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Egyptian Military Courts and IMF
Today, online Egyptian media are reporting the noted blogger Hossam El-Hamalawy and TV presenter Reem Maged were scheduled to be questioned by the military prosecution for criticizing Egypt’s ruling military on air; but following an outcry, the military only asked them “to provide evidence of alleged military police violations,” AhramOnline reports. El-Hamalawy has tweeted that he is scheduled to appear on OnTV again tonight.
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Ousted Honduran President to Return Tomorrow
“President Zelaya’s return offers a brief glimmer of hope, but the ongoing repression by current President Porfirio Lobo’s military regime — now even worse than immediately after the coup — remains undiminished, as state security forces now routinely use tear gas canisters as lethal weapons, and teachers, trade unionists and campesinos in the opposition are still being assassinated with complete impunity. Lobo and Secretary of State Clinton insist that democracy has been restored to Honduras. But the reality on the ground remains terrifying, which is why over 75 Congress members are calling for a suspension of U.S. military and police…
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Tornadoes, Global Warming and Causes of “Generation Hot”
MARK HERTSGAARD, mark at markhertsgaard.com “I’m glad the New York Times has started covering what cutting-edge local leaders are doing to adapt to climate disruption,” says Hertsgaard, who has reported on climate change for two decades for outlets including Vanity Fair, The Nation and NPR and recently published the first popular book on climate adaptation, HOT: Living Through the Next Fifty Years on Earth. “But the Times’s article leaves out a crucial part of the story: how we got into this mess. For more than 20 years, many of America’s political, business and media leaders have deliberately chosen to ignore scientific…
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G8, European Austerity and Protests
MARK WEISBROT, via Dan Beeton, beeton at cepr.net, Co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, Weisbrot said today: “While it’s clear that the G8 is able to unite quickly to keep a European as head of the IMF, they have been slow to come up with any feasible solution to the crisis in the eurozone. Continuing to squeeze the economies of Greece, Portugal, Ireland, and Spain — driving up unemployment and dragging out the recession — is just making things worse. But they haven’t even been willing to discuss any viable alternative.”
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Netanyahu’s Speech Disrupted, Activist Hospitalized
Rae Abileah, a Jewish-American activist of Israeli descent with the peace group CodePink, disrupted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s congressional address yesterday, Democracy Now! reports. … According to Democracy Now!, as Abileah rose up, members of the audience tackled her to the ground and people in the hall cheered, drowning her out. She was escorted out of the chamber by security forces and taken to George Washington University Hospital where she was treated for neck and shoulder injuries. While at the hospital, police arrested and charged Abileah with disorderly conduct for disrupting Congress.
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Obama “Will Not Relent” on Libya; Where’s Congress?
Fox News is reporting: “President Obama warned Libyan leader Muammar al-Qaddafi that the NATO military campaign against his regime ‘will not relent,’ as both he and British Prime Minister David Cameron reaffirmed their commitment to the mission and called on Qaddafi to leave power.” Politico reports: “Obama administration belatedly threatens veto of detainee, war legislation.”
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Could Rand Paul Force the PATRIOT Act to Lapse this Week?
The Hill reported Tuesday that Sen. Rand Paul’s, R-Ky., actions in the Senate “might cause the Patriot Act to lapse at the end of the week.” BRUCE FEIN, bruce at thelichfieldgroup.com Fein was deputy attorney general under President Ronald Reagan and is author of “Constitutional Peril: The Life and Death Struggle for Our Constitution and Democracy” and “American Empire: Before the Fall.”
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Supreme Court California Prison Ruling
The New York Times reports today on the Supreme Court’s ruling on California’s prison system: “Conditions in California’s overcrowded prisons are so bad that they violate the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment, the Supreme Court ruled on Monday, ordering the state to reduce its prison population by more than 30,000 inmates.”
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Obama, Netanyahu and AIPAC: Professional Wrestling or Real Fight?
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will address a joint meeting of Congress tomorrow. NOURA ERAKAT, nourae at mac.com Erakat works as an adjunct professor of international human rights law in the Middle East at Georgetown University and is the U.S.-based legal advocacy coordinator for the Badil Center for Palestinian Refugee and Residency Rights. She is also a contributing editor to Jadaliyya.com. She said recently on Democracy Now: “What Israel has been doing is trying to create its own de facto borders, and therefore not recognizing that there is an armistice line [the 1967 border].”
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Progressives Respond to Obama
AIMEE ALLISON, aimee at rootsaction.org Co-Ex…
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“With a tiny staff, it has managed to place on the air and in newspapers, points of view otherwise excluded from the national debate.”
Howard Zinn