Day: January 23, 2009

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Noam Chomsky: Obama’s Stance on Gaza Crisis “Approximately the Bush Position”

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Democracy Now!
1.23.2009

Noam Chomsky: Obama’s Stance on Gaza Crisis “Approximately the Bush Position”

In a visit to the State Department Thursday, President Obama made his first substantive comments on the Middle East conflict since Israel’s attack on Gaza. Obama first mentioned his commitment to Israel’s security, without affirming his commitment to Palestinian security. He condemned Palestinian rocket attacks on southern Israeli towns, but didn’t criticize the US-backed Israeli bombings of densely populated Gaza. But in a departure from the Bush administration, Obama acknowledged Palestinian suffering and said Gaza’s borders should be opened to aid. We speak with MIT professor, Noam Chomsky. [includes rush transcript]

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via Democracy Now! | Noam Chomsky: Obama’s Stance on Gaza Crisis “Approximately the Bush Position”.

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Mosaic News – 1/22/09: World News From The Middle East

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This video may contain images depicting the reality and horror of war/violence and should only be viewed by a mature audience.

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“Iraqi Voters Vent Out Before Elections,” Al Arabiya TV, UAE
“Iraqi Officials Prepare for Early US Withdrawal,” Saudi TV, Saudi Arabia
“Gaza’s Fragile Ceasefire,” Abu Dhabi TV, UAE
“Children in Gaza Left With No Schools,” Al Jazeera TV, Qatar
“Civilian Death in Gaza Lower Than Claimed By Hamas,” IBA TV, Israel
“UN Envoy Stunned By Destruction in Gaza,” Press TV, Iran
“Syrian Medical Team in Gaza,” Syria TV, Syria
“Obama Signs Order to Close Guantanamo in a Year,” Dubai TV, UAE
“Afghan’s Disappointed With Obama’s Speech,” Al-Alam TV, Iran
Produced for Link TV by Jamal Dajani.

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Democracy Now! A Tale of Two Brothers and A Son

Obama to close terrorist ‘black sites’ + Countdown: Gitmo & Dept of Justice

Israel-Palestine-Gaza-Occupation

Obama-Barack

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Kucinich Challenges Banks on Hoarding Bailout Funds

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Congressman Dennis Kucinich

Washington, Jan 21, 2009

“In God We Trust, Not in Banks We Trust”

Congressman Kucinich (D-OH) this morning made the following statement calling for assurances from Treasury and the new administration that the second tranche of the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) funds will be used to address the home foreclosure crisis:

“Let us discuss our system of checks and balances. Congress writes hundreds of billions of checks to the banks, and the banks, it turns out, don’t know their own balances.

“Banks are not lending the money that Congress gave them because most banks don’t know their own balance sheets. We throw countless dollars into a bottomless pit, and we’re wondering why new lending is not happening?

“Our nation’s motto is in God we trust, not in banks we trust. We must verify what banks are doing with the money we gave them.  We must get concrete assurances that the rest of the bailout funds be used to address the center of the financial crisis in America: foreclosure. Foreclosures are devastating the American family. There was a 41% increase in foreclosures in the past year.

“We must get concrete assurances from the new administration that the final bailout funds will be used to address the foreclosure crisis and help keep millions of Americans in their homes. We must help Americans save their homes.”

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Kucinich Ready To Go After The Federal Reserve!

Kucinich: Federal Reserve No More “Federal” Than Federal Express!

The Economy Sucks and or Collapse 2

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Mosaic News – 1/21/09: World News From The Middle East

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Warning

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This video may contain images depicting the reality and horror of war/violence and should only be viewed by a mature audience.

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Mosaic needs your help! Donate here: http://linktv.org/contribute

“Obama to Close Foreign Prisons and Guantanamo,” Al Arabiya TV, UAE
“Is Obama Committed to Israel?” IBA TV, Israel
“Views of Arab-Americans on Obama,” Al Jazeera TV, Qatar
“Israeli Tanks Withdraw from Gaza,” Dubai TV, UAE
“Ban Ki-moon Shocked from Destruction in Gaza,” Abu Dhabi TV, UAE
“Two Sisters Dead in Gaza,” Al-Alam TV, Iran
“Gaza: A New Challenge for Obama,” Al-Alam TV, Iran
“Weapons into Art,” Alsumaria TV, Iraq
Produced for Link TV by Jamal Dajani.

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Obama to close terrorist ‘black sites’ + Countdown: Gitmo & Dept of Justice

Israel-Palestine-Gaza-Occupation

Obama-Barack

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Capitalism’s Self-inflicted Apocalypse, by Michael Parenti

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by Michael Parenti
Global Research, January 21, 2009
www.michaelparenti.org

After the overthrow of communist governments in Eastern Europe, capitalism was paraded as the indomitable system that brings prosperity and democracy, the system that would prevail unto the end of history.

