Today's Stories

July 26 / 27, 2008

Joseph Nevins
Death as a Way of Life on the Borderlands

July 25, 2008

Harvey Wasserman
NRC: New Nukes Not Ready for Prime Time

Paul Craig Roberts
Are You Ready for the Facts About Israel?

Alan Farago
Where's the Outrage?

Paul D'Amato
The Arrest of Radovan Karadzic and the Selective Prosecution of War Crimes

Gary Leupp
War With Iran? State Dept. Realists vs. Cheney's Ultras

Niranjan Ramakrishnan
Eyes Wide Shut in India

Mike Whitney
Obama Dazzles Old Europe, While McCain Cries, "No Mas!"

Paul Krassner
Inside Camp Mogul

Mike Roselle
All Hail Nero!

Website of the Day
Pressing Starbucks

July 24, 2008

Greg Moses
Who Killed Azem Hajdari?

Andy Worthington
Folly and Injustice: Salim Hamdan's Guantanamo Trial

James Bovard
Daniel Ellsberg's Lessons for Our Time

Joe Bageant
Life in the Post-Political Age

George Wuerthner
Boondoggle in the Fields

DC Larson
Shutting Out Ralph Nader

William Willers
The Forest Products Industry in Public Education

David Macaray
On the Prospects for a SAG Strike

Website of the Day
Pacifica Radio Archive of 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago

July 23, 2008

Winslow T. Wheeler
An Air Force in Free Fall

Paul Craig Roberts
The Mother of All Messes

Ralph Nader
Pavlov's America

Mike Whitney
Visualizing Dow 6,000

Susie Day
Senator Sicko: Jesse Helms and the Theatre of the Depraved

Website of the Day
"A Kinder and Gentler Machine-Gun Hand..."

July 22, 2008

Nikolas Kozloff
Ten Years On, Bolivarian Revolution at Crossroads

Patrick Cockburn
Boost for Obama Over Iraq Withdrawal

Soldz, Olson, Reisner Arrigo and Welch
Torture After Dark

Moshe Adler
Everyone Must Share, Not Just Charlie Rangel

Martha Rosenberg
Protecting Bones from Drugs that Protect Bones

Dan Bacher
Bechtel and the Big Dig

Harvey Wasserman
Is Gore Inching Toward Solartopia?

Anthony Papa
A Slugger's Drug Redemption

Binoy Kampmark
Mad Over Benedict

Website of the Day
Hiroshima: A-Bombed Objects

July 21, 2008

Ishmael Reed
Remnick's Latest Blunder

Mike Whitney
The Democrats are the Real Problem

Andy Worthington
Dictatorial Powers Upheld: the Meaning of the Al-Marri Decision

Scott Pellegrino
Should "Meet the Press" Desegregate?

John Ross
McCain Crosses the Border, Gets No Satisfaction

Robert Weitzel
Blowback Through the Looking Glass

Mike Stark
I was Spied on by the Maryland Police

Website of the Day
Pinky Solves the Illegal Immigration Crisis

July 19 / 20, 2008

Alexander Cockburn
It's a Dull Race

Jeffrey St. Clair
How to Beat a Mining Company: Why a Gold Goliath Threw in the Towel

Dave Lindorff
I Was a Victim of the TSA

Saul Landau
Obits for Opposites: Carlin and Helms

Ron Jacobs
Why Afghanistan is Not the Good War

Uri Avnery
Different Planet:the Israel / Hezbollah Prisoner Swap

Neve Gordon
The Untold Story of Ni'lin

Roane Carey
Dr. Benny and Mr. Morris

Robert Fantina
Ashcroft, Torture and the U. S.

Christopher Brauchli
The General Lied

Fred Gardner
Cannabinoid Researchers Won’t Take the High Road

David Macaray
Labor Unions and the Courts

Richard L. Hutto
The Ecology of Severely Burned Forests

Bill Moyers /
Michael Winship
Mother's Milk of Politics Turns Sour

Ronnie Cummins
Netroots Nation or Nation of Sheep?

David Yearsley
Opera and Globalization

Alison McKenna
A Close Call for Medicare

Wajahat Ali
The Dark Knight Ascends

Poets' Basement
Ko Un

Website of the Day
What If Edward Said Had Told This Joke?

