In response to the ACLU’s June 10, 2009 letter demanding that the DoD pull a question from its DoD training exam that equated protest with “low-level terrorism,” which I wrote about at Open Salon on June 14 (“DoD Training Manual: Protests are ‘Low-Level Terrorism’&/… Read full post »

Update: June 22, 2009 at 6:03 pm EST - An Iranian teacher's letter on the situation is at Lotf Ali's new OS blog in a piece entitled "30 Khordad June 20." The letter is amazing and a must read.

I want to cite a passage from the letter that says so… Read full post »

Mark Ruffalo, speaking out against torture and calling for the release of the torture photos and prosecution of the torturers.

Thursday, June 25th, is Torture Accountability Day. Rallies and actions are planned in DC, NY, San Francisco, Pasadena, Honolulu, Anchorage, Boston, Las Vegas, Seattle,… Read full post »

David Swanson's newest article is up at World Can't Wait. It's entitled: "US Government Threatens to Prosecute Waterboarding."

An exciting development for those of us who have been waiting anxiously for precisely that headline.

Except that the waterboarding that our government is threatening to… Read full post »

By unanimous consent, the United States Senate on Wednesday agreed that the dirty deeds of our torture of detainees should be kept hidden.

• Sec. 1305. (a) Short Title- This section may be cited as the ‘Detainee Photographic Records Protection Act of 2009’.

   

  (b) Definition

… Read full post »

Update 2: See my follow-up article "DoD Deletes 'Protest = Terrorism,' Problems Remain." 

Update appended at the end:

The Department of Defense is training all of its personnel in its current Antiterrorism and Force Protection Annual Refresher Training Course that political protes… Read full post »

On June 12, 2009, Obama’s DOJ filed court papers seeking to overturn a landmark case that permitted the victims of torture to sue the Boeing subsidiary, Jeppensen Data Plan, for its role in “extraordinary rendition” and torture.

The case, Mohamed, et al v. Jeppesen Data Plan, et al/… Read full post »

Frank Apisa at OS has made it his mission to criticize me personally (and anyone else) for daring to criticize Obama. He and a very few other folks at OS think that criticizing the President makes you a secret right winger, a Fox News commentator, and someone who… Read full post »

Update: June 12, 2009:

Last night the Lakers went up 3-1 at Orlando and are therefore prohibitive favorites to win the title. I will admit to being a little concerned for the Lakers in the first half because even though the Magic weren't shooting the lights out, they were still… Read full post »

(Caption on Mr. Fish's cartoon above reads: "Barack Obama telling Muslims in the Arab world how deeply he respects and cares about them." Original at Truthdig.)  

*** 

David Horowitz, reactionary extraordinaire, who is apparently trying to do perpetual penance for his bri… Read full post »

This is the fourth and final installment in my series, "Exorcising the Ghost of Mass Political Activism: Deng Xiaoping, Workers, Peasants and the 1989 Spring Uprising."

The events of the late 1980s in China provide a wealth of lessons for those who want to radically remake society. In the… Read full post »

Part 3 of a four part series: "Exorcising the Ghost of Mass Political Activism: Deng Xiaoping, Workers, Peasants and the 1989 Spring Uprising"

I wrote this as my Master's Essay at UC Santa Cruz in 1991. I believe I then added some newer material around the mid-1990s.   

I original… Read full post »

Part Two of a four part series from my mid-1990s paper entitled

"Exorcising the Ghost of Mass Political Activism: Deng Xiaoping, Workers, Peasants and the 1989 Spring Uprising":

(A prefatory comment. While visiting China in the early 1990s I was witness to a scene that we wouldn't see… Read full post »

Part One of Four Parts

I wrote this as my Master's Essay at UC Santa Cruz in 1991. I believe I then added some newer material around the mid-1990s.  

One of the things that my readers might find surprising in the piece that follows is the discussion of… Read full post »

UPDATE: Added material at the end 6/3/09 1:10 am EST

Comes now a Defense Department spokesperson, anonymously speaking to Salon’s Mark Benjamin in today’s article entitled “Suppressed images don't show rape, official says: The Pentagon says no sexual abuse, no Abu Ghraib pho… Read full post »

Update: I have added a powerful essay by Rosemary Candelario at the end of Debra's piece. 

By Debra Sweet, Director, The World Can't Wait (posted at World Can't Wait and at Counterpunch).

A hero who wore a button saying “Trust Women,” was shot down and killed today, in a d… Read full post »

Photos by Joel Simpson 

This past week, and especially on May 28th, the day that Obama was originally going to release the torture and rape atrocity photos - but then changed his mind - protesters took to the streets and auditoriums in more than 15… Read full post »

When it comes to those who promulgated torture as policy and those who implemented that policy and tortured people - and in at least a hundred documented cases, actually tortured people to death - Obama says that now is the "time for reflection, not retribution." 

When, on the other ha… Read full post »

Robert Parry of Consortium News writes today in an article entitled "Obama Caves to 'Scaredy-Cat Nation,'" that: 

"Obama is bowing to the power of fear, political fear that he might be blamed by fearful Americans if a jury acquitted some allegedly dangerous terrorist because the evidence… Read full post »

City of West Hollywood and World Can't Wait Hold Joint Press Conference

From worldcantwait.net: 

CNN reported yesterday: 

"The Senate late Thursday easily passed a $91 billion spending bill for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. After stripping it of funds to close the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and placing restrictions on the transfer of its detainees, the bill wa… Read full post »

Orlando's problem: No answer to LeBron James.

Cleveland's problem: No answer to Dwight Howard, Hedo Turkoglu and Rashard Lewis. 

While it's almost guaranteed to go seven games, and one never knows beforehand for sure, the edge has to go to Orlando.

LBJ had a franchise playoff record 49 points y… Read full post »

James Petras writes in the Axis of Logic, "Obama's Animal Farm: Bigger, Bloodier Wars Equal Peace and Justice:" 

“The Deltas are psychos…You have to be a certified psychopath to join the Delta Force…," a US Army colonel from Fort Bragg once told me back in the 1980&/… Read full post »

In horse racing it's considered bad luck to predict that you're going to win. But Calvin Borel did it anyway before today's Preakness. The winner of two Kentucky Derby's and this year's Kentucky Oaks, Borel rode the filly Rachel Alexandra to a nearly wire to wire win by a length in… Read full post »

 New material added 5/16/09 1:20 am EST

These are two of the sixty photographs given to the Australian press previously that the Sydney Morning Herald is publishing now. They may be among the photographs that Obama is now refusing to release. 

Notice that t… Read full post »