Archive | June, 2006

  • In Complicity with Europe and the United States, Israel Overthrows the Palestinian Authority

    In an operation carried out throughout the West Bank and the Jerusalem area early on Thursday, Israeli forces kidnapped some 65 Hamas government ministers, parliament members, and activists in an effort to overthrow the democratically elected Palestinian government.  Palestinians fear that the officials were kidnapped to serve as bargaining chips for negotiating the release of […]

  • Since There’s No Longer Any Israeli Settlement, Gaza Is Now a Free Fire Zone!

    Click on an image for a larger view. Gaza: Free Fire Zone Does the Israeli Army Need Smart Bombs or Smart Soldiers? Accept the Existence of Israel Carlos Latuff, born in Rio de Janeiro on 30 November 1968, is a political cartoonist.  He is the author of the famous “We Are All Palestinians” series, comparing […]

  • Gaza: Do the Palestinians Have the Right to Exist?

    I am so tired of hearing Tel Aviv complain that certain Palestinian factions do not recognize Israel’s right to exist.  Regardless of their opinion of Israel’s right, even Hamas leaders have stated that the fact is that Israel does exist.  Meanwhile, Israel is once again waging a military campaign against the Palestinians that, in essence, […]

  • Stop the Israeli Attack in Gaza Immediately!

    Stop the Israeli Attack in Gaza Immediately: A Statement by the Alternative Information Center 29 June 2006 The Alternative Information Center (AIC) strongly condemns the Israeli army’s invasion of the Gaza Strip.  This invasion is a punishment for the results of the democratic Palestinian elections held in January and is irrelevant to the security of […]

  • Cuba Condemns Israel’s Military Aggression against the Gaza Strip [Cuba condena agresión militar de Israel contra Franja de Gaza]

    El Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores de la República de Cuba ha conocido con extrema preocupación de la operación militar a gran escala iniciada por Israel, desde horas tempranas de la madrugada del 28 de junio del 2006, en la Franja de Gaza, con la movilización de cerca de cinco mil soldados, cientos de tanques y […]

  • Confronting Bipartisan Empire: The Case of the Iran Freedom Support Act

    The depth and breadth of bipartisan commitment to the US empire among America’s political elite is best seen in the House vote on HR 282, the “Iran Freedom Support Act,” essentially a bill to “make U.S. sanctions against Iran under ILSA permanent unless there is a change of government in Iran”1:   YEAS NAYS PRES […]

  • Taken for a Ride on the Interstate Highway System

    The 50th anniversary of President Eisenhower’s signing of the Interstate Highway Act on 29 June 1956 is a good time to watch a 1996 PBS documentary Taken for a Ride again. Ten years ago, President Clinton visited my city during the 1996 presidential campaign.  Riding a “Presidential Special” from Columbus to Toledo on tracks that no […]

  • Should We Advocate an Election Boycott in the United States?

    Here in the purported paragon of electoral democracy, the United States of America,  we have now suffered through presidential elections in 2000 and 2004 that were widely regarded as questionable.  I am referring of course to the fiasco’s of Florida in 2000 and Ohio in 2004. Even before the Supreme Court made Bush President by […]

  • Hudson v. Michigan: The New Supreme Court’s Hostility to the Exclusionary Rule and the Fourth Amendment

    Last week, in Hudson v. Michigan, the new composition of the Supreme Court revealed its hostility to the century-old exclusionary rule, which prevents illegally-obtained evidence from being introduced against a criminal defendant.  In 1914, in Weeks v. US, the Supreme Court said that, without the sanction of exclusion, the Fourth Amendment “might as well be […]

  • Hairdresser at the Rehab

    On a broken woman’s scalp a froth of white gloves the fingers scrubbing pillow-matted hair combed, parted, cut, frosted tissue-wrapped ends rolled gently pink and blue. Surrounded by potions clear, cream rinses and highlighters, protein replenishers, a bouquet of silver scissor wands a judge whose voice can’t shape her name sits rapt anticipating, a waitress […]