July 18, 2008

Corey D. B. Walker
A Kinder, Gentler Imperialism?

Mike Whitney
Swan Song for Fanny Mae

Robert Bryce
Iran Rising

Mike Roselle
Ed's Chicken: Fighting King Coal in Appalachia

Bouthaina Shaaban
U. S. to Mandela: Happy 90th and You're No Longer a Terrorist

Eve Spangler
The Deaths of Children

Website of the Day
Lowbagger Needs Your Help

July 17, 2008

Paul Craig Roberts
Airport Gestapo

James G. Abourezk
Big Oil's Raid on the Great Plains

Ralph Nader
D. C. Socialists Save Crashing Capitalists

Allan J. Lichtman
Conservative Denial

Andy Worthington"Screwed Up" and"Abused": Omar Khadr's Interrogations at Gitmo

Ronnie Cummins
Move Over MoveOn

July 16, 2008

Jeffrey St. Clair
Star Whores: How John McCain Doomed Mt. Graham

Paul Craig Roberts
War Crimes Paradox

Conn Hallinan
To the Edge in the Middle East

Dave Lindorff
Torture for Torturers?

William S. Lind
Running the Narrows in Iraq

Christopher Brauchli
Sweepstakes Politics

Website of the Day
History of Iraqi Art

July 15, 2008

Michael Hudson
Why the Bail Out of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae is Bad Economic Policy

Brian Cloughley
Iran's Missile Tests

Patrick Cockburn
Sadr's Militia May Live to Fight Another Day

John Ross
Crunchtime for Mexico's Oil

Howard Lisnoff
When Torture Was Practiced on U. S. Soil

Website of the Day
Rachel Corrie Soccer Tournament

July 14, 2008

Uri Avnery
Will Israel and / or the US Attack Iran?

Paul Craig Roberts
Enabling Tyranny

Trish Schuh
Talking to Iran's Only Jewish Member of Parliament: an Interview with Morris Motamed

Patrick Cockburn
Immunity in Iraq

Mike Whitney
Betancourt Unbound

Alan Farago
Will Miami's Cubans Vote Blue?

Seth Sandronsky
Taxing U. S. Stocks and Bonds

Phyllis Pollack
Stones Paint It Black

Website of the Day
Our Pal in Butte, Jackie Corr, RIP

July 12 / 13, 2008

Alexander Cockburn
Lock and Load--It's the Law!

Jeffrey St. Clair
The Origins of the Western Greens

James Abourezk
Talking World War III Blues: From Dylan to Iran

Nicole Colson
The Ethanol Scam

Stan Cox
Fixing a Broken Agriculture

Ismael Hossein-Zadeh
Is There an Oil Shortage?

Wajahat Ali /
Omid Safi
The Future of Iran: an Interview with Iranian Nobel Laureate Shirin Ebadi

John Stauber
There May be a Left, But is it Moving? An Interview with David Sirota

Alan Farago
The Crash of the King of Liquidity

Missy Beattie
Dark Neighborhoods

Robert Fantina
Bush's Last Yes Man: Canada, Guantanamo and Yankee Poodles

Rannie Amiri
Mubarak Hires the Mosque

Gregory Kafoury
After the Obama Betrayal

Fran Shor
The Audacity of Hype

Martha Rosenberg
Why Heifer International is Rolling in Dung

David Macaray
Will There be an Actors Strike?

Andrew Wimmer
No Lies! No War!

Ron Jacobs
They Call Me the Seeker

Farzana Versey
The Kashmir Chiaroscuro

Kim Nicolini
Angelina Jolie's Wanted: Taking the M-Fers Down with Guns and Exploding Rats

Poets' Basement
Wright, Fleming, Solomon and Birnbaum

Website of the Weekend
Parsing Jesse Ventura

July 11, 2008

Kevin Alexander Gray
Why Does Barack Obama Hate My Family?

Sasan Fayazmanesh
Historical Amnesia and the Shoot Down of Iran Air Flight 655

Peter Morici
Breaking Down the Trade Deficit

Mike Whitney
Worse Than McCain?

