Here’s a just released Wikileaks statement: In a case against Valitor, formerly VISA Iceland, ReykjavÃk District Court just ruled the company had violated contract laws by blocking credit card donations to Wikileaks. After WikiLeaks’ publications revealing U.S. war crimes and statecraft in 2010, U.S. financial institutions, including VISA, MasterCard, Bank of America, erected a banking…
Showing all posts tagged United States
Yet another company profits from Australia’s privatised detention system
Shameful (via Paige Taylor in The Australian): It will cost about $29 million over the next 20 months for independent observers to watch over young, unaccompanied asylum-seekers in Australia’s immigration detention camps. The figure is the nominal amount of a new contract between the Department of Immigration and Citizenship and the US-linked Maximus Solutions to…
“Austerity” doesn’t work (but don’t tell the corporate media)
A key theme in my recently released book, Left Turn, is the failure of the corporate media to even imagine any alternative to vulture capitalism. Just imagine if a country dares to try? The essential Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting takes a look: When reality fails… to confirm the “truths” held by the international financial establishment,…
Islamic nations rightly shun American ambitions
So much for the Muslim’s world love of America and Barack Obama. Why the hell would they? (via IPS): Despite continuous assurances that the United States favours democratic rule during the 18-month-old “Arab Spring”, majorities or pluralities in six predominantly Muslim countries see Washington as an obstacle to their democratic aspirations, according to a new…
“Moderate” Zionist lobby against true democracy for Israel and Palestine
The latest email blast from J Street is revealing in its fear of what a one-state solution means for the Middle East. They want and crave Jewish privilege: Jeffrey Goldberg hit the nail on the head this morning in his assessment that adopting the recommendation of the Levy Committee would “spell the end of Israel…
Footage of my 2012 PEN Free Voices lecture
I was invited this year to give the 2012 Sydney PEN “Free Voices” lecture on free speech, censorship and war. It was delivered at the Sydney Writer’s Festival in May and in Melbourne in June. ABC published an extract recently. Film footage of the Sydney event is now available. May you be provoked:
Why does Australian join every bloody US war? To be tough, really tough
In a new report by the US Studies Centre at Sydney University titled, Australia, the US, and the Vietnam and Iraq Wars: “Hound Dog, not Lapdog”, the findings are interesting: In this article, Maquarie University’s Lloyd Cox and the US Studies Centre’s associate professor in American politics Brendon O’Connor refute the portrayal of Australia as…