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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  • Mother’s Day and War

    Mothers and their families will gather in front of the White House from 3 p.m. on Saturday until 3 p.m. on Sunday to call for an end to the war in Iraq and stand against a military attack on Iran. Cindy Sheehan and Elaine Johnson will be among those there; both had sons killed in…

  • · Behind Medicare Problems · DOD Funds: No One Accountable? · Impact of Tax Cuts

    CLAUDIA FEGAN, MD Co-author of the book Universal Health Care: What the United States Can Learn from the Canadian Experience, Fegan is past president of Physicians for a National Health Program. She said today: “The current problem with Medicare Part D is unfortunate because some of us believe that the way it was designed virtually…

  • · Iraq · Iran · Sudan

    SAMIR ADIL Adil is co-founder and president of the Iraqi Freedom Congress. He is one of several Iraqis on a speaking tour in the U.S. organized by the American Friends Service Committee. The Iraqi Freedom Congress states that it intends to be “an independent, democratic, secular, non-ethnic and mass organization, which is founded to guarantee…

  • The CIA and Hayden

    WILLIAM and KATHY CHRISTISON William Christison was with the CIA for 27 years, retiring when he was director of the CIA’s Office of Regional and Political Analysis; Kathy Christison is a former CIA political analyst. William Christison said today: “Much of the current discussion focuses on internal squabbling between various factions around Goss, Hayden, Rumsfeld,…

  • Paying the Price for Big Oil

    DAPHNE WYSHAM Wysham is director of the Sustainable Energy and Economy Network and a fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies. She is co-author of the report “Wrong Turn from Rio: The World Bank’s Road to Climate Catastrophe.” She said today: “The price we are paying at the pump will only grow higher, and our…

  • Gas Prices: Behind the Pain at the Pump

    With gas prices rising for drivers across the country and Chevron reporting today that it posted $4 billion in profits for the first quarter, consumers are fuming while politicians are scrambling. These energy-policy analysts are available for interviews: STEVE KRETZMANN Kretzmann, executive director of Oil Change International, said today: “As politicians of both parties scramble…

  • Seeking Accountability for Bloody Attacks: · Fallujah, Iraq — 2004 · U.N. Compound in Lebanon — 1996

    MARTI HIKEN COLLEEN FLYNN W. GORDON KAUPP Hiken, a spokesperson and co-chair for the National Lawyers Guild Military Law Task Force, is the plaintiff in a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit that has just been filed in U.S. District Court in San Francisco. Flynn and Kaupp are among the attorneys representing the Task Force. The…

  • The Politics of Leaks

    ROBERT PARRY Parry, a former reporter for The Associated Press and Newsweek, has written a number of books about Washington politics including, most recently, Secrecy & Privilege: Rise of the Bush Dynasty from Watergate to Iraq. He said today: “The Bush administration is cracking down on leaks and dissent inside the government not to protect…

  • Rising Oil Prices: Two Perspectives

    SAM STEIN Stein is a spokesperson at the Center for Public Integrity. He said today: “Our nation’s ‘addiction’ to oil did not happen by accident; far from it. For the past decade, the oil industry has spent hundreds of millions of dollars in its attempts to influence our political system. In the process it has…

  • Crisis in Nepal: An Opportunity for Democracy

    REESE ERLICH Freelance foreign correspondent Reese Erlich just returned from Nepal on assignment for Canadian Broadcasting Corp. Radio and Australian Broadcasting Corp. Radio. He said today: “Nepal is on the verge of a democratic revolution. When the country’s political parties and Maoist guerrillas jointly supported a general strike two weeks ago, most analysts thought the…

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