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 War Veterans and Military Families

    A news conference includes Mike Hoffman and Fernando Suarez del Solar next to the Arizona State University debate location at 10 a.m. local time today. The news conference is at the Twin Palms Hotel, 225 East Apache, Tempe (S.W. corner of Apache Blvd. and Mill Ave.), across Apache Blvd. from the ASU debate location and…

  • * Maathai’s Nobel Prize * Unemployment Numbers * DeLay’s Scandals

    Professor Wangari Maathai of Kenya has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for 2004. She is founder of the Green Belt Movement. More Information NJOKI NJOROGE NJEHU Njehu is director of the 50 Years Is Enough Network and worked with the Green Belt Movement for several years. Professor Maathai is both a mentor and a…

  • Scaring Away Voters in U.S Elections

    JACQUELINE JOHNSON Johnson is the executive director of the National Congress of American Indians. She said today: “In South Dakota’s June special election, erroneous signs were posted at the polls where Lakota people were voting in a special Congressional election. The signs read, ‘No ID, No vote.’ Many would-be voters went home feeling intimidated by…

  • Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: * U.S. Veto and Election * One State? * On the Ground in Gaza

    PHYLLIS BENNIS A fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies, Bennis is author of the book Before and After: U.S. Foreign Policy and the September 11th Crisis as well as the article “Veto” about the U.S. government’s repeated use of its veto of U.N. Security Council resolutions critical of Israel. She said today: “The U.S.…

  • Elections in Afghanistan and Iraq: Free and Fair?

    J. ALEXANDER THIER Thier was a legal advisor to Afghanistan’s constitutional and judicial reform commissions. He is currently a fellow at the Hoover Institution and the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law at Stanford University. He said today: “By most measures, Afghanistan seems far from ripe for democracy. As President Hamid Karzai…

  • Unequal and Separate: Voter Registration

    LISA WOZNIAK Wozniak is the Great Lakes regional director for the League of Conservation Voters. She said today: “The biggest hurdle we face here in Michigan is the requirement that the address on a voter’s driver’s license must match the address on his or her voter registration card. This disenfranchises large numbers of students. Students…

  • * Cheney * The Bush Dynasty

    JOHN NICHOLS Currently in New York City, Nichols is author of the new book Dick: The Man Who Is President. Nichols also wrote the recent article “10 Questions for Dick Cheney,” available at the web page below. More Information ROBERT PARRY Author of the just-released book Secrecy & Privilege: Rise of the Bush Dynasty from…

  • IMF and G7 Meet: Debt Cancellation and Exchange Rates

    MARIE CLARKE NEIL WATKINS Watkins is the outreach coordinator for Jubilee USA Network. Clarke is the national coordinator of Jubilee USA Network. Clarke said today: “As G7 finance ministers gather in Washington today, we issue an urgent call to G7 nations, and in particular our own government, to work in the spirit of multilateral cooperation…

  • Voter Suppression: The Long Shadow of Jim Crow

    NATHAN RICHTER PETER MONTGOMERY JOHN WHITE The NAACP and People for the American Way have recently released the report “The Long Shadow of Jim Crow: Voter Intimidation and Suppression in America.” John White is the director of communications at NAACP. People for the American Way Foundation President Ralph G. Neas said: “There is more than…

  • *Ellsberg Calls for Leaks * Presidential Debate Preview

    DANIEL ELLSBERG Currently on the west coast, Ellsberg is available for a limited number of interviews. Today’s New York Times features an op-ed by Ellsberg titled “Truths Worth Telling” in which he writes: “Surely there are officials in the present administration who recognize that the United States has been misled into a war in Iraq,…

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