Showing all posts in June 2019

My latest freelance article for Online Opinion details the failure of the Australian mainstream media is question the increasingly corporatised and corrupt connections between government and big business. Solely relying on the Murdoch, Fairfax or Packer press is no longer a viable option for objective journalism. Alternative sources are therefore essential. I’m currently writing a…

The Guardian reports: “UK intelligence chiefs have admitted for the first time that claims they made about Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction were wrong and have not been substantiated. The admission is revealed in the annual report of the parliamentary intelligence and security committee which also sharply criticises the lack of communication between ministers…

Former Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad often expressed anti-Semitic sentiments. But a conference last week in Kuala Lumpur suggests that the country’s new leader, Abdullah Badawi, will be taking a more pro-active approach to the Israel/Palestine conflict. Badawi is calling for a global campaign to facilitate the establishment of a Palestinian state: “If a global…

Clusters bombs are a deadly addition to any country’s arsenal. During the Iraq war, Britain and America dropped many of these deadly weapons. Numerous unexploded cluster bombs now exist in Iraq, likely to cause death or serious bodily harm if and when detonated. Human rights groups are continuing their campaign to outlaw the use of…

“I don’t believe this is the Third World War. Nor is it a “war on terror”. Nor is it a “war of civilizations”. But our own leaders are wilfully leading us into a period of appalling suffering because they will not address the causes of injustice in the Islamic world.” – Robert Fisk, journalist in…

If anybody doubts the quality of the Murdoch press, witness the front-page yarn of today’s UK Sun newspaper?“Police are investigating another security breach at Windsor Castle after a Sun journalist drove a van containing a fake bomb close to the Queen’s apartments just days before the royal wedding blessing.” The most important issue of the…

Vibewire.net e-Festival is coming. Log-on and discover. World affairs, media and democracy, poverty and wealth. All bases covered. Aussie progressives unite.

Web logs have the potential to revolutionize the Mideast’s information flow, writes Yigal Schleifer in The Jerusalem Report. From Iran to Egypt, governments are trying to shut bloggers down by intimidation and arrests. They are, of course, fighting a losing battle. In many countries with little or no independent media, blogging is the only form…

Former chief UN weapon’s inspector, Hans Blix, now says that the Iraq invasion was motivated by oil. “”I did not think so at first. But the US is incredibly dependent on oil. They wanted to secure oil in case competition on the world market becomes too hard.” UPDATE 1: A Western humanitarian worker, just returned…

Some of the fiercest critics of the Iraq are former soldiers. Paul Rieckhoff, 29, as a U.S. Army first lieutenant and junior officer, was a rifle platoon leader in Iraq last year. Returning home, he founded Operation Truth, aiming to tell the public the truth of the war from a soldier’s perspective, often through the…