Kucinich: We’re in Iraq for OIL!
May 01, 2008
C-SPAN Congress Coverage
John McCain Confirms America’s WAR for OIL Policy!
May 02, 2008 MSNBC HARDBALL
see
Kucinich Will Introduce Legislation To Ban U.S. Oil Companies From Iraq
Kucinich: I’ve Said For 5 Years This War is About Oil (video)
May 02, 2008
MSNBC Keith Olbermann
Hillary’s Turn To The RIGHT!
WAR FOR OIL!
Ann Coulter Worst Person In The World!!!
Richard Lewis on MISSION ACCOMPLISHED Five Years Later
Bushed!
Tonight’s: Iraq-Gate, No Child Left-Behind-Gate and Any Excuse For More Guns-Gate.
The Bin Ladens rose from poverty to privilege; they loyally served the Saudi royal family for generations and became wealthy enough to live and invest in other countries, including the United States. Yet the family struggled to adapt simultaneously to Saudi Arabia’s puritanism and America’s myriad temptations. This became the context for Osama’s overwhelming determination to destroy the United States.
Steve Coll is a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner and author of the national bestseller Ghost Wars.
from www.youtube.com posted with vodpod
.
By Noam Chomsky
ICH
05/02/08
Z Magazine 05/01/08
“Good News,” Iraq and Beyond Part 2
Having brought up Iran [in Part 1], we might as well turn briefly to the third member of the famous Axis of Evil, North Korea. The official story right now is that after having been forced to accept an agreement on dismantling its nuclear weapons facilities, North Korea is again trying to evade its commitments in its usual devious way—”good news” for superhawks like John Bolton, who have held all along that the North Koreans understand only the mailed fist and will exploit negotiations only to trick us. A New York Times headline reads: “U.S. Sees Stalling by North Korea on Nuclear Pact” (January 19). The article by Helene Cooper details the charges. In the last paragraph we discover that the U.S. has not fulfilled its pledges. North Korea has received only 15 percent of the fuel that was promised by the U.S. and others and the U.S. has not undertaken steps to improve diplomatic relations, as promised. Several weeks later (February 6), in the McClatchey press Kevin Hall reported that the chief U.S. negotiator with North Korea, Christopher Hill, confirmed in Senate Hearings that “North Korea has slowed the dismantling of its nuclear reactor because it hasn’t received the amount of fuel oil it was promised.”
As we learn from the specialist literature, and asides here and there, this is a consistent pattern. North Korea may have the worst government in the world, but they have been pursuing a pragmatic tit-for-tat policy on negotiations with the United States. When the U.S. takes an aggressive and threatening stance, they react accordingly. When the U.S. moves towards some form of accommodation, so do they.
When Bush came into office, both North Korea and the U.S. were bound by the Framework Agreement of 1994. Neither was fully in accord with its commitments, but the agreement was largely being observed. North Korea had stopped testing long-range missiles. It had perhaps one to two bombs worth of plutonium and was verifiably not making more. After seven Bush years of confrontation, North Korea had eight to ten bombs and long-range missiles, and was developing plutonium. The Clinton administration Korea specialist, Bruce Cumings, reports the Administration “had also worked out a plan to buy out, indirectly, the North’s medium and long-range missiles; it was ready to be signed in 2000 but Bush let it fall by the wayside and today the North retains all its formidable missile capability.”
The reasons for Bush’s achievements are well understood. The Axis of Evil speech, a serious blow to Iranian democrats and reformers as they have stressed, also put North Korea on notice that the U.S. was returning to its threatening stance. Washington released intelligence reports about North Korean clandestine programs; these were conceded to be dubious or baseless when the latest negotiations began in 2007, probably, commentators speculated, because it was feared that weapons inspectors might enter North Korea and the Iraq story would be repeated. North Korea responded by ratcheting up missile and weapons development.
see
“Good News,” Iraq and Beyond By Noam Chomsky
Israeli Bombing of Syria (nukes)
FAIR USE NOTICE: This blog may contain copyrighted material. Such material is made available for educational purposes, to advance understanding of human rights, democracy, scientific, moral, ethical, and social justice issues, etc. This constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use’, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
Note: the vodpod isn’t showing the video here, it’s some kind of technical error. Please click either “from thinkprogress.org” or the “…continued” to view the video and/or read the transcript. Sorry about that. ~ Lo
Think Progress
May 1, 2008
from thinkprogress.org posted with vodpod
.
Two weeks ago, the New York Times revealed a secret Pentagon program that uses retired military analysts to “generate favorable news coverage of the administration’s wartime performance.” Yesterday, White House Press Secretary Dana Perino defended the program, claiming “it’s absolutely appropriate to provide information to people who are seeking it.”
…continued plus transcript
see
Pentagon TV Scandal: Media Fails To Ask Hard Questions
Tomgram: Petraeus, Falling Upwards By Tom Engelhardt
More at http://therealnews.com/c.ph…
Pepe Escobar: New strategy to fight resistance–Wall-in a section of the city and bomb it…
from www.youtube.com posted with vodpod
.
see
Mosaic News – 5/1/08: World News from the Middle East
Ending the Nonsense in American Foreign Policy (video)
Countdown: Delegate Switch To Obama + Obama Interview + Mission Unaccomplished
May 02, 2008
CNN Wolf Blitzer
see
Ron Paul on CNN 04.28.08 (video)
Democracy Now!
May 2, 2008
After More than Six Years, Al Jazeera Cameraman Sami al-Haj Released from Guantanamo Bay
Arrested in Pakistan in December 2001, Sami al-Haj spent nearly six-and-a-half years at Guantanamo without charge or trial. He had been on a more than a year-long hunger strike to protest his imprisonment. We hear al-Haj¹s first public remarks from his hospital bed in Sudan and speak to his brother, Asim al-Haj.
