accuracy.org

News Items

  • Election Reforms: Falling short

    WASHINGTON — Proponents of progressive election reform gave cautious approval to the recent report issued by a commission assigned to investigate the improvement of federal elections. Many critics, however, point to several obstacles that remain in the way of free and fair elections throughout the United States. The report, issued by the National Commission on Federal Election Reform headed by former Presidents Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford, was presented to President Bush. Among its recommendations are provisions regarding increases in equipment standards and stepped-up federal funding for the administration of elections.

    Read more »

  • Son of Star Wars: Another arms race?

    WASHINGTON — Reports emerging from the Pentagon about plans to test a “Space Bomber” are drawing accusations that the U.S. government is attempting to engage in another arms race. The bomber, a spacecraft reportedly capable of destroying targets on the other side of the globe within 30 minutes, is a key component of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s plan to modernize U.S. weaponry. The satellite is currently under production by NASA and Lockheed Martin, a leading military contractor. Pentagon claims that the bomber can cause greater and deeper ground damage from a virtually unassailable height have many critics questioning it as…

    Read more »

  • ExxonMobil: Facing a boycott

    ExxonMobil, one of the biggest corporations on the planet, is now facing a boycott spearheaded by activist groups protesting the company’s policies at home and abroad. The boycott was launched by PressurePoint, a grassroots organization looking to “take real action on climate change and corporate influence,” according to Chris Doran, campaigns director for the group. “The U.S. government’s climate change policy is the ExxonMobil policy,” Doran says. “What sort of democracy do we have when one company can buy off our political process for its own gains?” ExxonMobil is a charter member of the Global Climate Coalition, an influential industry…

    Read more »

  • Beyond the Ford-Firestone Uproar: Critics blast lack of regulation, accountability in SUV safety

    WASHINGTON – Recent congressional hearings probed the accountability of Ford and Firestone in many incidents where car or tire malfunctioned, causing injury or death. The hearings also questioned the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the federal government’s chief regulator of automobile safety, and its role in providing the public with adequate information. While the blame-placing among corporate executives and congressional subcommittees occurred on Capitol Hill, several analysts decried the lack of accountability being demanded of the corporations involved. Joan Claybrook, president of Public Citizen, pointed to a lack of regulation of sport utility vehicles and rollover standards.

    Read more »

  • NEWS BRIEFING WITH LAWRENCE SUMMERS, SECRETARY OF THE TREASURY RAYMOND OFFENHEISER, PRESIDENT, OXFAM

    Questions from IPA appear below in bold HEADLINE: NEWS BRIEFING WITH LAWRENCE SUMMERS, SECRETARY OF THE TREASURY RAYMOND OFFENHEISER, PRESIDENT, OXFAM DEBT RELIEF TO POOR COUNTRIES AND OXFAM EDUCATION NOW AWARD INTRODUCTION: MARTA ARIAS LOCATION: NATIONAL PRESS CLUB, WASHINGTON D.C. BODY:

    Read more »

  • Ten Real Reasons To Impeach Clinton

    We all seem to have lost our sense of proportion. Why are the political leaders of the United States and the major media talking of impeaching Bill Clinton for lies about sex, surely not the most important sins of his administration? If Clinton is to be impeached, why do it for frivolous reasons? I can think of at least ten reasons to impeach him, for acts far more serious than his dalliance with Monica Lewinsky or his lies to Kenneth Starr. I am speaking of matters of life and death for large numbers of people. 1. Clinton approved, very early…

    Read more »

  • Autopsy Of A Disaster: The U.S. Sanctions Policy On Iraq

    For a shorter version of this timeline, click here. Myth: The Sanctions Will be Lifted When Iraq Complies with the U.N. Inspections April 3, 1991: U.N. Security Council passes Resolution 687 which states that upon “the completion by Iraq of all actions contemplated in” specific paragraphs of the resolution, “the prohibitions against financial transactions … shall have no further force or effect.” The paragraphs cited have to do with weapons inspections. Other paragraphs in the resolution have to do with “return of all Kuwaiti property seized by Iraq” and Iraqi liability for losses and damage resulting from Iraq’s occupation of…

    Read more »

  • · Yeltsin · Tillman/Lynch Falsehoods

    DAVID KOTZ Coauthor (with Fred Weir) of the new book Russia’s Path from Gorbachev to Putin, Kotz said today: “Yeltsin did not bring freedom and democracy to Russia, as we are so often told. These were substantially achieved under Gorbachev in the last years of the Soviet Union. Yelstin rode these reforms to power, then…

  • · Equal Pay Day · Biggest Bank Merger?

    VICKY LOVELL Today is Equal Pay Day. Lovell, director of employment and work/life programs at the Institute for Women’s Policy Research, said today: “The wage ratio between women and men failed to narrow in 2006, and an earlier trend toward equal pay has stalled. According to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, in 2006…

  • Israeli Military Shoots Nobel Peace Laureate

    MAIREAD CORRIGAN MAGUIRE Nobel Peace Prize recipient Maguire said today: “I was invited with my friend to attend a nonviolent conference in Bilin, a village outside Ramallah [in the West Bank], and to give a talk there, which I did. At the end of the conference, we were invited to participate in a nonviolent demonstration…

  • Where Is Iraq Headed?

    AARON GLANTZ An unembedded journalist and author of the book How America Lost Iraq, Glantz has reported extensively from Iraq since the spring of 2003. He said today: “Muqtada al-Sadr has millions of followers — many more than the Bush-backed government in the Green Zone. … He may be a Shi’ite fundamentalist, but even Sunnis…

  • Perspectives on Virginia Shooting

    MIKE MALES Author of the book “Kids & Guns:” How Politicians, Experts, and the Press Fabricate Fear of Youth, Males said today: “Mass shootings are common in the United States — we’ve had several in recent months in offices, and almost weekly in families. I cannot find another country where mass shootings are so common…

  • D.C. Emancipation Day: Taxation without Representation

    Today is D.C. Emancipation Day, an official holiday in the city of Washington (and the reason the IRS is closed today). The Washington Post notes in an editorial today: “On this day in 1862 President Abraham Lincoln signed an act that ended slavery in the District of Columbia. … [I]t’s appropriate that it serve as…

  • “Public Investment”: On a Dead-End Track?

    MAX SAWICKY In a real sense, trains are “symptomatic of what is wrong with the way people think about economic policy” — and the consequences for the United States are very serious. That’s the theme of a new essay by economist Max B. Sawicky. “Public spending is seen as a sink, not as a boost…

  • Military Families Across U.S. Responding to the Extension of Army War-Zone Stints

    The Pentagon announced this afternoon what Defense Secretary Robert Gates called “a difficult and necessary interim step” — extending the tours of duty of all active-duty Army troops currently in Iraq or Afghanistan from 12 months to 15 months. He said: “I realize this decision will ask a lot of American troops and their families.”…

  • Beyond Imus: What’s At Stake

    JILL NELSON A journalist and activist, Nelson is author of Straight, No Chaser: How I Became a Grown-Up Black Woman and editor of the anthology Police Brutality. She said today: “The absence of the voices of African American women in the current discussion of Don Imus’ comments emphasizes how irrelevant, powerless, and objectified black women…

  • Former British Ambassador on Lessons of Iran Crisis

    CRAIG MURRAY Available for a limited number of interviews, Murray is former head of the British Foreign Office’s Maritime Section. He has written extensively about the detention of the 15 Britons on his web page and was among the first to note that the boundary was contested. A piece he wrote entitled, “How I Know…

Mastodon