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  • NSA Whistleblower Thomas Drake Statement on Surveillance Legislation

    At this late hour (with all the fear mongering by national security authorities pushing to reauthorize and expand an unconstitutional warrantless surveillance program), unless the Amash-Lofgren Amendment is passed, Congress may end up passing a bill (S. 139) that actually gives criminal suspects more Fourth Amendment protections than innocent people.

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  • News Conference at Department of Justice on Threats to WikiLeaks’ Julian Assange by Attorney General Jeff Sessions

    CIA Director Mike Pompeo recently called WikiLeaks a “hostile intelligence service.” Attorney General Jeff Sessions recently stated that Julian Assange’s arrest is a “priority” of the Trump administration. This has caused numerous individuals — with differing perspectives on WikiLeaks — to warn of a growing threat to press freedom. The following will address U.S. government…

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  • Trump Education Policy

    Rhee and Moskowitz would certainly be zealous proponents of school choice. Selecting either of them would be a thumb in the eyes of the National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers, who campaigned mightily for Clinton. Both have tangled with the unions and made clear their distaste for public schools and for teachers’…

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  • Costas Panayotakis on the Brexit

    “The Brexit vote may have partly been an expression of right-wing xenophobia but it is also an expression of disgust across the continent with the neoliberal monstrosity that the EU has become. It remains to be seen, of course, whether the result will be honored. In the past, European political and economic elites have often…

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  • Breaking Down the Brexit Decision

    The political center has lost its commanding appeal and the public is drawn to vague slogans like “freedom” and “independence.” Right-wing projects are implausible as solutions to the problems faced by ordinary citizens but the electorate acts in desperation. The process has been under way for many years. Reagan and Thatcher were early signs. The…

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  • From “An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States”

    All the laws and customs of civilized warfare may not be applicable to an armed conflict with the Indian tribes upon our western frontier; but the circumstances attending the assassination of Canby [Army general] and Thomas [U.S. peace commissioner] are such as to make their murder as much a violation of the laws of savage…

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  • Bradley on His Visit to the Philippines

    Princess Alice sipped punch under a hot tropical sun as “Big Bill” Taft deliver a florid speech extolling the benefits of the American way. A century later I ventured to Zamboanga and learned that the local Muslims hadn’t taken Taft’s message to heart: Zamboanga officials feared for my safety because I was an American and…

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  • Video of Sterling News Conference

    On February 17th, 2016, Holly Sterling, Jesselyn Radack, John Kiriakou, Tim Karr, Delphine Halgand, and Cornel West spoke at a news conference at the National Press Club, then delivered a petition containing over 150.000 signatures to the White House calling for the pardon of CIA whistleblower Jeffrey Sterling.

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  • Media Advisory — Cornel West, John Kiriakou among speakers to urge Obama pardon for CIA whistleblower

    News Conference: Release of Petition Urging Obama to Pardon Imprisoned CIA Whistleblower; Speakers to Include Cornel West, John Kiriakou, Jesselyn Radack, Holly Sterling When: Wednesday, February 17 at 9:30 a.m. Where: National Press Club (Bloomberg Room), 13th Floor, National Press Building, Washington

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  • Noam Chomsky & Abby Martin: Electing The President Of An Empire (Full Transcript)

    At the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Mass., Abby Martin interviews world-renowned philosopher and linguist Professor Noam Chomsky. Full transcript included.

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  • Diplomacy and the UN: * “Threat” of Force * Samantha Power

    CHASE MADAR, chase.madar at gmail.com, @ChMadar Madar wrote the piece “Samantha Power and the Weaponization of Human Rights” and said today: “In her advocacy for missile strikes on Syria, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power is once again doing what she does best: inventing humanitarian reasons for the use of lethal military violence.…

  • Syria HAS Admitted Chemical Weapons; But Israel Hasn’t Admitted Nuclear Weapons

    “Much of the political class in Washington is now claiming, in the words of the Los Angeles Times: ‘Syria has never publicly acknowledged possessing chemical weapons.’ This is false. For example, see the piece: “Syria Admits to Having Chemical Weapons” from 2012 in the American Interest. “What hasn’t been admitted by any U.S. administration is…

  • Propaganda and Interests Behind Syria Bombing

    The heavyweights leading the push for military action in Syria appear to be looking only for information that supports their adventure. This pursuit often leads them to obscure sources of information: informal lobbyists. Last week we caught a glimpse of one: an analyst from the Institute for the Study of War called Dr. Elizabeth O’Bagy…

  • * Key Author of War Powers Act: “Obama has no Authority to Attack Syria” * Impeachment

    “Despite his own recent statements to the contrary, President Barack Obama has no legal authority to assault the government of Syria even as “a warning shot.” Neither the United States Constitution, nor the War Powers Act of 1973 gives him such authority in the absence of an emergency that allows Congress no time to react.…

  • Kerry Covers up Iraq War Falsifications

  • Syria War Resolution Contradicts Constitution, International Law

    “Perhaps the worst single clause in it was a reaffirmation of the illegal power Obama claims he has to bomb Syria without congressional approval: ‘the President has authority under the Constitution to use force in order to defend the national security interests of the United States.’ No such authority exists — except in self-defense –…

  • Religious Leaders Opposing War in Syria

    National Catholic Reporter states in “Francis chides world leaders on Syria, calls military intervention ‘futile'”: “Francis has declared Saturday a day of ‘fasting and prayer for peace in Syria, the Middle East and throughout the world.'” There have been a litany of statements from various Mideastern-based churches against U.S. military intervention in the strongest of…

  • “‘Credibility’ to be Chief Bully”

    “The merits or demerits of a U.S.-led war on Syria should be debated independently of the CW [chemical weapons] attack. It may well be that the armed opposition, not the Syrian regime, was responsible for the CW attack. And we are fully justified in taking assertions by American officials that claim the opposite with a…

  • Ruses for War

    JOHN QUIGLEY, Quigley.2 at osu.edu Professor emeritus of international law at Ohio State University, Quigley recently wrote a piece scrutinizing the legal justifications for an attack on Syria: “John Quigley on Intervention.” He is author of the book The Ruses for War: American Interventionism Since World War II. In addition to the false claims being…

  • Syria Facts: * Rebels Refusing to Talk * 43 Percent of 100,000 Dead are Pro-Government Combatants

    RANIA MASRI, rania.z.masri at gmail.com, @rania_masri Masri is assistant professor in the Department of Environmental Sciences at the University of Balamand in Lebanon and is currently visiting the U.S. She said today: “There are a host of falsehoods being made about Syria. The issue is falsely being framed as either bomb or ‘do nothing,’ ignoring…

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