Listen/Watch/Read
http://www.democracynow.org/2008/5/2/after_more_than_6_years_al
see
Ex-Guantanamo prisoner welcomes al-Hajj release + Sami al-Hajj speaks
Los Angeles song-a-week political band Max and the Marginalized – cartoon video for Teflon John, a song about how McCain is a hotheaded coot unfit for the presidency, and a lapdog media that spreads rose petals before him.
http://maxmarginal.blogspot.com/
Added: May 01, 2008
Warning
.
This video may contain images depicting the reality and horror of war/violence and should only be viewed by a mature audience.
Headlines coming soon!
by Joel S. Hirschhorn
featured writer
Dandelion Salad
www.foavc.org
May 2, 2008
Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama say they believe in giving Americans universal health care. I don’t believe them. Anyone who takes the time to understand universal health care should conclude that only a simple single payer system will reform the current outrageous system that benefits the insurance and pharmaceutical industries.
The contorted plans from Clinton and Obama are not sufficient reforms. And what John McCain has proposed is sheer nonsense and by itself should cause any conscious American to avoid voting for him.
Fights for health care system reform are centered in Congress, as if legislators will do what they have never done before: achieve true, major and systemic reforms that only serve the public interest, not lobbyists and campaign contributors from business sectors.
Both Clinton and Obama believe that Americans have a moral right to universal health care. If this is correct and if this is what you believe, then achieving universal health care that covers absolutely everyone by making health care affordable to absolutely everyone, as it is in many other nations, requires a different kind of government action. What exactly?
We must expand the Bill of Rights as embodied in the US Constitution to include the right to affordable universal health care. The time has come for the public to conclude that the right to universal health care is as important and necessary as the right to free speech and all the other beloved constitutional rights. Common sense says that health care is a right, not a privilege.
After all, what good are our current constitutional rights if you are ill or dying prematurely because of a lack of good health insurance? Certainly the pursuit of happiness cannot be successful when individuals are suffering from poor health because of inadequate health care.
Why would sensible, caring Americans be against a constitutional right to universal health care? Are there people who would stand up and publicly condemn the right of all Americans to have first rate health care? The only ones I can imagine doing this are those now benefitting financially from the current unjust system, those blocking necessary congressional actions.
What Obama and Clinton should explicitly and loudly advocate is a constitutional amendment that makes universal health care a nonnegotiable right of all Americans.
Why has no member of Congress submitted legislation to get Congress to propose such an amendment for ratification by the states? Clearly, the only rational answer are the many business interests that have corrupted Congress and that benefit from the current system. The Constitution provides an alternative.
Article V provides an option never used in the entire history of the US, because Congress has refused to obey the Constitution and respect state requests. The Article V convention option was put in the Constitution because the Founders and Framers believed that one day Americans would lose trust and confidence in the federal government. With 81 percent of Americans believing the nation is on the wrong track and with so many millions of Americans lacking good health insurance and care, that day has surely arrived. And with abysmally low levels of confidence in Congress and the president, an Article V convention – a temporary fourth branch of the federal government – is clearly the right path to obtaining a universal health care amendment. A convention of state delegates could debate such an amendment and if they agreed to propose it, then the standard ratification by three-quarters of the states would still be necessary.
Yes, this would probably take a few years. But it would be worth it. The prospect of Congress, even with Clinton or Obama as president, achieving universal health care without business-friendly loopholes faster than the amendment approach is not good. The process of pursuing such an amendment, moreover, would help keep pressure on Congress to do the right thing.
If this sounds reasonable and necessary, then learn the truth about the Article V option at www.foavc.org and start talking up a universal health care amendment that Hillary and Obama should support.
[Contact Joel S. Hirschhorn through www.delusionaldemocracy.com; he is a co-founder of Friends of the Article V Convention.]
see
The Fight for Workers’ Rights by Ralph Nader
US Relief Organization Takes Expedition to the USA (video) + What have we become as a nation?
No End to Media Myths About Healthcare Policy
God Bless Ralph Nader By Joel Hirschhorn
Peter Orszag Releases Study on Rising Cost of Health Care (video)
.
Former serviceman, businessman, and long-serving politician, Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE) contributes a wealth of personal experience on America’s most pressing issues from the domestic economy to political divisions to the Iraq war. The self-proclaimed patriot is not afraid to question the nation’s current status, recent policy debacles and future prospects. America: Our Next Chapter is a tough but optimistic letter from one concerned citizen to the rest of America.
Added: April 30, 2008
BBC
11:01 GMT, Friday, 2 May 2008 12:01 UK
Gordon Brown says it has been a “bad and disappointing” night for Labour, as the party suffers its worst local election results in at least 40 years.
BBC research suggests Labour won 24% of votes cast in England and Wales, behind the Tories on 44% and Lib Dems on 25%.
So far Labour has lost 182 councillors and key councils like Reading. Tory gains include Bury and North Tyneside.
Mr Brown insists his party will learn lessons. David Cameron called it a “big moment” for the Conservative Party.
…continued plus video
by Rich
Featured writer
Dandelion Salad
Rich’s blog post
Thumb Jig
May 2, 2008
An interview with the founder of the Pasadena Really Really Free Market.
More from Rich:
Free Culture – Creative Commons
see
So what is The Freeconomy Community about?
Extraordinary Times, Intentional Collapse, & Takedown of the U.S.A. by Richard C. Cook
Dandelion Salad 