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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  • No Oath for Gonzales; No Law for the President?

    JONATHAN TURLEY Turley is a professor of Constitutional law at George Washington University. He said today: “Alberto Gonzales has been claiming national security to avoid answering basic questions about the program. For example, when asked if he revealed information from the program to the FISA court, he refused to answer under the absurd claim that…

  • Iran and IAEA

    The International Atomic Energy Agency is scheduled to continue to meet this weekend on the case of Iran. The following are available for interviews: WILLIAM PEDEN Currently in Vienna at the IAEA meeting, Peden is a Greenpeace International nuclear analyst. The group has recently released a statement titled “Nukes, Iran, the UN: A Grave Mistake.”…

  • Budget Cuts: Costs and Consequence

    AVIS JONES-DEWEEVER Study director on poverty and income security at the Institute for Women’s Policy Research, Jones-DeWeever said today: “Following Hurricane Katrina, President Bush stood in New Orleans and made the strong statement that ‘we have a duty to confront this poverty with bold action.’ The budget that passed the House of Representatives last night,…

  • Responses to State of the Union Address

    IPA has a PDF critique of the State of the Union for public distribution here. CELESTE ZAPPALA A member of Gold Star Families Speak Out, Zappala’s eldest son, Sgt. Sherwood Baker, was the first Pennsylvania National Guardsman to die in combat since World War II. He was killed in action in Baghdad on April 26,…

  • Assessments of the State of the Union Address

    The following analysts and activists are available to critique various aspects of the State of the Union address. IPA will be producing a PDF critique of the State of the Union for public distribution by Wednesday morning, available here. FRANCES FOX PIVEN Author of the book The War at Home: The Domestic Costs of Bush’s…

  • Oil Profits

    ExxonMobil announced Monday that in 2005 it made the biggest annual profit on record for a U.S. corporation — $36.13 billion — up 42 percent from the year before. The following analysts are available for interviews: STEVE KRETZMANN Executive director of Oil Change International, Kretzmann said today: “While ExxonMobil is posting $10 billion profits in…

  • Scrutinizing Bush’s Claim That NSA Spying Could Stop More 9-11s

    In attempting to justify the government’s use of warrantless domestic spying by the National Security Agency, Bush administration officials have argued that such surveillance would help prevent another attack comparable to 9-11. MELVIN A. GOODMAN Now a senior fellow at the Center for International Policy, Goodman was with the CIA for 41 years, serving as…

  • Hamas Victory

    EDWARD L. PECK EUGENE BIRD Peck and Bird are on a delegation observing the Palestinian election. Peck is a former U.S. chief of mission to Iraq and was deputy director of the White House Task Force on Terrorism in the Reagan administration. He said today: “Many are talking about Hamas’ victory without mentioning Israel. [Israeli…

  • The Filibuster Option

    ROBERT PARRY “With the fate of the U.S. Constitution in the balance, it’s hard to believe there’s no senator prepared to filibuster Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito, whose theories on the ‘unitary executive’ could spell the end of the American democratic Republic,” ConsortiumNews.com editor Parry writes in a recent article, “Alito Filibuster: It Only Takes…

  • Does Gen. Hayden Know What the Fourth Amendment Says?

    As part of the Bush administration’s response to the revelations of warrantless domestic spying by the National Security Agency, a former head of the NSA, Gen. Michael Hayden, now the nation’s second-ranking intelligence official, spoke Monday at the National Press Club. Gen. Hayden disputed a questioner’s statement that the Fourth Amendment requires a showing of…

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