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: Turning Point or Going in Circles?

    KHALIL BENDIB Bendib is a cartoonist; his first collection of cartoons is titled “It Became Necessary to Destroy the Planet in Order to Save It!” His latest cartoon depicts Bush repeatedly claiming to be reaching a “turning point” in Iraq while in fact he is just going around in circles; see it here. Bendib said…

  • Exit Strategy

    MOUNZER SLEIMAN Sleiman is Washington bureau chief for the magazine Almustaqbal Alarabi, which is published by the Center for Arab Unity Studies, based in Beirut, Lebanon. The director of the Center for Arab Unity Studies, Dr. Kheir deen Haseeb, an Iraqi native, recently proposed a 21-point plan to end the U.S. occupation of Iraq and…

  • · Iran and Israeli Nukes · Iran Peace Offer Rebuffed?

    “Iran has followed President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s recent letter to President Bush with explicit requests for direct talks on its nuclear program, according to U.S. officials, Iranian analysts and foreign diplomats,” the Washington Post reported in a front-page article on May 24. “The eagerness for talks demonstrates a profound change in Iran’s political orthodoxy, emphatically erasing…

  • Memorial Day

    CELESTE ZAPPALA ELAINE JOHNSON NANCY LESSIN “It serves no purpose to have more and more servicemen and women die in an unjust and unjustifiable war, and have more families experience the unbearable and unending pain that my family has experienced,” said Celeste Zappala, mother of Sgt. Sherwood Baker, the first Pennsylvania National Guardsman to die…

  • Enron Convictions

    GREG PALAST Palast is an internationally recognized expert on regulation of power markets and coauthor of the book Regulation and Democracy. He said today: “Just like Al Capone, who went to jail for failing to file his taxes, Lay is convicted merely of stock fraud. This is nothing compared to the manipulation by Lay and…

  • Mr. Olmert Goes to Congress

    The Jerusalem Post is reporting today: “Amid a lengthy round of applause, including a standing ovation from U.S. lawmakers, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert addressed the U.S. Congress…” EDWARD L. PECK EUGENE BIRD Peck, a former chief of mission to Iraq, was deputy director of the White House Task Force on Terrorism in the Reagan administration.…

  • Why Won’t the U.S. Acknowledge Israel’s Nuclear Weapons?

    Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert meets with U.S. President Bush today and speaks to a joint meeting of both chambers of Congress on Wednesday. The U.S. government does not publicly acknowledge Israel’s nuclear weapons arsenal. MORDECHAI VANUNU Vanunu is a former Israeli nuclear technician who in 1986 revealed through The Sunday Times of London the…

  • Rep. Murtha and Haditha

    JOHN SIFTON Sifton is a researcher with Human Rights Watch. He said today: “Rep. John P. Murtha of Pennsylvania, a retired Marine colonel, has provided key new facts about the Haditha incident. If what Rep. Murtha is saying regarding the Haditha incident is indeed true, this can only be considered a serious war crime. Retaliations…

  • Hayden and Warrantless Surveillance

    CHRISTOPHER SIMPSON Professor of Communication at American University and author of the books Blowback, Science of Coercion and National Security Directives of the Reagan and Bush Administrations, Simpson said today: “There are two problems here: One is that the capability to collect this type of information is built into the networks involved. The other is…

  • Bush and Hayden vs. The Law?

    “I have two paths in front of me, both of them lawful, one FISA, one the presidential — the president’s authorization.” — Michael Hayden, National Press Club, January 23, 2006 “Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 shall be the exclusive means by which electronic surveillance … may be conducted.” — FISA; 18 U.S.C. Sec. 2511(f)…

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