Noam Chomsky: Instead of “Illegal” Syria Threat, U.S. Should Back Chemical Weapons Ban Worldwide + Chomsky on 9/11

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Dandelion Salad

with Noam Chomsky

democracynow on Sep 11, 2013

www.democracynow.org – In a national address from the White House Tuesday night, President Obama announced he is delaying a plan to strike Syria while pursuing a diplomatic effort from Russia for international monitors to take over and destroy Syria’s arsenal of chemical weapons. However, Obama still threatened to use force against Syria if the plan fails. We get reaction to Obama’s speech from world-renowned political dissident and linguist, MIT Professor Emeritus Noam Chomsky.

“The Russian plan is a godsend for Obama,” Chomsky says. “It saves him from what would look like a very serious defeat. He has not been able to obtain virtually any international support, and it looked as though Congress wasn’t going to support it either, which would leave him completely out on a limb. This leaves him a way out: he can maintain the threat of force, which incidentally is a crime under international law. We should bear in mind that the core principle of the United Nations charter bars the threat or use of force. So all of this is criminal to begin with, but he’ll continue with that.”

September 11: Forty Years Later by Carlos Torres

Dandelion Salad

Crossposted with permission from www.socialistproject.ca/bullet/

by Carlos Torres
Socialist Project
September 11, 2013

On September 11, millions of Chileans commemorate 40 years since the coup d’état in which the Palace of La Moneda in Santiago was attacked by warplanes and President Salvador Allende died fighting the conspirators. This event marked years of state terrorism and bloodshed in our country and the fortieth anniversary of the assault has been a political and emotional recollection for our friends and comrades from around the world.

Paul Theroux’s The Last Train To Zona Verde reviewed by Guadamour

by Guadamour
Writer, Dandelion Salad
September 10, 2013

Image by MegMoggington via Flickr

Paul Theroux has long held the title of Dean of Travel Writers, as well as being an accomplished novelist and insightful literary and social critic. He started off his career in Africa where he taught for six years, and wrote about his travels around the continent. In his most recent travel book, The Last Train To Zona Verde—Overland From Cape Town To Angola (The Penguin Group, 2013), Theroux brings a thoughtful perspective unavailable to anyone without his experience in Africa.

Chris Hedges and Rania Masri on Obama’s Syria Address + Gareth Porter: White House Culled Points in Released Intelligence Report on Syria

Image by The Eyes Of New York via Flickr

Dandelion Salad

TheRealNews on Sep 11, 2013

Pt 1: Scholar Rania Masri and writer Chris Hedges respond to President Obama’s Major Syria Address

Leader of Exceptional Nation: U.S. Military Doesn’t Do Pinpricks by Rick Rozoff + Obama’s Speech + Transcript

Image by The Eyes Of New York via Flickr

by Rick Rozoff
Writer, Dandelion Salad
Stop NATO
September 10, 2013

In his address to the American people, and by its very nature to the world as well as to the city, President Barack Obama delighted in playing the role of the emperor of the first global domain, omniscient and determined and even capricious in regard to the military at his command – the mightiest in the world, the most formidable in history, as he reminded his viewers – and when he will order it to strike Syria.