Manuel Garcia, Jr.
Oiling the War Machine

Robert Weissman
Crime, Punishment and ExxonMobil

Ramzy Baroud
The Not-So-Historic Barak-Talabani Handshake

Kelly Overton
If There is a Chimp Heaven

Adrian Burgos
In Praise of Jules Tygiel

Website of the Day
Wendell Berry on Mountaintop Removal

July 10, 2008

Brian McKenna
McCain's Melanoma Cover-Up

Paul Craig Roberts
Watching Greed Murder the Economy

Saul Landau
Mississippi River Blues

Ron Jacobs
Who Will Leave Iraq First?

Joshua Frank
Cutting Deals with Big Timber's Darth Vader

Peter Morici
What's Driving the Wall Street Rout

Alan Maass
Jesse Helms Finally Does the Right Thing

Robert Weissman
Humanitarian Failure at the G8

William Blum
Dr. Strangelove

Alan Farago
Coral Reef Meltdown

Website of the Day
Lieberman Must Go!

July 9, 2008

Ismael Hossein-Zadeh
Are They Really Oil Wars?

Luis Rodriguez
The Deadly Fallout from Gang Injunctions

Sheldon Richman
What's Wrong with Selling Your Vote?

Fatemeh Keshavarz
Lessons from Sa'di of Shiraz on"Enhanced Interrogation Techniques"

Chad Hanson
Blowing Smoke: Logging Industry Lies on Forest Fires and Climate Change

Sen. Russ Feingold
The Problems with the FISA Bill

Niranjan Ramakrishnan
Defining Deviancy Down with FISA

Dave Lindorff
Paul Krugman's Blind Spot

Stanley Heller
A Damned Good Assembly

Philip Rizk
Sick at the Gaza Crossing

Website of the Day
Mumia on Nader

July 8, 2008

Nikolas Kozloff
Riding the Colombia Gravy Train

Laura Carlsen
North America Doesn't Exist: the New Geography of Trade

Mike Whitney
Bush's Rampage in Somalia

Andy Worthington
Scandal at Diego Garcia

Patrick Irelan
The Empire Goes to the Movies

Chellis Glendinning
The Un-tied States of America

David Macaray
A Union Story

Dave Lindorff
Mumia's Long-Shot Appeal

John Chuckman
The Myths of Independence Day

Phillip Doe
FISA and the Decline of America

Website of the Day
Daniel Ellsberg on Warrantless Wiretap Bill

July 7, 2008

Patrick Bond
Can Reparations for Apartheid Profits be Won in US Courts?

Kathy Kelly
Cold Shoulders

Andy Worthington
Repatriation as Russian Roulette

Clifton Ross
A Rescue Staged for the Screen

Elizabeth Schulte
Obama's War Room

Ralph Nader
The Patriotism of Deeds

Dave Lindorff
Keeping Count

Binoy Kampmark
The World According to Jesse Helms

Stephen Fleischman
Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Change

Website of the Day
Time for a Change

July 5 / 6, 2008

Alexander Cockburn
Could Anyone be"Worse" Than Bush?

Jeffrey St. Clair /
Joshua Frank
Preliminary Notes from No Man's Land

Patrick Cockburn
Blowback from a Strike on Iran

Mike Whitney
Hunkering Down in Afghanistan with Field Marshall Obama

Robert Fantina
Obama, Iraq and Change

Binoy Kampmark
The Anwar Case: Snitching and Sodomizing

Rannie Amiri
Can Nasrallah Unite Lebanon?

Eric Ruder
Hidden Casualties

Brian Cloughley
Israel Flexes Its Muscles

William Blum
Some Thoughts on Patriotism

Frank Barat
The One-Word Solution

Christopher Brauchli
Bush's Phony Pollution Accounting

David Yearsley
Rubbert Shines, as US Envoy Puts Foot in His Mouth

Ron Jacobs
U. S. Blues

Karim Makdisi
On Soccer and Politics in Lebanon

Wendy Thompson /
Chris Kutalik
What Can We Learn from the American Axle Strike?

