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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  • Hurricanes, Climate Disruption and “Canada’s Dirtiest Needle”: 140 Arrested at White House

    Peter Shumlin, Governor of Vermont stated this morning: “I find it extraordinary that so many political leaders won’t actually talk about the relationship between climate change, fossil fuels, our continuing irrational exuberance about burning fossil fuels, in light of these storm patterns that we’ve been experiencing.” For over a week, people from across the country…

  • Rick Perry: “I’m Proud of Texas Schools,” Cuts $4 Billion

    ABBY RAPOPORT, rapoport at texasobserver.org Rapoport is a reporter with the Texas Observer. She said today: “Once upon a time, Rick Perry was all about public education. In his 2006 re-election campaign, he devoted an entire ad to his commitment. ‘I’m proud of Texas schools,’ he says to the camera as he wanders through a…

  • NY Attorney General’s Dismissal Has “Big Banks’ Dirty Fingerprints All Over It”

    The Washington Post reports: “Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller, who is leading foreclosure settlement negotiationswith the nation’s largest banks on behalf of all 50 states, abruptly removed New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman from the coalition’s executive committee Tuesday, saying he had “actively worked to undermine” the group’s efforts in recent months.

  • Martin Luther King Memorial: Honor or Burial of a Movement?

    JARED BALL, freemixradio at gmail.com Ball is an associate professor of communication studies at Morgan State University in Baltimore and is the author of I Mix What I Like! A Mixtape Manifesto. He just wrote the piece “The Corporate King Memorial and the Burial of a Movement,” which states that the newly unveiled MLK Memorial…

  • Nuclear Plant Near Earthquake Epicenter, with Hurricane Coming

    The Washington Post is reporting that a 5.9 magnitude earthquake “rattled Washington. Buildings across the capital are evacuated after quake strikes 87 miles southwest of Washington. An official with the U.S. Geological Survey says there could be aftershocks.” ROBERT ALVAREZ, kitbob at starpower.net Available for a limited number of interviews, Alvarez is a former senior…

  • Libya: Liberation or Re-Colonization?

    NASEER ARURI, naruri at aol.com Aruri is chancellor professor emeritus of political science at the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth and chair of the Trans-Arab Research Institute. He said today: “The impending collapse of the Qaddafi regime is part and parcel of an ongoing re-colonization of the Arab world by the United States and the…

  • The Rick Perry Model

    ABBY RAPOPORT, rapoport at texasobserver.org Rapoport is a reporter with the Texas Observer. She said today: “Don’t assume a gaffe or two means Rick Perry doesn’t have an excellent campaign strategy. The Texas governor rewrote the playbook on political organizing back in 2010, when he created an expansive grassroots network. No mailers, no yard signs,…

  • Tar Sands Pipeline: “A Climate Killing Disaster”

    Starting this weekend people from across the country will gather in Washington D.C. to oppose the Keystone XL, a 1,700 mile pipeline that would carry tar sands oil from Canada to refineries on the Gulf of Mexico. The protest will continue for two weeks. BILL MCKIBBEN, bill.mckibben at gmail.com, http://www.tarsandaction.org McKibben is the author of…

  • ‘We’ are Not Responsible for D.C. Deadlock

    THOMAS FERGUSON, thomas.ferguson at umb.edu Ferguson is professor of political science at the University of Massachusetts, Boston and a senior fellow of the Roosevelt Institute. He recently wrote the piece, “Memo to New York Times: Data Shows That ‘We’ Are Not Responsible for D.C. Deadlock.” It states: “After this summer’s exhausting budget and debt ceiling…

  • Iraq: “Disastrous 20 Year War”

    RAED JARRAR, jarrar.raed at gmail.com An Iraqi-American blogger and political analyst based in Washington D.C., Jarrar was in Iraq two weeks ago. He said today: “The coordinated wave of attacks that killed and injured hundreds of Iraqis this week were not religious, sectarian, or ethnic in nature. And unlike what many U.S. pundits have been…

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