Geography Archives: Americas

As economists in the US warn against the potential for double-digit unemployment, much of the world is already experiencing that reality.  In Spain, 200,000 workers lost their jobs in January alone, the most for a single month on record, pushing that country’s unemployment rate to over 14%.  Over 9% of workers in the Republic of […]

The response came barely a few hours later. Rahm Emmanuel, the White House chief of staff, spoke. It is of no importance that he failed to mention my modest Reflection. What is important is the response.

First they rammed the Dignity.  Then they harassed the Spirit of Humanity into turning back to its berth.  Now 18 corsair ships from the Israeli Navy have surrounded the Al-Ikhwa (The Brotherhood) ship, out of Lebanon, and boarded it, ransacking the boat and assaulting its passengers.  The ship was plainly up to no good: it […]

The other day I noted some of Obama’s ideas that point to his role within a system that is the negation of every just principle.

  Hadash released a great set of four election commercials today, which feature conversations between a supporter of Meretz and a supporter of Hadash, “The Left vs. the New Left.”  You can see the clips here. My favorite is the one on the Gaza war, which you can watch here in Hebrew.  The Leftie stutters […]

please keep in mind as you prepare to pass sentence you may at some time be in need of a presidential pardon and I may, understandably, be reluctant to grant it. Dennis Brutus is a South African poet.  Active against Apartheid, he was arrested in 1963 and imprisoned for 18 months on Robben Island.  After […]

As job losses hemorrhage, the American economy is in desperate need of a stimulus.  It is becoming increasingly clear that Congress must work rapidly to approve some version of President Obama’s plan. Then, Obama and the Congress should very quickly turn to taking a second, temporary step to create more jobs: creating incentives for companies […]

COSATU and PSC launch Week of Action for Palestine supported by YCL and other progressive organisations In a historic development for South Africa, South African dock workers have announced their determination not to offload a ship from Israel that is scheduled to dock in Durban on Sunday, 8 February 2009.  This follows the decision by […]

Babylon has fallen, has fallen Yea, Babylon has fallen Woe!  Woe!  Woe! Towers that soared into clear blue are at blocks of stone settled into earth all gone, all shattered ground into scattered dust Babylon has fallen, has fallen Yea, Babylon has fallen Woe!  Woe!  Woe! Now hordes of warring barbarians literate, skilled in killing […]

Want to hear something weird about the Left?  It’s chock-full of human nature.  For example: Some communist, in the dead of winter, stole my girlfriend’s coat. I take you back a few months.  A cold December.  My girlfriend and I are invited to a “holiday party,” as the Americans say.  Note how the festive noun […]

The Service Employees International Union (SEIU) wants its members to believe that their union is just like the alluring but ultimately nightmarish hostelry immortalized by The Eagles.   It’s a place of permanent imprisonment only “programmed to receive” workers and their dues money, not let either go elsewhere when the rhetoric of “progressive unionism” wears thin […]

  Roy Chaderton, Venezuela’s Ambassador to the Organization of American States, speaks of numerous members of the Jewish community who have supported the struggles of peoples against imperialism and Zionism, and he rejects any attack against the Jewish people. Watching television footage of one of the necessary and legitimate protests against the Israeli Embassy in […]

Dear Mr. President,

Your election as the President of the United States of America has opened a new and promising chapter in the history of the USA and created a strong wave of enthusiasm and hope across the world.

  His face the color of the Turkish flag, his right arm pinning the panel moderator to his seat, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan preferred not to listen to any more Israeli bullshit about Gaza.  With finger-wagging Israeli president Peres regurgitating the usual self-serving argument of self-defense to justify the criminal acts of his state, […]

The Gaza massacre, at least for the moment, is over — ended just before Barack Obama’s inauguration, so as not to cast an unwelcome cloud over his first hours as U.S. President.  The initial Palestinian death toll is 1,300 . . . and expected to rise.  (Four times that number were injured, and more wounded […]

New Orleans — Hurricane Katrina was a catastrophic event that forced many people in New Orleans to start over.  Since then, several hurricanes, such as Ivan and Gustav, continued to damage some of the oldest and most significant historical sites in the United States.  One of the sites in jeopardy is the Wesley United Methodist […]

Early speculation on the motive behind Israel’s slaughter in Gaza that began on 27 December 2008 and continued till 18 January 2009 centered on the upcoming elections in Israel.  The jockeying for votes was no doubt a factor in this Sparta-like society consumed by “revenge and the thirst for blood,”1 where killing Arabs is a […]

It isn’t too difficult. After his inauguration, Barack Obama stated that the return of the territory occupied by the Guantánamo Naval Base to its legitimate owner had to be carefully considered, in the first place, in terms of whether it would affect the defense capacity of the United States in the most minimal way.

Following close on the United Socialist Party of Venezuela’s (PSUV) electoral victory in the November 23 regional elections, Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez re-proposed a constitutional reform that would allow indefinite re-election.  The first attempt, bundled with various constitutional amendments that would have accelerated economic restructuring, was defeated 51 to 49 percent in December 2007. Predictably, […]

Liberals swooning over President Barack Obama’s recent speechmaking are also much impressed by his rhetorical overtures to Arabs and Muslims, first articulated during his inaugural address and reiterated on a major Arabic-language news channel. The sharp divergence in tone and tenor from Bush’s rhetoric is certainly welcome after eight years of hubris and arrogance. Quoting […]