about how the PAT-RIOT act attacks your freedom.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Some studies report that growing certain GM crops is good for wildlife, probably because of the reduction in pesticide use.
I don't agree with the people who think that genetically modified crops are intrinsically wrong. I am suspicious of the global businesses that develop them--suspicious that they will rush them into use too fast for their safety to be assured, and suspicious that due to patents or terminator technology these crops will hurt the social conditions of farming.
A participant in drafting a new constitution for the EU says it is developing into a threat to democracy.
The EU is already too remote from the public, too susceptible to making directives that are imposed on a public that has no way to resist or change them. If it is to be beneficial for the people of Europe, it must become more democratic.
The DOD is trying again to get a
blanket exemption from environmental protection laws,
so it can pollute at will.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Israeli fighters with bulldozers destroyed an apartment building because Palestinian fighters had entered it to fire at the Israelis. The Palestinians who lived in the building, who did not participate in the fighting, are now homeless.
An analogous policy of punishing the people in the neighborhood where an attack occurred was used by the Nazis in occupied countries.
Jimmy Carter
rejects the Bush regime's plans to attack Iraq.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Carter is no pacifist, and when Iranian religious fanatics took the US embassy staff hostage, he sent US troops to rescue them. (The troops messed it up.) His opposition to this war is thoughtful.
The Boy Scouts of America are running into protests for expelling Atheists.
I believe I recall that the Girl Scouts do not have such a policy, and neither do scouting organizations in Canada. This problem is unique to the BSA.
Repression of dissent in the US: police start a fight with students at
a peaceful protest, a journalist records this, then the journalist
gets arrested.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Palestinians and Israelis expect Sharon to use the expected US-Iraq war as the cover and excuse for massive crimes.
How Israeli troops
attacked a team of medics who were trying to aid a wounded man.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Such attacks are not unusual.
I reported on Susan Barclay's success in resisting first extralegal deportation and then legal deportation from Israel. Now she is being threatened with deportation again.
Look closely at the grounds that were reportedly offered for her deportation: "taking part in violent demonstrations" (i.e. someone else was violent, but Susan Barclay wasn't), and "gathering information on the activities of Israeli officers to release to the world" (i.e., reporting on war crimes). The first is otherwise known as guilt by association, while the second is a matter of suppressing information about injustice. For the sake of freedom in Israel, as well as just treatment of the Palestinians for whom Barclay serves as a witness, the Israeli judge should reject these charges as grounds for deporting anyone.
Edward Said, who denounced Saddam Hussein back when Kuwait and the US were supporting him, demolishes Bush's supposed intention to bring democracy to Iraq--and various other lies.
If you are blacklisted by the new US system for labeling air travelers
as a security risk, there will be no way you can try to clear your name,
no way to even confirm that you are on the list.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
If our government officials were always fair and honest, and never made a mistake, only real terrorists would be on the list. Then perhaps it would be ok if there is no way to clear your name. But have you ever heard of a government whose officials are always fair, and never make mistakes?
Will Bush hand Iraq over to a religious fanatic?
It might seem crazy, but the US has done it before. The fanatics of the Taliban and Al Qa'ida were trained by the US before they became our enemies.
The filtering programs that US law requires libraries to install on their internet browser terminals "to block porn" actually block a lot more than porn. For instance, they make image searching nearly impossible.
Majority Senate Leader Frist has an Iraq war poll on his website.
Right now the majority of the respondents are pro-war. So spread
the word to go to his website and respond to the poll, and
change the percentages.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
It's common for Israeli troops to kill Palestinians and say, when confronted, "We were shooting at militants attacking us" or "Palestinian fighters killed them."
Now a killing has been caught on video: an Israeli tank shot its gun at a Palestinian fireman who was putting out a fire. The video shows that no one near him was fighting the Israelis.
What is most interesting is to see that the Israeli army's excuses bear no relation to reality. They are not just slightly wrong, they are complete lies.
Meanwhile, the nonviolent international witnesses recently
prevented Israeli forces from destroying a medical clinic.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
The US is torturing prisoners in Afghanistan.
These are Al Qa'ida prisoners--or at least, suspected of being members of Al Qa'ida. (Not all suspicions are true.) But other suspects are brutalized in the US (Rodney King is perhaps the most famous). Soon people suspected of wearing a peace shirt in a mall may be tortured too.
A US citizen faces a year in prison for walking in a mall
wearing a shirt advocating peace.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
It reminds me of the woman in Lhasa, Tibet, who was attacked last year by Chinese police for wearing a shirt with the face of Phil Silvers (the police thought it was the Dalai Lama). They did not arrest her, they just took off her shirt, forcing her to go half-naked till she could find something else to put on.
Thus, both the US and China forcibly suppress dissent--the Chinese regime openly, while the US pretends to stand for freedom. The US approach is clearly more brutal. Being forced to run through the streets half-naked may feel humiliating, but being imprisoned for a year is a much greater injury.
Assassinations, shadowing and death threats continue against union organizations in Colombia.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Sharon's plans for Palestine amount to taking the Palestinians' land and imprisoning them in small Bantustans--or should we say, ghettos?
The US has already started the attack against Iraq, from the air. Doing this without any fanfare suggests that Bush wants to slide into war unnoticed--typical behavior for a government with something to hide.
Meanwhile, Turkey's parliament refused to vote to allow the US to attack Iraq from Turkish territory.
