News Items

  • Media Advisory: Whistleblowers to Speak About Surveillance and Cyber Issues

    “President Barack Obama is set to sign an executive order on Friday aimed at encouraging companies to share more information about cybersecurity threats with the government and each other, a response to attacks like that on Sony Entertainment. … Obama will sign the order at a day-long conference on cybersecurity at Stanford University in the heart of Silicon Valley.”

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  • Delegation of U.S. and UK Whistleblowers in London: News Conference on “Special Surveillance Relationship” — News Advisory

    Whistleblowers from four American and British “national security” agencies will hold a news conference in London on November 21 in a direct challenge to surveillance policies of the U.S. and UK governments. The whistleblowers — from the NSA, FBI, State Department and GCHQ — will speak about the effects of their governments’ policies on freedom of the press and democracy. They are traveling as a delegation co-sponsored by the U.S.-based organizations RootsAction.org and ExposeFacts, a project of the Institute for Public Accuracy. The news conference is being hosted by the Foreign Press Association.

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  • In Response to the Government’s Lynching of James Risen

    It has been a sharp learning curve for Jim Risen, but by having numerous grand juries and two administrations relentlessly hounding him, he has learned how deeply the government’s malevolence descends. But there was always one steadfast assertion he wound not compromise, Jim Risen assured his sources, from the very start of their first encounter, that he would never divulge their identities nor what information they provided him with.

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  • Militarization of U.S. Police: Ferguson, Mo.

    Community policing reforms came about as a corrective to the 1950-60s professional police model which created a large gulf between police and citizens. Few noticed that underlying all the CP rhetoric was a little noticed yet foretelling trend of para-militarism as found in SWAT teams. What we’re witnessing today, though, with the influence of the Dept. of Homeland Security since 9/11 — along with growing emphasis on military hardware and tactics — is the expansion of police militarization throughout entire police departments — and indeed, the entire police institution.

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  • Unconstitutional acts of war in Iraq

    President Obama ignored the wise direction of President George Washington when he casually told the nation — and Congress — that U.S. military forces will engage in acts of war in Iraq for an extended period of weeks and maybe months. Bombing, he said in a brief statement last week, is needed here and there, but he promised there will be no U.S. boots on the ground. … The announcement seemed almost an afterthought as the president headed for vacation in Martha’s Vineyard. He neglected to seek approval of Congress before authorizing bombardment of the military forces of ISIS, the…

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  • News Conference: Edward Snowden’s Passport, Political Asylum and Related Issues

    Ray McGovern, Coleen Rowley and Norman Solomon spoke at this news conference, sponsored by RootsAction.org and hosted by the Institute for Public Accuracy.

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  • NSA Veterans and Whistleblowers Respond to Obama Speech

    Minutes after President Obama’s major address on NSA surveillance on Friday, Jan. 17, the Institute for Public Accuracy held a news conference with noted NSA veterans and whistleblowers.

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  • The War on Poverty at Fifty

    Fifty years after Lyndon B. Johnson made it the centerpiece of his first State of the Union address on January 8, 1964, the War on Poverty remains one of the most embattled—and least understood—of Great Society initiatives.

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  • Edward Snowden: Profile in Courage

    Edward Snowden may go down in history as one of this nation’s most important whistleblowers. He is certainly one of the bravest.

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  • Obama’s Economic Race Legacy

    From the start, President Barack Obama has shown little interest or loyalty in the issues that affect the poor, working class and people of color in the United States. For almost his entire first term he didn’t utter the words poor or poverty. Early on he reminded African Americans: ‘I’m not the president of black America. I’m the president of the United States of America…’

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  • Why Are We Vulnerable to Food Shortages?

    Amanda Starbuck, Research Director with Food and Water Watch, said today: “Our corporate-controlled, just-in-time food system does little to buffer us from supply shocks created by events like Russian’s invasion of Ukraine. In fact, it helped create the problem… Agribusinesses stoked fears of food shortages during the pandemic to fatten their bottom lines. We must not…

  • Biden’s Dangerous Call for Regime Change in Russia

    “Outrage is the appropriate response. And a special onus is on Democrats in Congress, who should be willing to put humanity above party and condemn Biden’s extreme irresponsibility. But prospects for such condemnation look bleak. …

  • Biden Adding to Military Budget as Instability Grows and Contractors Profit

    A new statement from the National Priorities Project says that “more spending on militarism can’t address the nation’s or the world’s problems. At $813 billion, the President’s request for the Pentagon exceeds even the $782 billion budget that Congress just passed by $31 billion. The increase alone is twice the amount that Congress refused for…

  • Covid Funding Collapse Delays Millions of Doses of Pfizer’s Antiviral Pill

    After a $15.6 billion funding bill collapsed in Congress this month, the purchase and delivery of millions of antiviral pills has been delayed. The pills are a key aspect of the White House’s new Test to Treat initiative. Here, practicing pharmacists and physicians weigh in on the delay and on the potential problems with the…

  • Levels of Covid-19 in Wastewater Rise Across the US

    ” Experts suggest that surveillance of US wastewater sites shows a rise in Covid-19 cases in cities across the country. The decline in reliable case counting from reported tests has made community wastewater surveillance increasingly necessary. Dr. Julia Raifman says: “People can shed the virus in their digestive tracts before they become symptomatic. Wastewater tracking…

  • Bush, Rumsfeld: War Criminals

    Author Laurie Calhoun: “How much destruction and how many lives will be sacrificed on behalf of power elites unwilling to undertake meaningful negotiations because they themselves stand to lose nothing, while military industry stands to profit handsomely from the conflict? The ghastly war in Yemen and resultant humanitarian crisis continues to be supported by the…

  • The Impact of Ukraine on Yemen

    Experts comment on the lack of funding for Yemen, whose economy is fundamentally affected by the war between Ukraine and Russia. “Since the onset of the Ukraine conflict, we have seen the prices of food skyrocket by more than 150 percent,” said Basheer Al Selwi, a spokesperson for the International Commission of the Red Cross…

  • Ukraine War: How We Got Here, How to Get Out

    Nicolai N. Petro, political science professor and scholar of Ukraine, stresses the importance of Ukrainian identity and international influence in the current war: “This conflict over who gets to define Ukrainian national identity and its future has been going on for at least 150 years and has erupted in serious military hostilities inside Ukraine three…

  • Judge Jackson’s Record

    Marjorie Cohn, professor emerita at Thomas Jefferson School of Law and former president of the National Lawyers Guild, wrote about Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson on the eve of her Supreme Court nomination hearings: “Having served as a public defender, Jackson would be the only Supreme Court justice to have represented criminal defendants since Thurgood Marshall.…

  • U.S. Activists Help Expose Occupation Akin to Ukraine

    “Is the public and media ignoring the invasion and ongoing war in Western Sahara because it is in Africa? The courageous and dramatic actions by U.S. human rights activists highlight the brutal repression of the independence activist Sultana Khaya specifically and the indigenous Sahrawi people generally.”

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