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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  • * 9/11 First Responders * Administration Deceptions, Then and Now

    MEG BARTLETT Bartlett is founder of the group Ground Zero for Peace — First Responders Against War. As an emergency medical technician, she responded to 9/11. She said today: “We do not want our experiences to propagate further violence. No one should have to see what I’ve seen. But people around the world have seen…

  • What Did the EPA Know and When Did It Know It?

    JOEL KUPFERMAN Kupferman is the executive director of the New York Environmental Law and Justice Project. He said today: “On September 19, 2001, one day after the EPA declared that the ‘air was safe to breathe,’ we took samples in lower Manhattan and sent them to two respected labs — the results came back with…

  • 9/11 and Aftermath: Tragedy and Deception * Relatives of Sept. 11 Victims * Military Families

    DAVID POTORTI Potorti is the primary author of the new book September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows: Turning Our Grief into Action for Peace. His brother was killed in the World Trade Center. He said today: “With the worst kind of cynicism, George W. Bush continues the hallucinatory link of Iraq to the deaths of…

  • Senior EPA Specialists Comment Today on Deletions of Warnings About 9/11 Toxins

    Two senior specialists with the federal Environmental Protection Agency commented Thursday on emerging information about the White House role in early press releases from the EPA about potential health hazards in lower Manhattan after the 9/11 attacks. The comments, by Cate Jenkins and Hugh Kaufman, were released by the Institute for Public Accuracy on Sept.…

  • Electricity and Deregulation: More Corporate Scams?

    WENONAH HAUTER TYSON SLOCUM Hauter is director of Public Citizen’s Critical Mass Energy and Environment Program; Slocum is research director for the group. Hauter said today: “The House blackout hearings today and tomorrow will be nothing more than a high-wire act promoting transmission policies benefiting Enron-esque power marketers at the expense of consumers. That’s because…

  • * Ten Commandments * Labor Day * Against School * Psychiatric Protests

    Rev. GRAYLAN S. HAGLER Senior pastor of Plymouth Congregational United Church of Christ and national president of Ministers For Racial, Social and Economic Justice, Hagler said today: “The legal controversy around the Ten Commandments monument in Alabama highlights the misuse and abuse of religion in the United States. A monument of this kind is a…

  • Crisis with North Korea: Critical Analysis

    As representatives of six governments hold talks in Beijing regarding North Korea’s nuclear capability, the following analysts are available for interviews: BRUCE CUMINGS Author of several books including The Origins of the Korean War, Korea’s Place in the Sun: A Modern History and most recently Parallax Visions: American-East Asian Relations at the End of the…

  • Bush at American Legion: Interviews Available

    PAUL COX Cox is a Vietnam War veteran and the commander for the American Legion Post 315 in San Francisco. He said today: “Bush made assertions that the primary reason for the invasion of Iraq was weapons of mass destruction. Exactly a year ago today, Cheney said to the Veterans of Foreign Wars: ‘Simply stated,…

  • Interviews Available: The March on Washington

    The 40th anniversary of the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom is August 28. Events begin today in Washington, D.C. The following analysts and activists are available for interviews: Rev. JAMES LAWSON Pastor emeritus of Holman United Methodist Church, Lawson was a longtime associate of Martin Luther King Jr. and is available for…

  • The U.N. Role in Iraq: Interviews Available

    NANCY LESSIN, CHARLIE RICHARDSON Co-founders of Military Families Speak Out, Lessin and Richardson have a son, Joe, who just returned from Iraq. They said today: “Senator Kay Bailey Hutchinson and others are arguing that attacks in Iraq mean we have to send more troops. We have 58,000 names on a wall — and millions of…

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