The Israeli siege is strangling Gaza’s economy, and many of the businesses that were managing to scrape by were destroyed by the recent war. A look into the economic consequences of Israel’s blockade and the war on Gaza.
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Pt 2 Continue reading
Noam Chomsky interviewed by Neil Denny and Padraig Reidy. Little Atoms. April 24, 2009. Continue reading
Propaganda Alert
compiled by Cem Ertür
Featured Writer
Dandelion Salad
21 April, 2009
http://www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/media/204173/afghanistan_pakistan.pdf
excerpts from:
HM Government
UK policy in Afghanistan and Pakistan: the way forward
Cabinet Office website, 29 April 2009
(Note: The full text of this report is posted further below)
| Quote: |
| The UK’s counter-terrorism strategy – CONTEST – sets out our overall approach to counterterrorism, covering activity overseas, including cooperation and capacity-building with security forces in Pakistan. […]Our cooperation is designed to help the Pakistani government deal with the challenge it faces from local terrorist and insurgent groups, and the international terrorist networks that are linked with, and supported by, those groups. […] The UK and Pakistan have worked together in tackling numerous important terrorist plots which could affect either of our countries, or both, or third countries as well. […]
In December 2008, we announced our largest bilateral programme of counter-terrorism support and capacity-building, worth £10m. […] We are working to build increasingly close connections between police forces in the UK with specialist expertise on counter-terrorism, and the Federal Investigation Agency and police forces in Pakistan. […] We are also working with the Pakistani government, media, civil society and others to build resilience to violent extremism and tackle the grievances that drive radicalisation; and we are deepening our understanding of the links between counter-radicalisation in Pakistan and in Pakistani communities in the UK. |
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related links:
[1] SAS and other special forces to be expanded to defeat al-Qaeda
by Sean Rayment, Daily Telegraph, 25 April 2009
[2] UK “Terror Plot”: Gordon Brown points finger at Pakistan
Dandelion Salad, 11 April, 2009
[3] The United Kingdom’s Strategy for Countering International Terrorism
Home Office website, 24 March 2009
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full text:
http://www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/media/204173/afghanistan_pakistan.pdf
Or at this link: http://www.911forum.org.uk/board/viewtopic.php?p=134156#134156
Miguel Tinker Salas: Collapse of traditional economy created the space for the cartels to grow.
by Richard C. Cook
Featured Writer
Dandelion Salad
richardccook.com
May 3, 2009
In a letter to voters, Congressman Robert Wexler (D-FL) has announced his introduction of House Resolution 383 to establish “a bi-partisan Select Committee tasked with making comprehensive recommendations on our national security policy – including those covering laws on torture, FISA law violations, wiretapping, civil liberties protections, among others. This committee would have all of the power of a standing committee, including subpoena power.” Co-sponsors are Barbara Lee (D-CA) and John Conyers (D-MI). Conyers is chairman of the House Judiciary Committee.
Wexler’s statement continued by stating that, “The committee will investigate many of the outrageous policies of the Bush Administration to unearth and expose what happened during the past eight years…. We must take a hard look at what went wrong in the last eight years. We must continue to peel back the veil of secrecy that the previous Administration used as cover to undermine our system of checks and balances, and establish a clear line between what is necessary for our security and what is unlawful government intrusion and a violation of our civil liberties.”
May 02, 2009 CNN
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Ron Paul on the Recent Swine Flu Scare Continue reading
by Rick Rozoff
Featured Writer
Dandelion Salad
Stop NATO
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/stopnato/message/39164
May 3, 2009
For the past seven months world news outlets have provided daily coverage on what has been described as escalating piracy off the coast of Somalia in the Gulf of Aden and attempts by international, primarily Western, military vessels to combat it.
Absent from such reporting, as the exigencies of commercial news broadcasting inevitably entail, is how and why the situation in the region reached the impasse it has and what its broader significance is.
Instead the picture presented is, according to the standard formula, a point on a blank canvas with no historical depth, no geoeconomic and geopolitical width and no strata of diversified and interrelated causes that contribute to and dynamics that result from what is in truth a lengthy and complex process of developments.
In short the Somali situation is portrayed as a simple and self-contained event that at a seemingly gratuitous moment was declared a crisis.
There are dozens of comparable cases in the world, analogous in the general sense of presenting economic, security, national and regional threats to other nations and their environs, but these have not been declared crises and so aren’t given world attention.
Updated: May 4, 2009 added “Message of the Day” excerpt
Note: Video retitled to “Allow Yourself to Be Human”.
stbenedictsomerville
May 02, 2009
Fr. Carr speaks about what it means to follow THE Good Shepherd.
Fr. Carr is the pastor at St. Benedict Parish in Somerville
Continue reading
Happy Labor Day, solidarity to all the workers of the world. ~ DS Continue reading
Dandelion Salad 