The 4 March Wall Street Journal has an editorial lecturing Turkey on this "mistake". Why "mistake"? Because the US offered a lot of money to buy Turkish support, and Turkey refused to be bought. A fall in stock prices in Turkey supposedly proves the error of this decision. The idea that business is more important than lives and ethics is not stated explicitly, but rather taken for granted at every point. If you're not for sale, kiddo, you're making a terrible mistake passing up this one-time never-to-be-repeated offer.
Perhaps Turkey was less than enthusiastic about getting into an open battle with the Iraqi Kurds, who say that they would fight any Turkish forces that try to occupy their territory, as the US suggested Turkey should do.
It might be a bit embarrassing to the US to go to war and see two of its allies immediately begin to fight each other. But Dubya and the WSJ won't feel embarrassed--they will simply refuse to acknowledge the problem.
Greg Palast reports on the leaked, secret FBI document that
told agents not to investigate the bin Laden family and
their connections with terrorism.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Israeli agents tried to deport Susan Barclay, one of the international volunteers to protect human rights in Palestine, disregarding the fact that she had a court hearing coming up about whether she should be deported.
Susan defied the agents, convinced the plane's crew to refuse to take her, and eventually arrived at her hearing. The court decided not to deport her. What's most interesting, though, is the lack of respect that these agents have for their own court decisions.
Demolition of Palestinian housing is continuing at a high rate. Sometimes Israeli soldiers destroy houses in which suicide bombers live. This is collective punishment, in violation of treaties to protect the population of occupied countries.
The Israeli soldiers don't usually check who is in neighboring houses, and often people are killed in them.
Sometimes houses are demolitshed because Israel says the houses were
built without permits. They were--because Israel almost never gives
Palestinians building permits. In effect, this is a
legalistic excuse to punish a whole people.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Is the US government
lying about the arrest of Al-Qa'ida "mastermind"
Khalid Sheikh Muhammad?
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Ahmed Quddus was arrested in that raid, and his family says that nobody was arrested with Ahmed. Perhaps Bush is keeping arrests secret so he can announce them when he needs a PR boost.
I sure wish we had a government that we could trust to tell us the truth about fighting terrorism. Kucinich in 2004?
A US bombing raid in Afghanistan killed 17 civilians last month.
This is part of a pattern of low-intensity war against the Taliban. In this war it is always the US and allies that kill the civilians, and then tend to deny that it occurred. The consequences of this for the US in Afghanistan will not be good.
Meanwhile, depleted uranium in munitions ranging from anti-tank shells
to bunker-buster bombs is
suspected of causing the increase in birth defects
found in Afghanistan a year after the US invasion.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
US troops are in danger from using DU munitions too. They are safe
to handle before they are fired, but once they explode and burn,
the uranium is dispersed into the air and the water and becomes
easy to ingest.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
With this problem, even allies faced with outright enemy invasion will have to think twice before asking the US to chase the invaders out. If the price of liberating your country is birth defects and cancers forever, is it worth paying?
John Kiesling resigned from the US diplomatic service to protest Bush
administration policies, saying that "Our fervent pursuit of war with
Iraq is driving us to squander the international legitimacy that has
been America's most potent weapon of both offense and defense since
the days of Woodrow Wilson."
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Police in Atlanta are always at the ready to protect businesses like
Taco Bell from the danger of...being criticized by leaflets.
Even if it take stretching the law to do it.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
Policemen's attitude towards laws is like Humpty Dumpty: "The law means what I say it means, no more, no less."
Venezuelan President Chavez has
arrested the leaders of the general strike
that lasted through December and January.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
I do not support the strikers, who were generally the wealthiest Venezuelans and wanted the country to return to the US-dominated "new world order" and to policies that enrich them at the expense of the many. The US is suspected of instigating a coup against Chavez a year ago, and may well have instigated the general strike too.
But a strike is not a coup--it is a legitimate exercize of people's freedom. Chavez does wrong arresting people for leading the general strike. The strike failed; that should be enough.
Antiwar protestors were arrested in Minneapolis just
for handing out leaflets.
[Reference updated on 2018-05-08 because the
old
link was broken.]
I don't know what the law actually says about this--but either the police stretched the law and abused their power, or our society has gone too far in cutting down the public space where citizens can express their views. Either one is unacceptable.
Microsoft's gift to the next Enron: software designed to save documents so that only authorized people inside a corporation can read them--and even they can't transmit the text to anyone else. Future would-be whistleblowers will find that the whistle makes no sound.
Fanatics of various faiths, including Bush (Christian), Sharon (Jewish) and the Taliban (Muslim), are spreading so much hate and distrust that even groups that are dedicate to peace and understanding feel the strain among their members.
The Algerian government has "disappeared" at least 7,000 people in its civil war against Islamists. The Islamists were expected to win an election, so the government canceled the election.
The Islamists would probably have imposed Islamic law, which tramples human rights (especially those of women, but also those of men). However, the Algerian government's response has been no better.
Those disappeared in Algeria may have been murdered, or they may still be alive in prison. There is no way to know. Those who are disappeared in the US by the Bush administration are probably still alive, but they may be kept in prison all their lives.
In one respect, the Bush regime proposes to go one better than the Algerian regime. The Algerian regime won't give any information about what happened to the disappeared people, but it doesn't arrest Yassine Ourad for saying that his father was arrested. Bush would make that a crime.