KEVIN GRAY Gray wrote “The Novocaine Effect: Obama and Black America” in the recent print edition of CounterPunch. He said today: “Obama said that there’s limited funds at the ‘Jobs Summit’ yesterday, but that doesn’t seem to apply to billions for war. … “By any economic measure the black community is in a severe depression.…

“Only after the Taliban refused to turn over Osama bin Laden [did we send] our troops into Afghanistan.” — Barack Obama at West Point, Dec. 1 “[The Taliban] were given a chance to turn over al Qaeda and bin Laden before we attacked them and they refused.” — Hillary Clinton in response to questioning by…

GARETH PORTER Porter recently wrote the piece “Obama Had Rejected His Own Speech’s Surge Rationale,” which states that Obama in his West Point speech “said the escalation was for a ‘vital national interest’ and invoked the threat of attacks from the Afghanistan-Pakistan border area, asserting that such attacks ‘are now being planned as I speak.’…

THOMAS E. MAHANY Mahany, a Vietnam War veteran (101st Airborne Division), now a stonemason and artist from Michigan, has been on a water-only fast in front of the White House since Veterans Day. He sent Obama a second letter yesterday, stating: “The policy of procuring soldiers through the Presidential Authority of Stop-Loss, USC 12305, Title…

PRATAP CHATTERJEE Chatterjee just wrote the piece “Paying Off the Warlords, Anatomy of an Afghan Culture of Corruption.” He is an investigative journalist, senior editor at CorpWatch and author of Halliburton’s Army: How a Well-Connected Texas Oil Company Revolutionized the Way America Makes War and “Iraq, Inc. REESE ERLICH Freelance foreign correspondent Erlich has covered…

SERGIO MONCADA A co-founder of Hondurans for Democracy, Moncada is a D.C.-based environmental policy analyst. He said today: “We’re gravely disappointed that the State Department has said it will recognize the results of Sunday’s fraudulent election. We’re getting reports of widespread fear and intimidation by the military, especially in rural areas. The U.S. has taken…

The Los Angeles Times reports: “Ron Paul wins a key battle in war to open Fed’s books.” Huffington Post senior congressional correspondent Ryan Grim writes: “As the debate over an audit of the Federal Reserve intensifies in the House, one camp is trotting out eight academics that it calls a ‘political cross section of prominent…

THOMAS E. MAHANY Mahany, a Vietnam War veteran (101st Airborne Division), now a stonemason and artist from Michigan, has been fasting in front of the White House since Veterans Day. He sent Obama the following letter the day after Veterans Day: Dear Mr. President, In May of 1970 I spent 29 days in Lafayette Square…

SIMONE LOVERA Based in Paraguay, Lovera is co-founder of the Global Forest Coalition. She said today: “The U.S. per capita carbon dioxide emissions are so much higher than China’s emissions. In 2005, the U.S. was nearly 23.5 while China is 5.5 [tons of CO2 per person per year]. It’s inappropriate for the U.S. to be…

The Washington Post reports today: “The nation’s economic crisis has catapulted the number of Americans who lack enough food to the highest level since the government has been keeping track, according to a new federal report, which shows that nearly 50 million people — including almost one child in four — struggled last year to…