Bahraini Regime Holds Gun To Head In ‘Negotiations’ by Finian Cunningham

by Finian Cunningham
Featured Writer
Dandelion Salad
East Africa
Crossposted from PressTV
February 10, 2013

Image by Al Jazeera English via Flickr

The Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei described recent American offers of bilateral talks with Iran as tantamount to the US holding negotiations with a gun to the head.

The same apt metaphor, expressing the futility of conducting political talks under extreme duress, applies equally to the internal politics of Bahrain.

The American Manifest Destiny by Clive Hambidge

by Clive Hambidge
Guest Writer
Dandelion Salad
February 3, 2013

Image by Madison Guy via Flickr

Killing from afar

Americans and their European poodles coiffeured red white and blue in American power salons are unlawfully targeting, and killing from afar, suspected militants innocent bystanders, and helpers, labelled “collateral damage,” whilst avoiding more politically toxic body bags containing returning American “heroes” to military bases and more lachrymose wailing from American politicians. Today, this day, men and women with “games console mentality” can kill your brothers and sisters and mine, by pressing a button caressed by their dutiful hands in America, for a drone strike against suspected militants and thereby international law, in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, and Somalia, then take a burger lunch without fear of reprisal? I don’t think so.

Ethiopian Annihilation of the Ogaden People, by Graham Peebles

by Graham Peebles
Guest Writer
Dandelion Salad
London
February 6, 2013

Besieged, abused, ignored

In the harsh Ogaden region of Ethiopia, impoverished ethnic Somali people are being murdered and tortured, raped, persecuted and displaced by government paramilitary forces. Illegal actions carried out with the knowledge and tacit support of donor countries, seemingly content to turn a blind eye to war crimes and crimes against humanity being committed by their brutal, repressive ally in the region; and a deaf ear to the pain and suffering of the Ogaden Somali people.

Occupy Sandy–Recovery From The Bottom Up by Peter Rugh

Dandelion Salad

by Peter Rugh
SocialistWorker.org
February 5, 2013

Image by Michael Fleshman via Flickr

IT WAS Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday, and the sound of pounding drums mingled with subway steel rattling underground, sending a hot pulse through the high-arched edifice of a humble house of worship in Sunset Park, Brooklyn. As Nina Simone sang in her blue soliloquy to the slain civil rights leader, “The king of love is dead.” But here, in St. Jacobi Lutheran Church, one could feel King’s heart beat on.

Thomas Drake: Corporations and the US Government–It’s An Unholy Alliance

Dandelion Salad

breakingtheset· Feb 8, 2013

Abby Martin sits down with former NSA whistleblower, Thomas Drake, about his personal story as a whistleblower and what he describes as a ‘total betrayal’ by part of the government.

Capitalism Stands As A Death Sentinel Over Planetary Life by Chris Williams

Image by jeancliclac via Flickr

Dandelion Salad

by Chris Williams
SocialistWorker.org
February 8, 2013

Chris Williams, author of Ecology and Socialism: Solutions to Capitalist Ecological Crisis, looks at the battles ahead for those who will protest for the planet next week.

CAPITALISM STANDS as a death sentinel over planetary life.

Recent reports from institutions such as the World Bank detail how, as a result of human activity, we are on track for a four-degree Celsius increase in average global temperatures.

Generalissima Clinton Expanding the Empire by Ralph Nader

Image by Abode of Chaos via Flickr

Dandelion Salad

by Ralph Nader
The Nader Page
February 8, 2013

Hillary Clinton has completed her four-year tenure as Secretary of State to the accolades of both Democratic and Republican Congressional champions of the budget-busting “military-industrial complex,” that President Eisenhower warned about in his farewell address. Behind the public relations sheen, the photo-opportunities with groups of poor people in the developing world, an ever more militarized State Department operated under Clinton’s leadership.

Socialist Register 2013: The Question of Strategy

Image by brent_granby via Flickr

Dandelion Salad

LeftStreamed·Feb 9, 2013

Moderated by Leo Panitch. Presentations by Joan Sangster and Meg Luxton: “Feminism, co-optation and the problems of amnesia: a response to Nancy Fraser.” Recorded in Toronto 31 January 2013.