News Items

  • Affidavit by Daniel Ellsberg for Plowshare Activists Being Allowed a Defense of Necessity

    In 1971 I gave the U.S. Senate, the New York Times and the Washington Post copies of what have come to be known as The Pentagon Papers. I was arrested on twelve felony counts. My trial was dismissed because of government misconduct which figured in the impeachment proceedings against President Nixon…These considerations bear on two other elements of the necessity defense, the “lack of legal alternatives” and the “imminence” of the harms to be averted. Again, I speak from my own experience, but not only mine, in saying that it is the perceived insufficiency of other means, by themselves not…

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  • A Long List of Democratic Candidates Requires a Large Catalog of Their Funders

    By Sam Haut: As the first debates for the Democratic primary begin, and the list of candidates has grown to 24, it can be difficult to contextualize where each candidate has received funding from over the course of their time in office. What follows is a list of the Democratic candidates and the top sources for how much money they’ve made and where those top sources come from.

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  • NATO and US Foreign Policy: Dangers Ahead

    RootsAction.org held a news conference Thursday on “NATO and U.S. Foreign Policy: Dangers Ahead” hosted by the Institute for Public Accuracy. Speakers include former State Department officials Matthew Hoh, Ann Wright, as well as Martin Fleck. The event was moderated by Norman Solomon.

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  • Media Advisory: “NATO and U.S. Foreign Policy: Dangers Ahead”

    At 10 a.m. Tuesday, April 2, 2019 at the National Press Club: On the same day that President Trump is scheduled to meet with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg at the White House, this news conference will focus on the U.S.-NATO relationship. Speakers include former State Department officials Matthew Hoh and Ann Wright.

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  • Statement by Floyd Abrams in response to Attorney General nominee William Barr’s remarks on the First Amendment

    “It’s one thing to say that there could be circumstances in which a journalist’s need to protect her sources could lead to a potential finding of contempt of court if she refused to obey a court order requiring such disclosure. But the notion that a journalist could properly be jailed for publishing material that the government thinks could ‘hurt the country’ is something else entirely and would be deeply threatening to First Amendment norms in general and journalistic freedom in particular.”

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  • Statement on NAFTA’s “Kafkaesque” Turn

    The supposedly concluded renegotiation of NAFTA has reached a Kafkaesque stage. As the United States Trade Representative has stated: “The United States and Mexico have reached a preliminary agreement in principle, subject to finalization and implementation.” Not only the negotiations have not been finalized, and without Canada, but the texts remain hidden from the public.

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  • What’s the Cost of Medicare for All?

    Even a Koch-backed think tank finds Medicare for all would cut health care spending. In a report released by the Mercatus Center, a single-payer health care system would offset costs with even greater savings. The Intercept and other media reporting on this are citing the work of Drs. David Himmelstein and Steffie Woolhandler. They are distinguished professors of health policy at the City University of New York at Hunter College and lecturers in medicine at Harvard Medical School. They have written an analysis of the work of the Koch-backed think tank, the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, which is…

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  • Trump Team Hired Israeli Spy Firm Used by Harvey Weinstein to Attack Obama Officials on Iran Deal

    “Aides to Donald Trump, the U.S. president, hired an Israeli private intelligence agency to orchestrate a ‘dirty ops’ campaign against key individuals from the Obama administration who helped negotiate the Iran nuclear deal, the Observer can reveal. People in the Trump camp contacted private investigators in May last year to ‘get dirt’ on Ben Rhodes, who had been one of Barack Obama’s top national security advisers, and Colin Kahl, deputy assistant to Obama, as part of an elaborate attempt to discredit the deal.”