N. D. Jayaprakash
The NPT as a Roadblock to Disarmament

Ramzy Baroud
Journalistic Imperatives

Kelly Overton
Animal Rights and Obama

Richard Neville
Bitch Fights and Tomorrow's Top Model

Poets' Basement
Anderson, Gibbons, Matson and Buknatski

Website of the Weekend
Ginsberg and Cassady on"Extremists"

July 4, 2008

Kathy Kelly
Istiklal

Dave Lindorff
My War Story

Paul Krassner
Confessions of a Barista

Jackie Corr
In the Footsteps of Evel Knievel: Obama Heads Back to Butte

Laray Polk
Military-Industrial Convergence

Dan Bacher
Dead Runs: Salmon Fishing Banned in Central Valley Rivers

Walter Brasch
The Rocket's Red Glare--May be Chinese

Charles Modiano
Hall of Fame Hypocrisy

Website of the Day
Springsteen: Independence Day

July 3, 2008

Sharon Smith
Exxon's Legal Guardians

Andy Worthington
Another Torture Victim Gets Charged

Laura Carlsen
NAFTA and the Elephant in the Room

Peter Morici
Crisis Grips the Jobs Market

Ramzi Kysia
Breaking Into a Prison

Martha Rosenberg
Mandatory School Milk and the Early Death of Football Players

Anne Landman
Who Really Benefits From Voluntary Codes of Corporate Conduct?

Dave Zirin
Grand Theft Hoops

Kristin Bricker
US Contractor Leads Torture Training in Mexico

Website of the Day
Bush Tours America to Survey Damage from His Presidency

July 2, 2008

Patrick Irelan
Holy Obama

Vijay Prashad
Lunch with Karzai

Brian Cloughley
Sense of Honor, French and US Style

Ralph Nader
Economic Domino Theory

Robert Fantina
General Stupidity: McCain, Obama and Clark

Dave Lindorff
What's So Special About Veterans?

Parvez Ahmed
Obama and Those Pesky Muslim Rumors

Robert Bryce
The Democrats and Off-Shore Drilling

Website of the Day
King Corn: Q&A

July 1, 2008

Alexander Cockburn
Two Months Later, Seymour Hersh Strains to Catch Up With CounterPunch

Mike Whitney
Getting to the Heart of America's Economic Crisis: an Interview with Michael Hudson

Douglas Macgregor
Obama's General?

Steven Higgs
Fighting the NAFTA Super-Highway

Andy Worthington
Guantánamo as Alice in Wonderland

Binoy Kampmark
The Global Seed Police

Dave Lindorff
Blood Money Democrats

Roger Burbach
Fighting Food Fascism

Richard W. Behan
The Story Behind George Bush's Lies

Gary Leupp
The McCain Edge Among Voters on Iraq

Website of the Day
Mountaintop Removal and the Fight for Coalfield Justice

Weekend Edition
July 26 / 27, 2008

Stop Whining, It's All in Your Head!

Truth in Comedy

By SAUL LANDAU

Have mainstream politicians grown so out of synch with the needs of the people that only comedians address the issues? Traditionally, the court jester dared shine a satiric light on imperial problems. In our society, standup comics and “The Daily Show” and “The Colbert Report” under the guise of clowning get away with exposing corporate rip offs and self-serving government agencies. The mainstream media accept these thug operations as national axioms.

Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert don’t joke about tens of millions of people moaning, not whining, from pain of economic hardship. Because it’s not funny! They occasionally refer to the proverbial elephants in the American living room, which grow fatter and nastier. Who but a joker would dare denigrate the “celebrated” armed forces, just because they don’t win the wars that politicians manufacture? Or make fun of the “protectors” from Homeland Security? FEMA, part of the Security apparatus, played a cruel joke on the victims of Hurricane Katrina. Let’s not forget the “noble” drug warriors. One day in the very distant, as the comics know, they will surely make a dent in addiction rates. The military, “security” and drug baron, prime examples of imperial waste and idiocy, play the big joke on the public: each receives a humongous – or humorous—slice of the national budget.

If more than $800 billion annually goes to feed these unproductive monsters who metaphorically eat the country’s living room furniture and shit on its floor, how will needed infrastructure repairs take place, how will education, health and social services respond to the growing needs of the nation, now almost officially in recession? Such a question obviously makes my patriotism questionable. Or, I’m a crazed addict! A “Reagan revolution?” Did I hallucinate? Nostalgia oozes from those who remember him fondly. During his reign sleeping with the President meant attending a Cabinet Meeting.

