Showing all posts tagged United States
Setting the right priorities over Wikileaks support
As a long-time supporter of Wikileaks, since its inception in 2006, its importance is often overlooked by the personal issues surrounding its founder Julian Assange. It’s a complex legal and ethical battle and his fear of US arrest and imprisonment is real and justified. Trusting any authorities is unwise considering the record of governments and…
Obama admin as secretive as Bush admin over legal reasons for killing “enemies”
Good editorial by MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow that challenges the dictatorial style of government in Washington that provides little or no reason why America has the right to murder its own citizens by drone strike: Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
Find me a country that isn’t complicit in US rendition
Damning new report (via Open Society) reveals the extent of nations desperate to help Washington break laws and morality post 9/11. When our leaders speak about believing in human rights, the best response is to laugh in their faces. Via the Guardian: The full extent of the… CIA‘s extraordinary… rendition… programme has been laid bare with the publication…
US doctrine: “stability means conformity to US orders”
Noam Chomsky, still as compelling and profound as ever, in an extract from a new collection of conversations with… David Barsamian: Right after the assassination of Osama bin Laden, amid all the cheers and applause, there were a few critical comments questioning the legality of the act. Centuries ago, there used to be something called presumption…
How #ZeroDarkThirty seduces viewers into supporting torture
Days after seeing Zero Dark Thirty I’m still thinking about its normalisation of torture. Rolling Stone’s great writer Matt Taibbi concurs in a stinging piece: Back to the “enhanced interrogation” in the first scene: conducted by chameleonic Australian actor Jason Clarke’s “Dan” character while Oscar nominee Jessica Chastain’s Maya character looks on, it’s shocking, horrific,…
“We’re talking about the potential for a second Holocaust here”
Brooklyn College is hosting an event about BDS and a general discussion over Israel and Palestine. Freedom of speech. Academic freedom. And yet (via the New York Times): Brooklyn College, in the Midwood neighborhood, would seem an unlikely place for Jewish students to feel besieged. Nearly a fifth of the undergraduate population is Jewish, and…
If you don’t think the Israel lobby has deformed Washington, you’re delusional
This brief clip from the confirmation hearings of Chuck Hagel for Defence Secretary shows all you need to know about what can and cannot be said even in elite circles over Israel: More here.