  • Iran’s Western Behavior Deserves Criticism

    If imitation is the highest form of flattery, Iran must really adore the American model of state conduct.  Contrary to popular perceptions, the decision-makers in Tehran agree with their nemesis, Akbar Ganji, who recently told the Voice of America that the West was “the cradle of civilization.”  Two recent moves by Iran are especially noteworthy […]

  • Is the Fight for Union Democracy Corrupt? A Review of Robert Fitch’s Solidarity for Sale

    Robert Fitch.  Solidarity for Sale.  PublicAffairs, 2006. In Solidarity for Sale, Bob Fitch argues that the defining weakness of U.S. unionism bubbles up from a single poisoned well: corruption.  Much of his book is a well-written account of the rise of business unionism in this country — and business unionism’s ability to hold onto power […]

  • “You Can’t Forgive the Man You Rob”: America’s Willful Ignorance of Muslims

    Against a bloody backdrop of massacres and lynchings aimed at blacks in early 20th century America, W.E.B. DuBois observed that the suffering of the nation’s darker-skinned sons and daughters gave many whites a feeling of “fierce, vindictive joy.”  He further wrote, “A true and worthy ideal frees and uplifts a people; a false ideal imprisons […]

  • The Dogs of War — Barking at the Moon?

    The current debate in Congress over the war in Iraq has put the myth of victory and its opposite — surrender– back on the front pages.  These are actually more than myths; they are genuine misrepresentations of what’s happening in Iraq — lies, in other words.  It doesn’t really matter, though, because those who want […]

  • “Seeger Sessions”:Springsteen Makes Folk Classics Come Alive

    I was fortunate enough to attend the Bruce Springsteen “Seeger Sessions” concert in Saratoga Springs, New York, Monday. June 19th. The current Springsteen tour is in support of his new album, We Shall Overcome:The Seeger Sessions, inspired by a request to do a Pete Seeger song for a tribute, which morphed, according to Springsteen, into […]

  • Mexican and Central American Labor: The Crux of the Immigration Issue in the U.S.

    Capitalism’s demand for cheap labor is the thread that runs throughout the history of immigration in the U.S. and remains the central issue today.  Currently, the crux of the immigration issue is the status of the undocumented Mexican and Central American labor force working in this country.  Just how closely the U.S. economy is linked […]

  • Will Democrats Regain Control of the U.S. House of Representatives on Election Day?

    With several months to go until the election, you may already be tired of the seemingly endless speculation in the media about the Democrats’ chances to regain control of the U.S. House of Representatives.  While there is some small discussion among working people about this possibility, for most, the November 7th elections are a long […]

  • On Neoliberalism: An Interview with David Harvey

    A BRIEF HISTORY OF NEOLIBERALISM by David HarveyBUY THIS BOOK Neoliberalism has left an indelible, smoldering mark on our world for the last thirty years.  Eminent Marxist geographer David Harvey, author of A Brief History of Neoliberalism (Oxford, 2005), spoke earlier this year to Sasha Lilley, of the radical radio program Against the Grain, about […]

  • Bugging Hillary

    After years of tortured searching, I have finally found a use for Western literature.  I merely select pieces from the dead-white-men canon and revise them, in a way that we can better understand contemporary politics!  For instance, the perplexing realpolitik of a certain U.S. Senator, and possible Presidential candidate, suddenly becomes clear, as we reconfigure […]

  • What Really Happened in Tehran on June 12?Did Human Rights Watch Get It Wrong?

    Even before Iran was rocked by the mass uprising of 1978-79, I understood that moralists of all stripes shroud certain tragedies with unique reverence as a means of discouraging dissent.  Three decades later, Iran’s opposition movement — and occasionally Human Rights Watch — are grounded in orthodoxies of their own even as they struggles against […]