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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  • Katrina: The Community Struggles to Recover

    COLETTE PICHON BATTLE Pichon Battle’s family was displaced after Hurricane Katrina, and her mother is still in Texas. Pichon Battle founded Moving Forward as an advocacy group in Slidell (northeast of New Orleans) after the storms. She said today: “We have started a campaign against FEMA’s attempt to ‘recoup’ funds given to Katrina survivors —…

  • Katrina: Where’s the Accountability?

    Michael Chertoff, the head of the Department of Homeland Security, is reportedly among the candidates to replace Alberto Gonzales. CHRIS KROMM Kromm is the executive director of the Institute for Southern Studies and co-author of the new report “Blueprint for Gulf Renewal: The Katrina Crisis and a Community Agenda for Action.” He said today: “To…

  • Gonzales Resignation

    MICHAEL RATNER President of the Center for Constitutional Rights, Ratner said today: “Until we get rid of the entire cabal, which includes Bush and Cheney, that has engaged in torture, off-shore prisons such as Guantanamo, violations of the Geneva Conventions and warrantless wiretapping, there is little to celebrate in Gonzales’ resignation. Guantanamo continues, as does…

  • Katrina, Two Years Later: Where’s the Progress?

    On Thursday, August 23, at 1 p.m. ET, the Institute for Southern Studies holds a phone-in media briefing to release “Blueprint for Gulf Renewal,” an in-depth investigation into the state of the Gulf Coast on the two-year anniversary of Katrina. The study features a report on “Where did the Katrina money go?” and presents results…

  • Housing Bubble Fallout

    DEAN BAKER Co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, Baker said today: “There is a simple and direct way in which the federal government can help out millions of moderate-income families struggling to keep their homes: They can simply change the rules on foreclosure to allow moderate-income homeowners the option to remain in…

  • Realities of Iraq

    DAVID ENDERS Enders is a freelance journalist who has just returned from Iraq, where he spent time throughout the country. He said today: “The Bush administration says that ‘the surge is working,’ but the realities of Iraq are that violence is increasing, the electrical and water systems are approaching a state of collapse and most…

  • Pentagon-Media Collusion?

    Last week a former top CNN official defended his visits to the Pentagon for a “thumbs-up” on retired generals who were prospective CNN news analysts before the cable network hired them to provide on-air assessments of the Iraq war. Former CNN news chief Eason Jordan — quoted in an article on the IraqSlogger.com site, owned…

  • Padilla

    DAVID COLE Professor at Georgetown University Law Center, Cole said today: “The conviction shows that the government did not need to assert the extraordinary power to detain Padilla without charges for several years. But at the same time, because of how they treated Padilla in detention and others in CIA black sites, the government was…

  • Iran’s Revolutionary Guard: A Terrorist Organization?

    “The Bush administration is preparing to declare that Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps is a foreign terrorist organization,” the New York Times reports. It would be “the first time that the United States has added the armed forces of any sovereign government to its list of terrorist organizations.” REESE ERLICH Erlich, the author of the forthcoming…

  • Rove

    Rev. MEL WHITE Rev. White said today: “Karl Rove scapegoated gays to win elections, first for Congress and then for president.” White is a former ghostwriter for fellow evangelicals, including Billy Graham, Pat Robertson, Jim Bakker, and Jerry Falwell. He is president of Soul Force, a group using the nonviolence methods of Gandhi and Martin…

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