Geography Archives: Americas

The United States, in its struggle against the Revolution, had in the Venezuelan government its best ally: the choice specimen Mr. Romulo Betancourt Bello. We did not know it then. He had been elected President on December 7, 1958; he had not taken office yet when the Cuban Revolution triumphed on January 1st, 1959. Weeks later I had the privilege of being invited by the provisional government of Wolfgang Larrazabal to visit Bolivar’s homeland, which had been so supportive of Cuba.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has definitely had a very good crisis.  Just over a year ago, it was an institution on life support: ignored by most developing countries; derided for its failure to predict most crises in emerging markets and its often counterproductive responses to such crises; even called to book by its auditors […]

At 4:30am on November 26, a couple thousand people started ferrying from San Francisco to Alcatraz Island, to witness and participate in the annual Indigenous Peoples Sunrise Gathering.  This year, it commemorated the 40th anniversary of the occupation of Alcatraz, an event which brought renewed energy and visibility to Indigenous Peoples movements. As the rising […]

Recent press reports suggest that President Obama is likely to try to sugarcoat his announcement next week of a major military escalation in Afghanistan with talk of “exit ramps”: opportunities in the future to evaluate and possibly reduce the U.S. military commitment.  That’s supposed to make opponents of military escalation feel better, the media suggests. […]

  Addressing delegates at the International Encounter of Left Parties held in Caracas, November 19-21, Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez stated: “the time has come for us to convoke the Fifth International.”  Face with the capitalist crisis and the threat of war that is putting at risk the future of humanity, “the people are clamoring for” […]

  Paul Jay: . . . How bad is unemployment in China now?  And how much worse might it get if the yuan were to appreciate? Minqi Li: Well, it’s reported that during the current crisis about 40 million Chinese workers have already lost jobs.  And, of course, if there is a further appreciation of […]

  The NLG NYC Condemns the Israeli Government for the Detention of African American Political Activists 25 November 2009 The New York City Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild condemns the actions of the Israeli government for its unlawful and racially motivated detention of two African-American political activists. On November 23, 2009, Dhoruba Bin Wahad, […]

  23 November 2009 Hello All, It’s taken me a minute to report on Lynne because I have waited to talk to attorneys after they have visited with her firsthand to discuss Lynne’s situation, needs, and other matters. Lynne Stewart 53504-054 MCC/NY 150 Park Row New York, NY 10007 Above is Lynne’s mailing address.  All […]

In a decision that reflects the post-911 terrorism hysteria, a three-judge panel of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals has affirmed prominent civil rights attorney Lynne Stewart’s convictions and remanded her case to district court Judge John G. Koeltl to reconsider her sentence.  The appellate panel directed Koeltl to remand Stewart to custody and the […]

  Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad‘s controversial visit to Brazil further underscored the independence of this country’s diplomacy, and gave Tehran a chance to defend its points of view on the construction of a lasting peace in the Middle East. Ahmadinejad’s one-day trip to Brasilia Monday was the third visit to Brazil by a Middle Eastern […]

  Lula from Brazil and Ahmadinejad from Iran.  What is this — the new axis of evil?  No — Luladinejad is a new axis of business. In the latest round of the increasingly warm embrace between Latin America and the Middle East, Lula and Ahmadinejad, meeting in Brazil, signed agreements on energy, trade and agricultural […]

As the world looks to full stabilisation and a rebound from the crisis due to the efforts of governments, clearly, it is finance rather than the real economy that has benefited more from those initiatives.  In fact, the turnaround in the financial sector, which was responsible for the crisis in the first instance, has been […]

  Just what good is freedom if no one is free, And folks go to jail if they dare disagree? And lawyers get punished for doing their jobs? And folks are afraid of the White House lynch mob? Lynne Stewart was doing what she had to do Protecting her client and civil rights, too. She […]

  The Sixth Annual Helen Pond McIntyre ’48 Lecture, Barnard College, 5 November 2009 The right to religious freedom is widely regarded as a crowning achievement of secular liberal democracies, one that guarantees the peaceful coexistence of religiously diverse populations.  Enshrined in national constitutions and international laws and treaties, the right to religious liberty promises […]

International Republican Institute and National Democratic Institute Plan to Observe Elections Controlled by Honduran Military and Police Cf. Eva Golinger, “The Role of the International Republican Institute (IRI) in the Honduran Coup” (Postcards from the Revolution , 6 July 2009) Washington, D.C. – The National Democratic Institute (NDI) and the International Republican Institute (IRI), organizations […]

The Killing Continues Since the suspension of the death penalty in Japan in September of 2009, the US is the only developed nation in the world that continues to execute its citizens — but, perhaps, not for long.  The unmasking of the political agenda behind state-sanctioned killing during the past 25 years and the growing […]

  After ten years’ war with perpetual success, to tell us it is yet impossible to have a good peace, is very surprising, and seems so different from what has ever happened in the world before, that a man of any party may be allowed suspecting that we have either been ill used, or have […]

On the night of October 10, Mexican police and soldiers occupied installations of Luz y Fuerza del Centro (LFC), the publicly owned electric company that provided power to Mexico City and the surrounding states.  A few minutes later, center-right Mexican president Felipe Calderón Hinojosa decreed the company’s liquidation, merging it with the national power company, […]

In his wild and slanderous “Open Letter to Amnesty International” (signed, fittingly, “Yours, in disgust and despair”),2 The Guardian-Observer‘s veteran reporter Ed Vulliamy explains that two “main concerns” motivated him to draft his repudiation of AI’s choice of Noam Chomsky to deliver this 2009 Stand Up for Justice lecture: One is that the “pain” individuals […]

  This open letter was published on 9 October 2009, before the University of California Regents voted to approve a 32% tuition hike on 19 November 2009. — Ed. As students, you pay tuition in order to get an education at UC, and you know that the Regents plan to raise your tuition even higher. […]