Archive | December, 2010

  • Saving the Euro

    Surrounded by sharks in the financial market, the many-headed eurozone says: “I say we had better swim to the shore!” “No way!  We have to face them down!” “Come on!  It’s much better to cry: Help!” “Well, I think. . . .” Bernardo Vergara is a Spanish cartoonist.  This cartoon was published in Territorio Vergara […]

  • CPI Edges Up 0.1 Percent

    The Consumer Price Index rose 0.1 percent in November.  Over the last three months, headline inflation has run at an annualized rate of 1.8 percent, compared to 1.7 percent in the previous three.  Despite November’s more moderate 0.2 percent rise in energy prices, the last three months have seen a 14.8 percent annualized rate of […]

  • Order Reigns on the Internet

    Scarcely a day after the WikiLeaks disclosures of U.S. State Department cables the U.S. political establishment went ballistic.  Some called for the assassination of WikiLeaks’ spokesperson, Julian Assange, whereas others wanted to amend the 1917 Espionage Act to target the website.  Targeted “denial of service” attacks shut down the web site, and then the political […]

  • Secret Anti-Palestinian House Resolution to Be Voted on Today

    The US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation revealed today the text of a secret anti-Palestinian resolution to be voted on by the House of Representatives later in the day.  The full text of the draft resolution, not yet made public officially, is reprinted below.* The resolution, introduced by Rep. Howard Berman, Chair of the […]

  • Flash Mob to AIPAC: “We Don’t Need Your Occupation!  Leave Iran Alone!”

      On Monday, 13 December 2010, a flash mob hit a fundraiser for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in Oakland, California, singing (to the tune of Pink Floyd’s “Another Brick in the Wall”): We don’t need no bombs and sanctions . . . Hey, AIPAC, leave Iran alone! . . . All in all […]

  • Modern Slavery

      Plunder + Immigration Laws = Modern Slavery Cecilia Areito is a Colombian cartoonist.  This cartoon was published in Rebelión on 15 December 2010.  Translation by Yoshie Furuhashi (@yoshiefuruhashi | yoshie.furuhashi [at] gmail.com).  | Print  

  • The empire stands accused

    Julian Assange, a man known only to a very few in the world some months ago, is demonstrating that the most powerful empire to have existed in history can be challenged. The daring challenge did not come from a rival superpower; from a state with more than 100 nuclear weapons; from a country with millions […]

  • To Save Mumia Abu-Jamal

    Who would demonstrate on a day like this?  Weatherwise it was the nastiest day of the year.  Berlin had been covered in snow for a week but on Saturday it thawed, the snow turned to slush and water, flooding sidewalks so that almost every step landed in a puddle, with more rain coming down to […]

  • Unquiet on the Far Eastern Front

    From the FWIW department, a video of an anti-war demonstration of 160 people in Shinjuku, Tokyo, Japan, on 5 December 2010. One of the themes of the Shinjuku demo, as shown in this poster, was (to paraphrase rather than translate): “‘China Will Invade Japan’?  Are You Nuts?” In other words, the crazy Japanese right-wingers are […]

  • Saturday Mothers of Turkey

      “The silent vigils started with the disappearance of Hasan Ocak, who was detained by police in Istanbul on March 21, 1995.  55 days later, his tortured body was uncovered in a graveyard for unidentified people.  Ocak’s family and friends led the first sit-down protest. . . .” Bijoyeta Das is an independent multimedia journalist […]

  • Israel’s War on Children of Jerusalem

    Israeli police have been criticized over their treatment of hundreds of Palestinian children, some as young as seven, arrested and interrogated on suspicion of stone throwing in East Jerusalem. In the past year, criminal investigations have been opened against more than 1,200 Palestinian minors in Jerusalem on stone-throwing charges, according to police statistics gathered by […]

  • A New Bandung?

      Would you say that you’re among the pessimists who regard the five decades of African independence as five lost decades? I’m not a pessimist and I don’t think that these have been five lost decades.  I remain extremely critical, extremely severe with respect to African states, governments, and political classes, but I’m even more […]

  • Television in Venezuela: Who Dominates the Media?

      It is commonly reported in the international press, and widely believed, that the government of President Hugo Chávez controls the media in Venezuela.  For example, writing about Venezuela’s September elections for the National Assembly, the Washington Post‘s deputy editorial page editor and columnist, Jackson Diehl, referred to the Chávez “regime’s domination of the media. […]

  • Socialism Is Dead!  Long Live the Commons and Social Accounting!

    In his essay, “Degrow or Die?” in the December/January 2011 Red Pepper magazine, John Bellamy Foster criticized degrowth advocates’ proposals for shorter working hours as not “dealing with the unemployment problem directly” and as not being viable on a broad scale unless they were part of a transition to “a post-capitalist (indeed socialist) society.”  In […]

  • Lift Sanctions against Iran: Interview with Hooman Majd

      Hooman Majd: Most average Americans, if they only follow the news on Iran the way it is presented, wouldn’t even know that there is a parliament, wouldn’t even know that there are three branches of government in Iran, like America: there’s the executive; there’s the legislative, which is the parliament; and there’s the judiciary.  […]

  • Israel and the Iranian Opposition

      On Sunday, 12 December, the Iran Committee organized a demonstration in Amsterdam against “human rights violations” in Iran.  This committee was initiated by the Centre for Information and Documentation about Israel (CIDI), which is an influential pro-Israel lobby.  The leadership of this committee consists of right-wing politicians, Christian fundamentalists, anti-Muslim racists, and unfortunately a […]

  • WikiLeaked

    US diplomacy, WikiLeaked Eneko Las Heras, born in Caracas in 1963, is a cartoonist based in Spain.  This cartoon was first published on his blog . . . Y sin embargo se mueve on 10 December 2010.  | Print

  • Jasmine

      “When you are in love with two persons at the same time. . . .” “I could have married the both of you if I were a man.” “Well, of course I wouldn’t have accepted your proposal while another woman named Ahmad was also involved. . . .” Written, edited, and directed by Saeed […]

  • What Happened in Cancún

    Pedro Méndez Suárez is a Cuban cartoonist.  This cartoon was first published in Granma.  See, also, Meena Raman, “COP16: Cancunhagen Lets Rich Countries Off the Hook” (MRZine, 11 December 2010). | Print

  • Egyptian Elections and US Foreign Policy

      Reed Lindsay: It’s election day in Egypt, the second round of parliamentary balloting.  But in this working-class suburb of Cairo, few people seem to care. “There are no free and fair elections.  All the opposition parties withdrew.  A lot of us are unemployed.  So why should we vote?” “All we are seeing is corruption, […]