Reuters reports: “Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich was arrested on criminal charges on Tuesday, including trying to sell the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by fellow Democrat President-elect Barack Obama, federal prosecutors said. “Blagojevich was also accused of threatening to withhold substantial state assistance to the Tribune Company in connection with the sale of the Chicago…

LISA HAJJAR Hajjar, chair of the Law and Society Program at the University of California-Santa Barbara, said today: “The paradox is that both KSM [Khalid Sheikh Mohammed] and his fellow ‘high values’ are aligned with still-President Bush and his allies in wanting the death of the former. But the difference between ‘war’ and ‘law’ includes…

The lead story in USA Today this morning reports that the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan told the newspaper “he has asked the Pentagon for more than 20,000 soldiers, Marines and airmen” to augment the American forces in that country. Gen. David McKiernan is quoted as saying that U.S. troop levels of 55,000 to 60,000…

AP is reporting: “The 200 workers demanding severance and vacation pay have become a national symbol for thousands of employees laid off nationwide as the economy continues to sour. They occupied the plant of their former employer, Republic Windows and Doors, after the company abruptly fired them last week.” BILL FLETCHER Fletcher is co-founder of…

For the first time, the recent documentary film “War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death” — based on the book of the same name by Norman Solomon — will be the subject of a C-SPAN focus this Sunday, December 7. Solomon, executive director of the Institute for Public Accuracy, is…

MARK BRENNER JANE SLAUGHTER Brenner and Slaughter are with Labor Notes, an independent periodical on labor based in Detroit. They just wrote the piece “Cutting Wages Won’t Solve Detroit 3’s Crisis” for the Detroit News in which they state: “No matter how you cut the numbers, demolishing auto workers’ living standards will not transform the…

ANAND GOPAL Afghanistan correspondent for the Christian Science Monitor. More Information SONALI KOLHATKAR Co-author of Bleeding Afghanistan: Washington, Warlords, and the Propaganda of Silence. More Information NORMAN SOLOMON Solomon, the author of War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death, is executive director of the Institute for Public Accuracy. He said…

ROGER HU An Obama volunteer and Obama delegate, Hu is a spokesperson for WenHoLee.org, a grassroots effort that has sent a letter to the Obama transition team. The letter begins: “As concerned citizens, we write to express our opposition to the appointment of Bill Richardson as the Secretary of Commerce. Our objection relates to Richardson’s…

WENDY THOMPSON Thompson, a retired worker at American Axle in Detroit and former president of UAW Local 235, is helping organize a caravan of auto workers to D.C. There will be a rally seeing the caravan off on Sunday at 2 p.m. at the Metropolitan Center for High Technology in Detroit, and it will arrive…

ABC News is reporting: “A biological or nuclear attack is likely to occur somewhere around the globe during the Obama administration or shortly thereafter, a new congressionally mandated report has warned. “The report, titled ‘The World at Risk,’ starkly states, ‘The commission believes that unless the world community acts decisively and with great urgency, it…