• * Haiti Elections * Nobel Peace Prize Corrupted?

    ALEX MAIN, and via Dan Beeton Policy analyst with the Center for Economic and Policy Research, Main is just back from Haiti. See the Center’s blog on Haiti FREDRIK HEFFERMEHL The Nobel Peace Prize will be awarded on Friday. Author of the new book The Nobel Peace Prize: What Nobel Really Wanted, Heffermehl argues that…

  • Ex-Intelligence Officers, Others See Plusses in WikiLeaks Disclosures

    The following statement was released today, signed by Daniel Ellsberg, Frank Grevil, Katharine Gun, David MacMichael, Ray McGovern, Craig Murray, Coleen Rowley and Larry Wilkerson; all are associated with Sam Adams Associates for Integrity in Intelligence. WikiLeaks has teased the genie of transparency out of a very opaque bottle, and powerful forces in America, who…

  • The Real Climate-Gate? WikiLeaks and Climate Talks

    Professor of global environmental policy at Dartmouth College, Dorsey can comment on events in Cancun as well as the U.S. diplomatic cables recently released by WikiLeaks regarding climate negotiations. See in the Guardian: “WikiLeaks cables reveal how U.S. manipulated climate accord: Embassy dispatches show America used spying, threats and promises of aid to get support…

  • Commission: * Deficit “Hysteria” * Medicare

    THOMAS FERGUSON ROBERT JOHNSON Ferguson and Johnson, who are with the Roosevelt Institute, just wrote the in-depth paper “A World Upside Down? Deficit Fantasies in the Great Recession.” Key points include: “The current hysteria over deficits in the U.S. is unjustified. Markets for even long term U.S. government debt are strong. … Claims that economic…

  • WikiLeaks and Latin America

    ADRIENNE PINE Pine is assistant professor of anthropology at American University specializing in Latin America. She said today: “Cables released by WikiLeaks have painted a stark picture of State Department activities throughout the Americas. These include collecting biometric data on Paraguayan presidential candidates; covertly orchestrating an anti-Chavez propaganda campaign in Venezuela; working with Brazilian authorities…

  • Commission Targeting Social Security

    President Obama’s National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform (chaired by Alan Simpson and Erskine Bowles) releases its report today. See live webcast from the National Press Building with Joseph Stiglitz, Dean Baker, Robert Kuttner and others commenting on the report from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. ET: ourfiscalsecurity.org DEAN BAKER Available for a limited…

  • Austerity Politics

    DOUG HENWOOD Editor of Left Business Observerth, Henwood said today: “While the government can’t run big deficits forever, there’s no great urgency to do anything in a hurry. Even on official projections (which assume decades of near-depression rates of economic growth), federal debt won’t become a problem until well into the 2020s. Alarmists are trying…

  • U.S. Spying at the UN

    Reuters reports that UN Ambassador Susan Rice said Monday: “Let me be very clear — our diplomats are just that, they’re diplomats.” Reuters noted that “Rice declined to comment on the details of the cables.” KATHARINE GUN Available for a limited number of interviews, Gun is a former British government employee who faced two years…

  • WikiLeaks: Beyond the Spin

    PRATAP CHATTERJEE Chatterjee is a regular columnist for the Guardian and just wrote a piece titled “WikiLeaks v the imperial presidency’s poodle: Once, Harold Koh spoke truth to power. Now, as Hillary Clinton’s legal adviser, he obediently denounces the embassy cables leak.” Chatterjee is author of Iraq, Inc: A Profitable Occupation and Halliburton’s Army: How…

  • Egyptian Parliamentary Elections

    McClatchy reports: “Under a cloud of intimidation and suppression, Egyptians will vote Sunday in parliamentary elections that already have been denounced as a charade aimed at prolonging the three-decade rule of President Hosni Mubarak’s National Democratic Party. “Egyptian authorities have jailed Mubarak’s opponents, blocked rallies, clamped down on independent news media and angrily rejected calls…

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