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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  • Iraq to Iran: Propaganda for War

    RAY McGOVERN McGovern was a CIA analyst for 27 years and is on the Steering Group of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity. He just wrote the piece “A Neocon Preps U.S. for War with Iran,” which states: “I guess I was naïve in thinking that The Atlantic and its American-Israeli writer Jeffrey Goldberg might shy…

  • BP Oil: “Out of Sight, Out of Mind (Even When It’s Not Out of Sight)”

    DAHR JAMAIL Currently in Florida, independent journalist Jamail is on his way to New Orleans. He has written a string of investigative pieces on the effects of the oil leak in the Gulf. He recently co-wrote “Out of Sight, Out of Mind (Even When It’s Not Out of Sight).” He also just wrote: “Gulf Coast…

  • Would Google-Verizon Deal Hurt Innovation and Independent Voices?

    SUSAN CRAWFORD Available for a limited number of interviews, Crawford is former special assistant to the president for science, technology, and innovation policy (2009). She now teaches at the Cardozo Law School and is a visiting researcher at Princeton University’s Center for Information Technology Policy. She is quoted in Time Magazine: “It’s the next Google…

  • Pakistan: “Zardari’s Katrina”

    FATIMA BHUTTO Bhutto just wrote the piece “Zardari’s Katrina: Why is Pakistan’s president junketing while his people drown?” — which states: “This week, Pakistan’s president, Asif Ali Zardari, boarded a private Gulfstream jet along with his family and his hundreds-large entourage to visit the European countries included on the president’s grand tour. Yesterday, Zardari —…

  • Social Security and CBO’s Odd Numbers

    The 2010 Social Security and Medicare Trustees’ Report is scheduled to be released on Thursday. The 75th anniversary of Social Security is on Aug. 14. DOUG HENWOOD Henwood is editor of Left Business Observer. He writes regularly at http://doughenwood.wordpress.com. His books include Wall Street. He said today: “Though what little economic recovery we saw earlier…

  • Hiroshima After 65 Years: Disarmament or Nuclear Buildup?

    MARYLIA KELLEY Kelley is executive director of Tri-Valley CAREs (Communities Against a Radioactive Environment) located in Livermore, California. She said today: “This August 6, at 8 a.m., I will join hundreds of people of peace who will gather at the Livermore nuclear weapons Lab in California in solemn remembrance of the 65th anniversary of the…

  • Questions to EPA on Gulf and Dispersants, from Expert at EPA

    HUGH KAUFMAN A noted expert at the Environmental Protection Agency, Kaufman today produced a list of questions for EPA Assistant Administrator for Research and Development Paul Anastas, whose testimony before the Senate Environment and Public Works Subcommittee is currently on C-SPAN: 1) Do you believe EPA had enough technical and scientific information, in April, to…

  • Veterans and Military Families: Pentagon Statements on WikiLeaks Cloud Real Issues

    Three organizations representing veterans and military families have released a joint statement on the Pentagon’s response to the Afghanistan WikiLeaks documents. They said today: “Obama administration officials are trying to spin events in their favor. On the one hand, in an effort to downplay the significance of the release, we are told the documents contain…

  • Obama Speech and Iraq Realities

    Today, Obama made remarks about Iraq to a veterans group convention in Georgia. The New York Times today published a piece titled “A Benchmark of Progress, Electrical Grid Fails Iraqis.” Obama made no mention of it, but today is the 20th anniversary of Iraq invading Kuwait and the beginning of the buildup to the early…

  • Education: “Chicago Model a Disaster”

    PAULINE LIPMAN Lipman is professor of policy studies at the College of Education at the University of Illinois-Chicago. Her books include High Stakes Education: Inequality, Globalization, and Urban School Reform. She said today: “President Obama’s speech Thursday, in which he touted the performance of ‘Race to the Top,’ is now the prime example of equating…

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