CINDY SHEEHAN JUAN TORRES TIFFANY BURNS AMY BRANHAM Sheehan, Torres, Burns and other peace activists interrupted a news conference as Congress member Rahm Emanuel was speaking Wednesday. They shouted “De-escalate! Investigate! Troops home now!” [Video] Today, they dropped two banners in the Senate’s Hart Building. Sheehan, Torres and Branham are members of Gold Star Families…

NIR ROSEN Available for a limited number of interviews, Rosen has spent a total of two and a half years in Iraq since the invasion; he returns to the Mideast in ten days. His most recent piece is “Hijacking Eid and Hanging Saddam: Timing and Hostile Repartee Creates Further Division,” which notes: “For Sunnis [the…

SUREYA SAYADI, MD An Iraqi Kurdish doctor and academic now living in the U.S., Sayadi said today: “Kissinger eulogized Ford today, but he could have eulogized Saddam. In 1975, Kissinger brokered the Algiers agreement whereby Iran ended its support of the Kurds, leaving them alone to be attacked by Saddam. I was actually in a…

The U.S. Army is attempting to compel testimony from journalists for the prosecution of 1st Lieutenant Ehren Watada, the first commissioned officer to publicly refuse to deploy to Iraq. Independent journalist Sarah Olson has been subpoenaed to testify at a Jan. 4 pre-trial hearing and a February court-martial about her May 2006 interview with Lieutenant…

BASSAM HADDAD Assistant professor of political science at St. Joseph’s University in Philadelphia and visiting professor at Georgetown University, Haddad is editor of the Arab Studies Journal and was in Lebanon earlier this year. He said today: “The recent monumental protests by the opposition indicate that in any future elections the support for the current…

The New York Times is reporting on its front page today: “The United States and Britain will begin moving additional warships and strike aircraft into the Persian Gulf region in a display of military resolve toward Iran that will come as the United Nations continues to debate possible sanctions against the country, Pentagon and military…

CINDY WILLIAMS Principal research scientist at the Security Studies Program of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Williams is editor of the book Filling the Ranks: Transforming the U.S. Military Personnel System. CARL CONETTA Co-director of the Project on Defense Alternatives, Conetta said today: “Unless you are planning more invasions like that of Iraq, or you…

In a piece today, Editor & Publisher reports that Sean Penn “hit the media and called for impeachment of the president in receiving the 2006 Christopher Reeve First Amendment Award from The Creative Coalition Monday night in New York City.” In his speech, Penn said: “Now, there’s been a lot of talk lately on Capitol…

Yesterday, as Colin Powell left his interview on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” Sam Husseini of the Institute for Public Accuracy asked him about claims he made regarding Iraqi weapons of mass destruction in his speech at the UN Security Council before the invasion of Iraq. Powell was asked by IPA about his speech’s citing of…

United Press International is reporting: “Five Iraqi trade union federations have condemned federal oil law negotiations for being too corporation-friendly.” The wire service quoted Hasan Jum’a, president of the Federation of Oil Unions, as saying: “This law has a lot of problems. It was prepared without consulting Iraqi experts, Iraqi civil society or trade unions.”…