The present economic crisis, however, has convinced even some prominent free-marketeers that something is gravely amiss. Truth be told, capitalism has yet to come to terms with several historical forces that cause it endless trouble: democracy, prosperity, and capitalism itself, the very entities that capitalist rulers claim to be fostering.

Plutocracy vs. Democracy

Let us consider democracy first. In the United States  we hear that capitalism is wedded to democracy, hence the phrase, “capitalist democracies.” In fact, throughout our history there has been a largely antagonistic relationship between democracy and capital concentration. Some eighty  years ago Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis commented, “We can have democracy in this country, or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can’t have both.” Moneyed interests have been opponents not proponents of democracy.

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Mysterious Prison Buses in the Desert, by Ellen Brown

by Dr. Ellen Hodgson Brown
featured writer
Dandelion Salad
Ellen’s post
webofdebt.com
Jan 23, 2009

On a recent visit to Tucson, where I was invited to give a presentation on monetary reform, I was disturbed by a story of strange goings on in the desert. A little over a year ago, it seems, a new industrial facility sprang up on the edge of town. It was in a remote industrial zone and appeared to be a bus depot. The new enterprise was surrounded by an imposing security fence and bore no outward signs identifying its services. However, it soon became apparent that the compound was in the business of outfitting a fleet of prison buses. Thirty or so secondhand city buses were being reconfigured with prison bars in the windows and a coat of fresh paint bearing the “Wackenhut G4S” logo on the side.

The new Wackenhut operation is shrouded in mystery. It has been running its fleet of empty prison buses night and day, apparently logging miles on a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) contract. Multiple buses can be seen driving all over town and even on remote desert back roads. Oddly, except for the driver and one escort guard seated in front, these buses are always empty.

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Jewish Peace News: Dissent despite repressive silencing in Israel

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Jewish Peace News
Jan. 22, 2009

1) Alert from the Alternative Information Center (AIC) on the detention of AIC worker Mohammed Abu Humus;

2) Interview in the Guardian with Sharon Shalev

3) Report on Gathering to Mourn and Protest in Jaffa

Up to and also after Israel announced its unilateral cease fire, just in time to make sure that U.S. inaugural celebrations could go ahead unmarred, people all over Israel were vehemently expressing their outrage at the government’s (equally unilateral) blanket destruction of Gaza. Despite repeated claims that a huge majority supported government and military actions, protests were a visible presence in the public sphere all over the country. In fact, the repressive measures taken by state authorities, clearly intended to stifle public opposition, seemed to belie the alleged wall-to-wall support described by media and identified in polls. Police resorted to arrests on an unprecedented scale to intimidate, stem and silence dissent. Among many others (most of them Palestinian citizens of Israel), the police arrested Nir Oren, co-chair of the Bereaved Families Forum and such (by her own account; see: http://meretzusa.blogspot.com/2009/01/peace-activist-leah-shakdiel-under.html) “wishy-washy … middle of the road” figures as Leah Shakdiel, an orthodox feminist pedagogue and Israel’s first female member of a local Religious Council.

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Perestroika 2.0 Beta, By Dmitry Orlov

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By Dmitry Orlov
Speaking Truth to Power
Thursday, 22 January 2009

Reprinted from ENERGY BULLETIN

Congratulations, everyone, we have a new president: a fresh new face, a capable, optimistic, inspiring figure, ushering in a new era of responsibility, ready to confront the many serious challenges that face the nation; in short, we have us a Gorbachev. I don’t know about you, but I find the parallel rather obvious.

Obama wishes to save the economy, and to inspire us with words such as “We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories.” [Inauguration speech] At the same time, he cautions us that “We will not apologize for our way of life, nor will we waver in its defense” — an echo of Dick Cheney’s “The American way of life is non-negotiable.” And so we descend from the nonexistent but wonderfully evocative “clean coal” to the more pedestrian “Put a little dirt in your gas tank!”

But these are all euphemisms: the reality is that it is either fossil fuels, which are running out while simultaneously destabilizing the planet’s climate and poisoning the biosphere, or the end of industrial civilization, or (most likely) both, happening in that order. According to the latest International Energy Agency projections, the half-life of industrial civilization can be capped at about 17 years: it’s all downhill from here. All industrial countries will be forced to rapidly deindustrialize on this time scale, but the one that has spent the last century building an infrastructure that has no future — based on little houses interconnected by cars, with all of the accompanying moribund, unmaintainable infrastructure — is virtually guaranteed to fall the hardest. An American’s two greatest enemies are his house and his car. But try telling that to most Americans, and you will get ridicule, consternation, and disbelief. Thus, the problem has no political solution. Tragically, Obama happens to be a politician.

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via Carolyn Baker – PERESTROIKA 2.0 BETA, By Dmitry Orlov

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That Bastion Of American Socialism By Dmitry Orlov

Maintaining And Creating After Collapse, By Steve Thomas