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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  • Iraq and Afghanistan: Crossing the $1 Trillion Mark

    JO COMERFORD Comerford is executive director of the National Priorities Project, which analyzes budget choices. She said today: “Over the weekend, the National Priorities Project Cost of War counter — designed to count the total money appropriated for the Iraq and Afghanistan wars — passed the $1 trillion mark. “Taxpayers in Natick, Massachusetts have paid…

  • Israel Attacks on Aid Ships Called Aggression

    RICHARD FALK Falk is professor of international law emeritus, Princeton University and Special Rapporteur on Occupied Palestinian Territories for the United Nations Human Rights Council. He said today: “The Israeli naval and helicopter lethal attack on the Freedom Flotilla bringing needed humanitarian relief to the civilian population of Gaza is a shocking crime against humanity.…

  • Israel Threatening to Stop “Freedom Flotilla” to Gaza

    The British Guardian reports: “A flotilla of eight boats carrying thousands of tons of construction materials, medical equipment and other aid is [sailing to] Gaza … setting the scene for a confrontation with Israel which has vowed to prevent the ships [from] breaking the blockade on the Palestinian territory.” See “Gaza aid flotilla to set…

  • BP Disaster: Assessing Ken Salazar

    CORRECTION: In the news release sent out this morning titled “A Drilling Moratorium That Isn’t,” the phrase “as deep at” should have been “as deep as.” The full correct sentence is: “At least four of those are for wells in water over 9,000 feet deep — nearly twice as deep as the Deepwater Horizon well…

  • A Drilling Moratorium That Isn’t

    DANIEL J. ROHLF Rohlf, a law professor at Lewis & Clark Law School specializing in environmental issues, states that despite the announcement of a moratorium on offshore oil drilling, the federal regulators are still granting such permits. He said today: “The stated moratorium does not even cover all of the dangerous drilling that caused the…

  • General Petraeus’ Secret Ops

    On Monday, the New York Times published a news report titled “U.S. Is Said to Expand Secret Actions in Mideast.” ROBERT DREYFUSS Available for a limited number of interviews, Dreyfuss is editor of The Dreyfuss Report and author of Devil’s Game: How the United States Helped Unleash Fundamentalist Islam. He just wrote the piece “General…

  • Can a Bad Economy Finally Discipline the Pentagon?

    CHRIS HELLMAN Hellman is communications liaison at the National Priorities Project and recently wrote the piece “Putting the Pentagon on a Diet.” He said today: “With the current economic situation bringing suffering, foreclosure and unemployment to millions, and concerns about spiraling deficits as well as a staggering national debt, the first faint signs of a…

  • Brazil and Turkey: Iran Agrees on Nuclear Program; “Can Obama Administration Take ‘Yes’ for an Answer?”

    AP is reporting that “Iran agreed Monday to ship most of its enriched uranium to Turkey in a nuclear fuel swap deal that could ease the international standoff over the country’s disputed nuclear program and deflate a U.S.-led push for tougher sanctions. “The deal was reached in talks with Brazil and Turkey, elevating a new…

  • * Delaying Withdrawal in Iraq? * Extending Repression in Egypt

    RAED JARRAR Jarrar is the Iraq consultant for the American Friends Service Committee and a senior fellow with Peace Action. He is recently back from a visit to Iraq. Jarrar said today: “According to President Obama’s withdrawal plan, all combat forces must leave Iraq by the end of August. But this deadline is being challenged…

  • Alaskans in the Gulf: Lessons from Exxon Valdez

    RIKI OTT, via Lisa Marie Jacobs Martin is political director of , one of several groups urging President Obama — who is meeting Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai today in Washington — to say “yes to President Karzai’s request for the U.S. to support peace talks now to end the war.” Currently on the Gulf coast,…

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