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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  • Two Years Later in Afghanistan: Enduring Freedom?

    SONALI KOLHATKAR Co-director of Afghan Women’s Mission, Kolhatkar said today: “On the second anniversary of the U.S. bombing of Afghanistan this October 7, the status of the first target in the ‘War on Terror’ is nothing for Bush and friends to write home about. To date, none of the warlords has ever been held accountable…

  • Interviews Available: Wilson, Kay, Iraq Fines

    PHILIP AGEE A former CIA officer, Agee wrote the book Inside the Company: CIA Diary, which named CIA officers and prompted the government to enact the Intelligence Identities Protection Act. Agee now runs a travel services business in Havana. He said today: “The outing of Ambassador Joseph Wilson’s wife as an undercover CIA officer is…

  • The California Recall: Interviews Available

    GRAY BRECHIN Brechin is the author of Farewell, Promised Land: Waking From the California Dream. He said today: “As the state’s public services and infrastructure have precipitously deteriorated, an ever-angrier electorate has sought sound-bite answers orchestrated by invisible public relations firms.” More Information RUTH WILSON GILMORE Gilmore is a professor of geography and African American…

  • Civil Liberties in Crisis: Interviews Available

    ADELE WELTY, [via David Potorti] Welty is a member of September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows. She lost her son, Timmy, a firefighter who was one of the first to arrive at the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. She said today: “I support Congressman Dennis Kucinich’s bill, which would roll back certain sections…

  • Context: Governing Council’s Crackdown on Al-Jazeera

    “You know, I just came in from Baghdad, and there are now over 100 newspapers in the free press in Iraq in a free Iraq, where people are able to say whatever they wish. People are debating, people are discussing — something they have not done for decades.” — Donald Rumsfeld, in response to protesters,…

  • Interviews Available: Bush at the UN

    JAMES PAUL Paul is executive director of the Global Policy Forum, which monitors policy-making at the UN. More Information 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 and the recent article “Back to the UN.” She…

  • * Wesley Clark * Arafat

    PETER HART Hart, who works with the media watch group FAIR, said today: “A review of his statements before, during and after the war reveals that Clark has taken a range of positions — from expressing doubts about diplomatic and military strategies early on, to celebrating the U.S. ‘victory.’” More Information ZOLTAN GROSSMAN Grossman is…

  • Behind Bush’s Coal “Clear Skies” Photo-Op in Michigan

    President Bush is visiting the Detroit Edison coal-burning power plant in Monroe, Mich., this afternoon to promote his air pollution plan called the “Clear Skies Initiative.” [See: abcnews.go.com/wire/Politics/ap20030915_1081.html] The administration is being criticized by public health, environmental, labor and public interest leaders for recent EPA changes to the Clean Air Act. Among those available for…

  • * Arafat in Exile? * WTO in Cancun

    ADAM SHAPIRO Shapiro is an activist and organizer with the International Solidarity Movement based in Washington, D.C. In March, 2002 he entered Yasser Arafat’s presidential compound escorting an ambulance during the Israeli siege of Ramallah and ended up trapped inside under attack with President Arafat and over 300 men by Israeli forces. Shapiro spent the…

  • “The Other 9/11” — This Sept. 11 Marks 30-Year Anniversary of Coup in Chile

    On Sept. 11, 1973, a U.S.-backed coup brought down the democratically elected government of Salvador Allende in Chile. The coup began a repressive dictatorship under Gen. Augusto Pinochet that lasted until the end of the 1980s. The following Chileans, living in Northern California, are available for interviews: HECTOR SALGADO A few days after the military…

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