Archive | February, 2009

  • New Orleans Intifada: A Grassroots Movement Rises in New Orleans’ Arab Community

    In neighborhoods around New Orleans, there’s a buzz of excitement gathering among this city’s Arab population.  A new wave of organizing has brought energy and inspiration to a community that is usually content to stay in the background.  The movement is youth-led, with student groups rising up on college campuses across the city, but also […]

  • Insuring against Private Capital Flows: Is It Worth the Premium?  What Are the Alternatives?

    The text below is composed of short excerpts (abstract, introduction, conclusion) from Jörg Bibow, “Insuring Against Private Capital Flows: Is It Worth the Premium?  What Are the Alternatives?” published online by the Levy Economics Institute of Bard College in December 2008.  The full text of “Insuring against Private Capital Flows” is available (in PDF) at […]

  • Resisting a Police State: The Importance of Dr. Binayak Sen

      Analytical Monthly Review, published in Kharagpur, West Bengal, India, is a sister edition of Monthly Review.  Its February 2009 issue features the following editorial. — Ed. We have lost twice over from the late November terror attacks in Mumbai.  We must add to the anguish of the loved ones of the poor people who […]

  • Peaceful Rally in Beirut for Gay Rights

      Nearly two hundred people gathered yesterday afternoon at the crossroads of Sodeco in Beirut to protest against violations of the rights of social minorities in Lebanon.  The defense of the homosexual community was clearly the dominant theme of the demonstration, organized at the initiative of the Helem association, which has been fighting for the […]

  • Those Alternative Socialist “Stimulus” Plans

    There are, of course, other ways to “support and stimulate” the declining US economy: those that congressional debaters, presidential advisors, and the dutiful media never discuss.  All the Federal Reserve and the US Treasury ever do is justify their functions as lenders and spenders “of last resort” (when the private sector will not).  Neither ever […]

  • A Jewish Glasnost

    Winning the “hearts and minds” of the civilian population, according to counterinsurgency field manuals, is key to defeating the resistance.  It is a lesson that imperialists learned a long time ago, but one that they seldom put into practice, let alone successfully impart to their clients.  Israel’s attack on Gaza is a case in point.  […]

  • X-Plain: Israeli Hasbara

      “Look on us, Look on them. Who looks more like you? Us! We have McDonald’s and soon H&M. They don’t even have a Subway-type chain.” “Support US! Hate THEM!” Eretz Nehederet (A Wonderful Country) is a satirical Israeli television program.  H/T to Norman G. Finkelstein.

  • April Delegation to Venezuela: Human Rights, Food Sovereignty, and Social Change

    The Alberto Lovera Bolivarian Circle of New York invites you to join us in April for a 10-day trip to Venezuela examining advances in food sovereignty and other initiatives for social change.  Start off in the capital city of Caracas, then travel to four additional states, including visits to newly formed cooperative farms and rural […]

  • Sharia in Pakistan’s Swat

      Part 1 Part 2 Cf.  Kamran Rehmat, “Swat: Pakistan’s Lost Paradise” (Al Jazeera, 27 January 2009); “‘Peace March’ in Pakistan’s Swat” (Al Jazeera, 19 January 2009); Sanjeev Miglani, “Pakistan Islamists in a Deal with China Communists: a Sign of the Times?” (Pakistan: Now or Never?  19 February 2009); Patrick Goodenough, “Turn to China, Islamists […]

  • Who’s Telling the Truth About Iran’s Nuclear Program?

      Since February 2003, Iran’s nuclear program has undergone what the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) itself admits to be the most intrusive inspection in its entire history.  After thousands of hours of inspections by some of the most experienced IAEA experts, the Agency has verified time and again that (1) there is no evidence […]

  • Back to the Future: Latin America’s Current Development Strategy

    The text below is composed of short excerpts (abstract, introduction, conclusion) from Esteban Pérez Caldentey and Matías Vernengo, “Back to the Future: Latin America’s Current Development Strategy,” International Development Economics Associates Working Paper No. 07/2008. The full text of “Back to the Future” is available (in PDF) at <networkideas.org/working/dec2008/07_2008.pdf>. — Ed.

  • Finland: Students Defend Universities from Capitalism

    Over 1,500 students demonstrated in Helsinki on 19 February 2009 against the proposed reform of higher education.  After the demonstration, the students proceeded to occupy the administration building of the University of Helsinki.  Students in Tampere, Turku, Joensuu, Rovaniemi, and Oulu also organized walkouts. The new Universities Act proposed by the Finnish government, if enacted, […]

  • NYU Administration Thuggishly Breaks Occupation

    Continuous updates on Twitter: twitter.com/takebacknyu Today New York University has shown its true face more than ever.  Claiming to be a “private university in the public service,” it is clearly not even in the service of those students whose tuitions allow it to exist. Earlier today, NYU cut power to all outlets in the occupied […]

  • We Will Eat

    Baldwin-Wallace is a well-heeled liberal arts college in Berea, Ohio.  Students in dorms there are being driven to pilfer food in the cafeteria because their $12.00 per day food allowances are totally inadequate for the prices.  I’m told by a firsthand witness that students of color were the first to be punished for pilfering.  To […]

  • The Global Collapse: a Non-orthodox View

    This is the longer version of an essay by the author released by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) on 6 February 2009. Week after week, we see the global economy contracting at a pace worse than predicted by the gloomiest analysts.  We are now, it is clear, in no ordinary recession but are headed for […]

  • Tehran Has No More Pomegranates

      Directed by Massoud Bakhshi, Tehran Has No More Pomegranates, a feature-length experimental documentary made over the span of five years, tells the story of Iran’s encounter with modernity and its social and political changes through a comic and ironic narrative about the transformation of its capital, Tehran, from a small village to a huge […]

  • Sri Lanka: An Unfolding Catastrophe

    Few people in the U.S. have paid attention to the island nation of Sri Lanka and to the decades-long struggle for self-determination by the Tamil-speaking minority community.  As the conflict has begun to intensify and make headlines in recent weeks, the Sri Lankan government has done its utmost to control the story being told by […]

  • Muslim Pilgrimage to Manzanar

      In April 2008, the Greater Los Angeles Area office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-LA) led a group of over 100 Southern California Muslims on an educational trip to Manzanar, the first Japanese internment camp established during World War II.  Along with Southland Muslims, some 1,500 people from California and beyond attended the […]

  • Statement of Joel Kovel Regarding His Termination by Bard College

      Joel Kovel holds the Alger Hiss chair in social studies at Bard College and is the author of Overcoming Zionism among other titles.  He has recently been informed by the college that his contract will not be extended beyond July 1.  In the statement below, he argues that the termination is due to his […]

  • A Camp Follower Who Aims to Please: How Anthony Cordesman Proved That Israel Fought a Clean War

    Anthony H. Cordesman, a leading military analyst from the Center for Strategic and International Studies, published a “strategic analysis” of the Gaza massacre shortly after it ended.  He reaches the remarkable conclusion that “Israel did not violate the laws of war.”  The report is based on “briefings in Israeli [sic] during and immediately after the […]