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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  • * Elections in Iraq * Clinton in Honduras

    RAED JARRAR Jarrar is an Iraqi-born political analyst who just came back from a visit to Iraq. A senior fellow with Peace Action, Jarrar has written several articles since his return to the U.S.: “The Iraq Withdrawal: Obama vs. the Pentagon,” “Sliding Backwards on Iraq?” and “A Military Coup in Iraq?” available at his web…

  • Clarity on Poverty Measure

    DIANA M. PEARCE Pearce is the director of the Center for Women’s Welfare and is currently on the faculty of the School of Social Work at the University of Washington. She said today regarding reports of changes in how poverty is measured: “While change in the outdated federal poverty measure is long overdue, caution is…

  • Analysts: Another Financial Crisis on Way; Strong Regulation Needed

    ROBERT WEISSMAN, via Dorry Samuels Weissman is president of Public Citizen, which just released a statement: “Americans Need an Independent Consumer Financial Protection Agency.” ROB JOHNSON ABC News reports today: “Even as many Americans still struggle to recover from the country’s worst economic downturn since the Great Depression, another crisis — one that will be…

  • Having Consumer Protection Under Treasury “A Sick Joke”

    MarketWatch reports today: “Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., has dropped plans for a separate, stand-alone agency to protect consumers against credit-card and mortgage fraud in a bid to restart stalled financial reform legislation.” WILLIAM K. BLACK Black is associate professor of economics and law at the University of Missouri, Kansas City. He was…

  • Why is Haiti So Poor?

    KIM IVES Ives, a journalist with Haiti Liberte newspaper, just returned from Haiti on Thursday. He reports that with the rainy season coming, tens of thousands of Haitians remain homeless, living in giant camps of sheets, tarps and tents. Many complain that they still do not receive food aid, charging that the coupon system devised…

  • Single-Payer Advocates, Excluded from Summit, Take to Sidewalk

    STEFFIE WOOLHANDLER, M.D., M.P.H. MARGARET FLOWERS, M.D. QUENTIN YOUNG, M.D. MARK ALMBERG Young, national coordinator of Physicians for a National Health Program, an organization of 17,000 doctors who support a single-payer, Medicare-for-All approach to reform, said today: “Regrettably, the president’s proposal is built on some of the worst aspects of the Senate bill. For example,…

  • White Tilt: Jobs and Stimulus Bills

    CHARLES HALLMAN Hallman is a staff reporter with the Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder. The pieces he has written recently include “Minnesota Stimulus Dollars Bypass Black Businesses: Transportation millions flow to the white ‘status quo.’” EVA SANCHIS Metro editor for El Diario/La Prensa, Sanchis’ articles include “Bushwick Is Dying: The mortgage crisis is eating away the wealth of…

  • * Airstrikes in Afghanistan * Back to Square One in Iraq?

    BEAU GROSSCUP AP reports today: “A NATO airstrike killed at least 27 Afghan civilians, officials said Monday, in the third coalition strike this month to kill noncombatants and draw a sharp rebuke from Afghanistan’s government about endangering civilians.” Author of the book Strategic Terror: The Politics and Ethics of Aerial Bombardment, Grosscup is professor of…

  • * Obama’s Healthcare Proposal * New Credit Card Law

    TRUDY LIEBERMAN Today, the White House released its new plan on healthcare. Lieberman is a contributing editor of the Columbia Journalism Review. A complete archive of her Campaign Desk articles can be found at CJR.org. Lieberman stresses the need for media outlets and others to examine the contents of the proposal rather than focusing on…

  • From Afghanistan

    ANAND GOPAL Available for a limited number of interviews, Gopal has reported for the Wall Street Journal and the Christian Science Monitor; he is currently working on a book and doing independent reporting from Afghanistan. In a recent interview, he said: “Almost all the reporters who are there are the embedded reporters, so they’re only…

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