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.”

    Read more »


  • 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.

    Read more »


  • 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.

    Read more »


  • 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.

    Read more »


  • 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…

    Read more »


  • 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.

    Read more »


  • 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.

    Read more »


  • 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.

    Read more »


  • 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.

    Read more »


  • 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…’

    Read more »


  • 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…

  • Tax Day

    ANITA DANCS Research director of the National Priorities Project, Dancs said today: “With the cost of the Iraq war at $315 billion through fiscal year 2006, taxpayers should reflect this tax day on where their money is going. That’s enough money to have built 18,000 elementary schools across the country and paid more than 900,000…

  • Behind the Immigration Crisis: Policies in Latin America

    ROBERTO RODRIGUEZ, Rodriguez writes the syndicated “Column of the Americas” with Patrisia Gonzales. He said today: “The effect of the Sensenbrenner proposal may well be to make a ‘guest worker’ program seem reasonable. Such a proposal would create a two-tiered society of citizens and non-citizens. Or better yet, a system with full-fledged citizens and dehumanized,…

  • Peru Elections

    MARK WEISBROT The AP is reporting that “Ollanta Humala, a populist retired army officer … [is] in first place” in Peru’s first round of presidential elections. Weisbrot is co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research and author of the recent paper “Peru’s Election: Background on Economic Issues,” which notes: “In the last several…

  • “The Israel Lobby” — A Debate

    The paper “The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy,” by John Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago and Stephen Walt of Harvard University, has come under attack from various quarters. It was published in edited form as “The Israel Lobby” in the London Review of Books. The authors write: “The thrust of U.S. policy in…

  • U.S. Plans on Iran

    “There is a growing conviction among members of the United States military, and in the international community, that President Bush’s ultimate goal in the nuclear confrontation with Iran is regime change,” Seymour Hersh writes in the new issue of The New Yorker. He also reports: “One of the military’s initial option plans, as presented to…

  • Leak Story: Rogue President?

    The Washington Post reports today that “President Bush authorized White House official I. Lewis ‘Scooter’ Libby to disclose highly sensitive intelligence information to the news media in an attempt to discredit a CIA adviser whose views undermined the rationale for the invasion of Iraq, according to a federal prosecutor’s account of Libby’s testimony to a…

  • The Massachusetts Health Plan: Behind the Hype

    The lead story in today’s New York Times reports that “Massachusetts is poised to become the first state to provide nearly universal health care coverage with a bill passed overwhelmingly by the legislature Tuesday that Gov. Mitt Romney says he will sign.” The following Boston-based health care analysts are available for interviews: STEFFIE WOOLHANDLER, MD…

  • Saddam and Attacks on Kurds

    AP is reporting: “The Iraq tribunal Tuesday announced new criminal charges against Saddam Hussein and six others for alleged genocide and crimes against humanity in [the] 1980s crackdown against the Kurds.” The following analysts are available for interviews; many of them point to U.S. policy during the 1980s as helping Saddam Hussein. For background, see:…

  • U.S. in Iraq: Big Picture · Election Interference · America’s Blinders · The Logic of Withdrawal

    JERRY STARR Author of The Lessons of the Vietnam War, Starr said today: “The U.S. government is openly manipulating the construction of the Iraqi government. For the past half century, the U.S. has intervened in elections on behalf of candidates and parties considered most responsive to U.S. interests, including Iran and Guatemala in 1954, Vietnam…

Mastodon