accuracy.org

News Items

  • Election Reforms: Falling short

    WASHINGTON — Proponents of progressive election reform gave cautious approval to the recent report issued by a commission assigned to investigate the improvement of federal elections. Many critics, however, point to several obstacles that remain in the way of free and fair elections throughout the United States. The report, issued by the National Commission on Federal Election Reform headed by former Presidents Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford, was presented to President Bush. Among its recommendations are provisions regarding increases in equipment standards and stepped-up federal funding for the administration of elections.

    Read more »

  • Son of Star Wars: Another arms race?

    WASHINGTON — Reports emerging from the Pentagon about plans to test a “Space Bomber” are drawing accusations that the U.S. government is attempting to engage in another arms race. The bomber, a spacecraft reportedly capable of destroying targets on the other side of the globe within 30 minutes, is a key component of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s plan to modernize U.S. weaponry. The satellite is currently under production by NASA and Lockheed Martin, a leading military contractor. Pentagon claims that the bomber can cause greater and deeper ground damage from a virtually unassailable height have many critics questioning it as…

    Read more »

  • ExxonMobil: Facing a boycott

    ExxonMobil, one of the biggest corporations on the planet, is now facing a boycott spearheaded by activist groups protesting the company’s policies at home and abroad. The boycott was launched by PressurePoint, a grassroots organization looking to “take real action on climate change and corporate influence,” according to Chris Doran, campaigns director for the group. “The U.S. government’s climate change policy is the ExxonMobil policy,” Doran says. “What sort of democracy do we have when one company can buy off our political process for its own gains?” ExxonMobil is a charter member of the Global Climate Coalition, an influential industry…

    Read more »

  • Beyond the Ford-Firestone Uproar: Critics blast lack of regulation, accountability in SUV safety

    WASHINGTON – Recent congressional hearings probed the accountability of Ford and Firestone in many incidents where car or tire malfunctioned, causing injury or death. The hearings also questioned the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the federal government’s chief regulator of automobile safety, and its role in providing the public with adequate information. While the blame-placing among corporate executives and congressional subcommittees occurred on Capitol Hill, several analysts decried the lack of accountability being demanded of the corporations involved. Joan Claybrook, president of Public Citizen, pointed to a lack of regulation of sport utility vehicles and rollover standards.

    Read more »

  • NEWS BRIEFING WITH LAWRENCE SUMMERS, SECRETARY OF THE TREASURY RAYMOND OFFENHEISER, PRESIDENT, OXFAM

    Questions from IPA appear below in bold HEADLINE: NEWS BRIEFING WITH LAWRENCE SUMMERS, SECRETARY OF THE TREASURY RAYMOND OFFENHEISER, PRESIDENT, OXFAM DEBT RELIEF TO POOR COUNTRIES AND OXFAM EDUCATION NOW AWARD INTRODUCTION: MARTA ARIAS LOCATION: NATIONAL PRESS CLUB, WASHINGTON D.C. BODY:

    Read more »

  • Ten Real Reasons To Impeach Clinton

    We all seem to have lost our sense of proportion. Why are the political leaders of the United States and the major media talking of impeaching Bill Clinton for lies about sex, surely not the most important sins of his administration? If Clinton is to be impeached, why do it for frivolous reasons? I can think of at least ten reasons to impeach him, for acts far more serious than his dalliance with Monica Lewinsky or his lies to Kenneth Starr. I am speaking of matters of life and death for large numbers of people. 1. Clinton approved, very early…

    Read more »

  • Autopsy Of A Disaster: The U.S. Sanctions Policy On Iraq

    For a shorter version of this timeline, click here. Myth: The Sanctions Will be Lifted When Iraq Complies with the U.N. Inspections April 3, 1991: U.N. Security Council passes Resolution 687 which states that upon “the completion by Iraq of all actions contemplated in” specific paragraphs of the resolution, “the prohibitions against financial transactions … shall have no further force or effect.” The paragraphs cited have to do with weapons inspections. Other paragraphs in the resolution have to do with “return of all Kuwaiti property seized by Iraq” and Iraqi liability for losses and damage resulting from Iraq’s occupation of…

    Read more »

  • Mnuchin and Congress Plotting Tax Cuts for Wealthy Opposed by Majority

    While Americans have consistently and overwhelmingly supported higher taxes on business and the rich, tax policy has generally moved in the opposite direction, with sharp reductions in taxes on business and the wealthy, and increases in regressive taxes to make up some of the shortfall. The mass media contribute to this striking failure of democratic…

  • Comey Firing

    “In July 2013, I suggested in this New York Times op-ed that James Comey should answer a lot of hard questions before the Senate confirmed his appointment by Obama as FBI Director, explaining why he had signed off on the Bush administration’s torture, unlawful detention and illegal warrantless surveillance programs. But in 2013, the Senate…

  • Sinclair to Buy Tribune Media: “Reward from Trump Administration”?

    “Sinclair’s plan to buy Tribune Media is unsettling for several reasons. It is a major consolidation of the local media market, giving Sinclair access to a staggering 69 percent of the U.S. population.This exceeds the 39 percent ownership cap and was enabled by Trump-appointed FCC chairman Ajit Pai and his decision to reinstate a needless…

  • Drone Killings: “Making Children Afraid of Sunny Days”

    “No one is immune from a strike. This is nothing short of terror, the kind of terror that makes children afraid of sunny days. We are not fighting a finite army. A person becomes a ‘terrorist’ when they say they are. If, as General McChrystal has suggested, five new terrorists are created when there is…

  • As Saudis Threaten Port, Yemen Famine Leaves Refugee Chief “Shocked to the Bones”

    “‘Men with guns and power inside Yemen as well as in regional and international capitals are undermining every effort to avert an entirely preventable famine,’ he said, ‘as well as the collapse of health and education services for millions of children.’ …”

  • Horizon on Healthcare: Single Payer?

    “This vote shows that House leaders are not only out of ideas on health care, but out of touch with their own constituents. … In polls and at town hall meetings, Americans consistently demand Medicare for all, the only plan that is universal, sustainable, and proven to work in every other industrialized nation.”

  • The Religious Freedom Strategy of the Christian Right

    “Both Trump’s executive order and the National Day of Prayer are abuses of religious freedom — what we have long called The First Freedom, because it precedes freedom of speech and the press in the First Amendment.

  • Budget Funds Wall

    The group states: “Congressional leaders in both parties agreed Sunday to include $146 million in the federal budget for the construction of new walls along the U.S.-Mexico border. The replacement of vehicle barriers with pedestrian barriers will step up border militarization, continue to harm local communities, and have devastating effects on wildlife, blocking the movement…

  • U.S. Breakthrough on Nuclear First Strike Threatens Stability

    The paper states: “The U.S. nuclear forces modernization program has been portrayed to the public as an effort to ensure the reliability and safety of warheads in the U.S. nuclear arsenal, rather than to enhance their military capabilities. In reality, however, that program has implemented revolutionary new technologies that will vastly increase the targeting capability…

  • Ellsberg: Trump Threats to WikiLeaks “Nuclear Option” Against the First Amendment

    “Obama having opened the legal campaign against the press by going after the roots of investigative reporting on national security — the sources — Trump is going to go after the gatherers/gardeners themselves (and their bosses, publishers). To switch the metaphor, an indictment of Assange is a ‘first use’ of ‘the nuclear option’ against the…

Mastodon