Archive | May, 2009

  • Once Again, the Rotten OAS

    Yesterday the German cable service DPA revealed that the ICHR of the OAS approved a report pointing out that Cuba “continued to transgress” on fundamental rights by keeping “restrictions” on the population’s political and civil rights, while at the same time continuing to be the “only” country in the region where there is absolutely no freedom of expression.

  • Mexican Human Rights Organizations Speak Out against US Militarization of Mexico

      On May 6, 67 Mexican human rights organizations (all non-governmental organizations) along with several other Mexican organizations and individuals, made a call to end US support to the Mexican military in the war on drugs. The letter came after the approval of the 2009 installment of the controversial three-year Merida initiative which provides US […]

  • Nepal: Women Protesters Clash with Police

    7 May 2009 — The All Nepal Women’s Association – Revolutionary (ANWA-R) protested against President Ram Baran Yadav’s unconstitutional reinstatement of the Chief of Army Staff, General Rookmangud Katawal, despite the cabinet’s decision to fire him.  The protesters said that the president’s move threatens the civilian rule and democracy. For the background, watch Ben Peterson, […]

  • James Galbraith on Bank Stress Tests

    Al Jazeera: Earlier, I spoke with progressive American economist James Galbraith, and I asked him to explain why some banks still need more capital after receiving billions in government bailouts. James Galbraith: I think this is expected.  If the test did not show that they needed capital, nobody would believe them.  At the same time, […]

  • Rate of Job Loss Slows Moderately, Unemployment Rate Rises to 8.9 Percent

    The economy lost another 539,000 jobs in April, down from an average of 680,000 over the prior five months.  The unemployment rate rose to 8.9 percent, in spite of the fact that the household survey actually showed an increase in employment of 120,000.  On an age-adjusted basis, the current unemployment rate would be equivalent to […]

  • The Only American Ex-President I Have Met

    Carter is the only ex-president of the United States that I have had the honor of meeting, other than Nixon who was not one yet.

  • Help Israeli Human Rights Activist Ezra Nawi

    “Nawi is not a typical rights activist.  A member of Ta’ayush Arab-Jewish Partnership he is a Jewish Israeli of Iraqi descent who speaks fluent Arabic.  He is a gay man in his fifties and a plumber by trade.  Perhaps because he himself comes from the margins, he empathises with others who have been marginalised — […]

  • Obama Misses Opportunity for Accountability on Aid to Israel

    Washington, DC (May 7, 2009) — The US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation, a national coalition of more than 280 organizations working to change U.S. policy toward Israel/Palestine to support human rights, international law, and equality, today criticized the Obama Administration for including $2.775 billion in unconditioned military aid to Israel in its FY2010 […]

  • New Phase in the US-Israel Relations?

    The wave of pressures exercised by Washington on Israel could signal the beginning of a new era in the relations between the US and Israeli governments.  The administration of US President Barack Obama has reiterated the requirement that a Palestinian state be created, a key issue, which is not supported by the new right-wing government […]

  • CAIR’s Humanitarian Mission to Iran for Saberi, Momeni, and Levinson

    The current relation between the U.S. and Iran is not pretty; in fact, it is like a roller-coaster ride.  This is bad news for Muslims in America and abroad. Iran is bitter over its billions of dollars in frozen assets still in U.S. banks for the last three decades, following the takeover of our embassy […]

  • Guerrilla Ad Campaign Replaces “Study in Israel” Billboards

      Students and community members near the UC Berkeley campus were surprised one weekend to see a series of bus shelter billboards asking, “What country uses live ammunition against unarmed children?”  Below a photo of identically dressed schoolboys in front of a barbed wire fence is the answer: Israel. The guerrilla ads replaced ads which […]

  • A Question With No Answer

    Our world is not only threatened by the cyclical economic crises which are ever more serious and frequent. Unemployment, bankruptcy, and the huge losses in goods and wealth are inseparable companions of the blind market laws which govern the world economy today. Neo-liberalism proscribes any interference by the State, considering it a disturbing element for the economy, as if the domestic order, the army, health, education, culture, science, the courts, the judges, and many other activities could exist without the State and its laws.

  • Doctors, Single Payer Activists Arrested, Make History at Senate Finance Roundtable

      5 May 2009 — It has finally happened right here in the United States.  Citizens who believe healthcare is a human right have been arrested and are being processed like criminals through the Southeast District of Columbia police station.  Their crime? Asking for single payer healthcare reform — publicly funded, privately delivered healthcare — […]

  • Stanford Anti-War Alumni, Students Call for Condi War Crimes Probe

    During the Vietnam War, Stanford students succeeded in banning secret military research from campus.  Last weekend, 150 activist alumni and present Stanford students targeted Condoleezza Rice for authorizing torture and misleading Americans into the illegal Iraq War. Veterans of the Stanford anti-Vietnam War movement had gathered for a 40th anniversary reunion during the weekend.  The […]

  • Antonio Giustozzi, Researcher, London School of Economics and Political Science: “The New Afghan Taliban Are Waging a Real Guerrilla War”

    Antonio Giustozzi, a researcher at the London School of Economics and Political Science, is one of the internationally recognized specialists on the Taliban.  Author of Koran, Kalashnikov, and Laptop: The Neo-Taliban Insurgency in Afghanistan (Columbia University Press, 2008) among other books, this academic divides his time between London and Afghanistan.  Talking to Le Monde in […]

  • How Ideological Enemies Collaborated to Achieve Divergent Goals

    Francis R. Nicosia.  Zionism and Anti-Semitism in Nazi Germany.  Cambridge University Press, 2008.  xiv + 324 pp.  $85.00 (cloth), ISBN 978-0-521-88392-4. In his latest book, Francis R. Nicosia returns to and explores in greater detail one of the major topics of his important earlier book, The Third Reich and the Palestine Question (1985): the complex […]

  • AIPAC, Interrupted

    William Hughes Interviews Medea Benjamin, Malachy Kilbride, Louis Wolf, Brian Hennessy, Eric Anderson, Rev. Philip Wheaton, Athena Viscusi CodePink Protester Desiree Fairooz Stands Up for Gaza as Shimon Peres Speaks at Annual AIPAC Conference Both videos were brought online on 4 May 2009.

  • Giving Everything

    On May Day, still under the impression of the parade, the colors of our flag, today a symbol in the eyes of the world, and the youthful, intelligent and enthusiastic faces of our students, who closed the parade of that overflowing river, the words of the poet, repeated so many times that day, came to my mind:

  • Israel: New Profile under Investigation

      Dear friends, Some of you have already heard: The attempt to criminalize New Profile, begun in September 2008 with the Israeli Attorney General’s announcement of a criminal investigation of the movement, has now been accelerated.  On April 26th, a day before Israel’s Memorial Day, Israeli police produced a hyperbolic piece of political theater.  As […]

  • Paraguay: Protests and Rubber Bullets Greet Return of Dictatorship Criminal

    Workers and activists gathered in the central plaza of Asunción, Paraguay on May 1st to commemorate International Workers Day.  Paraguayan President Fernando Lugo marked the day by raising the minimum wage by 5%, half of what many of the unions present were demanding.  But another piece of news set the tone for this annual gathering: […]