Arrest of BP Scapegoat: Real Killers Walk by Greg Palast

Platform supply vessels battle the blazing remnants of the off shore oil rig Deepwater Horizon. A Coast Guard MH-65C dolphin rescue helicopter and crew document the fire aboard the mobile offshore drilling unit Deepwater Horizon, while searching for survivors. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

by Greg Palast
Featured Writer
Dandelion Salad
www.gregpalast.com
Special for Buzzflash at Truthout
April 24, 2012

The Justice Department went big game hunting and bagged a teeny-weeny scapegoat.  More like a scape-kid, really.

Today, Justice arrested former BP engineer Kurt Mix for destroying evidence in the Deepwater Horizon blow-out.

I once ran a Justice Department racketeering case and damned if I would have ‘cuffed some poor schmuck like Mix––especially when there’s hot, smoking guns showing greater crimes by BP higher ups.

John Pilger: Obama’s Greatest Achievement: To Seduce and Silence the Anti-war Movement

Dandelion Salad

with John Pilger

John Pilger speaking at Marxism 2010, the annual conference hosted by Socialist Alternative. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Apr 23, 2012 by marxismconference

Marxism 2012: Revolution in the air hosted radical journalist, writer and film-maker John Pilger. Back for his fourth year, Pilger says about the Marxism conference:

“Marxism in Melbourne is now Australia’s premier festival of debate and free speech on issues that are either excluded from or suppressed by the mass media: issues such as the government’s agenda for Indigenous Australians, Palestine and propaganda in its many disguises.”

Massive Pro-Democracy Rally Defies US-Backed State Terrorism by Finian Cunningham

by Finian Cunningham
Featured Writer
Dandelion Salad
East Africa
April 24, 2012

Image by Al Jazeera English via Flickr

One of the biggest pro-democracy rallies took place in Bahrain this week, defying claims that more than a year of US-backed brutal repression has crushed the popular movement against the unelected Al Khalifa monarchy.

Crowds of up to 200,000 marched on the outskirts of the capital, Manama, on Monday for the funeral of well-known pro-democracy activist Salah Abbas Habib [see amateur video 1]. The 36-year old was killed last Friday by regime forces during protests held against the Persian Gulf island’s staging of the Formula One Grand Prix over the weekend.

Canada’s Economic Collapse and Social Crisis: Class War and the College Crisis, Part 5 by Andrew Gavin Marshall

by Andrew Gavin Marshall
Featured Writer
Dandelion Salad
http://andrewgavinmarshall.com
April 24, 2012

Part 1: The “Crisis of Democracy” and the Attack on Education

Part 2: The Purpose of Education: Social Uplift or Social Control?

Part 3: Of Prophets, Power, and the Purpose of Intellectuals

Part 4: Student Strikes, Debt Domination, and Class War in Canada

What are the Spending Priorities of the Government?

In the debate raging over increased costs of tuition in Quebec, increased debt loads of the federal and provincial governments, the need to reduce costs – impose “fiscal austerity” – and find “solutions” to these problems, very little context is given.

America’s Genocide in Africa: Celebs Provide Mood Music for Humanitarian Wars by Finian Cunningham

by Finian Cunningham
Featured Writer
Dandelion Salad
East Africa
April 23, 2012

President Barack Obama discusses the situation in Sudan with actor George Clooney during a meeting outside the Oval Office, Oct. 12, 2010. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

It’s a sign of the times: Hollywood heart-throbs, pop divas and TV chat show celebrities are turning on the mood music for America’s never-ending global war.

In a world of lawlessness, state terrorism, rank mendacity and war criminals masquerading as government leaders, what better than to engage the glamour of reassuring celebrities to add a certain “star appeal” to otherwise barbaric endeavours?

Executive Order – Blocking the Property and Suspending Entry into the United States of Certain Persons with Respect to Grave Human Rights Abuses by the Governments of Iran and Syria via Information Technology by Barack Obama

Dandelion Salad

Propaganda Alert!

by Barack Obama
The White House
April 23, 2012

Image by SS&SS via Flickr

EXECUTIVE ORDER
– – – – – – –
BLOCKING THE PROPERTY AND SUSPENDING ENTRY INTO THE
UNITED STATES OF CERTAIN PERSONS WITH RESPECT TO GRAVE
HUMAN RIGHTS ABUSES BY THE GOVERNMENTS OF IRAN AND SYRIA
VIA INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (50 U.S.C. 1701 et seq.) (IEEPA), the National Emergencies Act (50 U.S.C. 1601 et seq.), section 212(f) of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952, as amended (8 U.S.C. 1182(f)), and section 301 of title 3, United States Code,

U.S.’s Post-Afghanistan Counterinsurgency War: Colombia by Rick Rozoff

by Rick Rozoff
Featured Writer
Dandelion Salad
Stop NATO
April 23, 2012

Image map of Colombia and Venezuela with subdivisions (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The Pentagon announced on April 23 that Defense Secretary Leon Panetta has begun a trip to South America, arriving in Colombia as part of a three-nation tour that will also take him to Brazil and Chile.

It is his first visit to the continent as Pentagon chief, though he has visited often in other capacities, including as director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Panetta’s meetings with top government and military officials in the three nations will follow those of America’s top military officer, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Martin Dempsey, to Colombia and Brazil late last month.