JAMES JENNINGS On Tuesday, the New York Times reported that “Chevron, the second-largest American oil company, is preparing to acknowledge that it should have known kickbacks were being paid to Saddam Hussein on oil it bought from Iraq as part of a defunct United Nations program, according to investigators. … At the time, Condoleezza Rice,…

Each year the president issues a Mother’s Day Proclamation. The original Mother’s Day Proclamation was made in 1870. Written by Julia Ward Howe, perhaps best known today for having written the words to “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” in 1862 when she was an anti-slavery activist, the original Proclamation was an impassioned call for…

SAMEER DOSSANI NJOKI NJOROGE NJEHU Director of the 50 Years Is Enough: U.S. Network for Global Economic Justice, Dossani said today: “The Wolfowitz scandal is a symptom of a much deeper problem.” Referring to the “gentleman’s agreement” which allows the U.S. government to appoint the head of the World Bank, while Europe appoints the head…

The lead story in the New York Times today is headlined “A Draft Oil Bill Stirs Opposition from Iraqi Blocs; Sunnis and Kurds Balk; Benchmark in Danger…” The piece states that the proposed Iraqi oil law “establishes a framework for the distribution of oil revenue” and that “the White House was hoping for quick passage…

LIAM MADDEN Madden was a communications and electronics specialist with the Marines in Iraq. He co-founded the Appeal for Redress, a way in which individual service members can appeal to their Congressional Representative and U.S. Senators to urge an end to the U.S. military occupation. He left the military in January. He said today: “The…

AP reports that “Dow Jones & Co., publisher of the Wall Street Journal, said Tuesday it received an unsolicited bid from Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. to buy the company for $5 billion.” BEN H. BAGDIKIAN Author of The New Media Monopoly and professor emeritus and former dean of the Graduate School of Journalism at the…

NADIA MARTINEZ Martinez is a research fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies. She said today: “A sound immigration policy recognizes the importance of a sound foreign policy. We must deal with the pressing issues of poverty, inequality, unemployment and security abroad just as much as at home. “For instance, since 1994 when the North…

NANCY LESSIN Lessin is co-founder of Military Families Speak Out. She said today: “April has been an exceedingly violent month with at least 104 U.S. troops killed and we don’t know how many Iraqis. This is almost as high as during the offensives against Fallujah. Contrary to the White House line that we need to…

Activists today decried Abbott Laboratories’ stance on selling medicines to people living with HIV/AIDS in Thailand and announced plans to protest at offices across the U.S. during Abbott’s shareholder meeting set for Friday near Chicago. Under pressure from activists, Abbott recently offered to re-introduce the drugs if Thailand gives up the right to import generic…

AP reports that in Indiana “inmates at the New Castle Correctional Facility took over part of the prison [Wednesday] afternoon, injuring two employees and setting several fires.” MARC MAUER Executive director of The Sentencing Project, Mauer is author of the book Race to Incarcerate. More Information ED MEAD Mead is publisher of Prison Focus magazine,…