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  • From the desk of Noam Chomsky

    From the desk of Noam Chomsky

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  • 15 Years Later: The Whistleblower Who Almost Blocked the Iraq War

    Media Advisory: Press Conference to Mark 15th Anniversary Of Leak by GCHQ Translator Katharine Gun Revealing US “Dirty Tricks” at UN for Iraq War When:  Thursday, 1 March 2018 at 11:00 a.m. Where:  Head office, National Union of Journalists Headland House, 72 Acton Street, London, WC1X 9NB Who:  Katharine Gun, Thomas Drake, Matthew Hoh, Jesselyn Radack This press conference will take place the day before the 15th anniversary of the Observer’s publication of the explosive March 2, 2003 story “US dirty tricks to win vote on Iraq war” — based on a leak by GCHQ translator Katharine Gun — revealing the US National Security Agency’s UN surveillance memo that aimed to grease the way for the…

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  • Postol on Accidental Nuclear War: “We Should be Very Alarmed”

    “The 1995 false alarm happened to take place during a politically calm time between Moscow and Washington. If such a mistake were to happen now, there would be a very serious risk of nuclear war which would kill billions of people. In the U.S., there has been virtually no concern on this issue.”

  • New Investigative Report Reveals How Koch Network and Other Groups Shaped the School Safety Debate

    A new investigative report – produced by a partnership between the Center for Media and Democracy and The Daily Poster –  shows how the end to mask-wearing in schools marks the culmination of a two-year public debate about school safety that has been heavily influenced by right-wing money groups, including the network of oil billionaire…

  • Ukraine: Is the U.S. Furthering or Preventing Negotiations?

    “The United States is in a punishment mindset with regards to Russia and it needs to quickly transition to a more balanced, diplomacy-based approach, that includes clear incentives, off-ramps for sanctions, and a realistic pathway to a ceasefire.”

  • Long Covid and Public Policy: A writer on chronic illness speaks out

    An analysis of U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data, released in early February by the Center for American Progress, concludes that the pandemic has led to 1.2 million more people being identified as having a disability in 2021 than in 2020. Meghan O’Rourke, author of “The Invisible Kingdom: Reimagining Chronic Illness” speaks out on the policy shifts…

  • End of Federal State of Emergency Could Mean Catastrophic Medicaid Results

    The federal public health emergency (PHE) is set to expire on April 15. New reports show that without the PHE’s renewal, 15 million people–including 6 million children––could potentially lose Medicaid coverage. Libby Watson writes that a right-wing campaign is pushing an end to the PHE and the transition period may serve as a “gold rush”…

  • * Threats of a No-Fly Zone * $782 Billion for Pentagon

    William Hartung, a senior research fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, said of the prospect of a no-fly zone over Ukraine:   “Implementing a no-fly zone of any sort, whether for all of Ukraine or  ‘just’ to protect humanitarian corridors and Ukrainian defensive systems, would mean that the U.S. Air Force would essentially…

  • Why the Pandemic Is Not Over and What We Need to Do About It 

    Physicians and researchers contend that the pandemic is not over––because new variants will inevitably arise in the coming months. Given that information, they call for a new phase of health preparedness and accountability: improving indoor ventilation, increasing testing and contract tracing, improving sick pay, strengthening health services, and addressing ongoing vaccine hesitancy and resistance.

  • New CDC Data Undermine the Agency’s COVID Isolation Guidelines

    New data from the CDC cast doubt on the agency’s own guidelines for those isolating with COVID-19. Dr. Michael Mina says: “In general, individuals in isolation who are planning to leave isolation at 5 days since symptom onset, per CDC recommendations, have perhaps the single greatest risk for spreading the virus compared to any other…

  • If Russia is to Withdraw, There Must be Negotiations

    “President Volodymyr Zelensky has publicly hinted that a treaty of neutrality may be on offer; and he is right to do so. For two things have been made absolutely clear by this war: that Russia will fight to prevent Ukraine becoming a military ally of the West, and the West will not fight to defend…

  • Calling Russia’s Attack “Unprovoked” Lets U.S. Off the Hook

    “Putin was very clear about a path to deescalation: He called on the West to halt NATO expansion, negotiate Ukrainian neutrality in the East/West rivalry, remove U.S. nuclear weapons from non proliferating countries, and remove missiles, troops and bases near Russia. These are demands the U.S. would surely have made were it in Russia’s position.…

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