Outside the denial addicted White House, income and manufacturing wages have fallen. In some 25 years, the bottom 40%’s share of national wealth dropped along with income of families living on pensions. Funny? US manufacturing jobs have dramatically decreased. Hilarious?

On the other side, Reaganomics also inspired growth. For example, the top 1% now “made” more money, and thus spurred the growth rate in the gap between rich and poor incomes. Foreign debt has risen as a percent of GDP. Thanks to Republican economics – supported by many Democrats – the number of hungry people and housing foreclosures have also risen. Jokes!

We’re still number 1 -- in the size of our armed forces, amount of nuclear weapons, unwanted pregnancies, percentage of people, especially minorities, in prison, and number of crystal methamphetamine labs. (See Sam Smith’s The Progressive Review July 14)

Barack Obama, satirized by the New Yorker cover as a terrorist, has yet to address issues of eroding infrastructure and causes of suffering. Has he turned into Zelig, as in the Woody Allen film by that title, the adaptable, opportunistic creep who morphs into those he meets? Trying to win elections – then they’ll “do something” –turns candidates into PR images to make them look “honest,” “tough,” and warm and avuncular at the same time.

Even Franklin Roosevelt in 1932 said almost anything to get votes. Those who speak their minds like John McCain’s economic guru, and arch representative of banking hanky panky, former Texas Senator Phil Gramm, should have done his shtick on one of the comedy shows. Poor rich Gramm, sentenced to pariah status -– “He doesn’t speak for me,” said McCain, disowning his economic mentor. Gramm voiced his and probably other multimillionaires’ thoughts about the millions of homeless, hungry, out of work and recently foreclosed people as “a nation of whiners” -- and probably dangerous as well.

Gramm’s speech patterns sound like the translation into words of the screech made by a piece of chalk working its way across a blackboard. May Gramm aspires to become a columnist for The Onion? “You just hear this constant whining, complaining about a loss of competitiveness, America in decline,” he said. “You’ve heard of mental depression; this is a mental recession.” Very funny! He also questioned the veracity of some poor people. “If they’re poor, how come they’re fat?” The Don Rickles of politics!

After stumping Michigan with his candidate, McCain, and seeing thousands of unemployed factory workers, he smirked. “Thank God the economy is not as bad as you read in the newspaper every day.” Optimistic millionaires like Gramm, whom McCain supported fully for President in 1996, dismiss such statistics. Michigan, once the country’s center of major industry, leads the nation in joblessness! Big deal that May unemployment rose 8.5%, up 2 points from April! The national average in May was already 5.5% and rising. And official figures don’t include people who have stopped looking for work, those who have just begun to look or are about to seek employment like “thousands of auto workers who are accepting buyout checks to drop off the payrolls of the companies that make autos or auto parts.”

Gramm and his ilk challenge PC behavior by continuing to buy SUVs. They scoff at “buy America” slogans. The want quality and US autos – and their sales—have gone South because foreign autos are better and production in Mexico is cheaper. “U.S. vehicle sales are expected to drop below 15 million this year. Three years ago, the industry sold 17 million cars and trucks.” (BW June 24 2008) “That’s free trade,” Gramm might say. “Live with it.” Perhaps GM, Ford and Chrysler will heed Obama’s “yes we can” chant.

Bring the mantra to Wall St. to tackle the financial slide? Tell police officers “yes we can” when they try to get the homeless and crazy people off the street, along with the addicted, depressed and recently “foreclosed.”

Respond with “Hope” when you read about soaring murder and violent crime rates in cities like Oakland, California, where the number of jornaleros on the street seems to rise as the number of available jobs diminish. Mock the growing number of people trying to augment their $300 “general assistance” checks by pushing shopping carts of cans and bottles to recycling centers.

The health care crisis has become truly hilarious. Surely there’s something funny about the poor having poor health and limited access to medical facilities. Do you get anxious about rising health care costs? The real joke is not one major candidate dares to offer the single payer option. They remember how the muscular health insurance companies pulled a fabulous gag on Bill and Hillary in 1993 and killed off all health care reform. Candidates understand humor. Single payer health plan? That’s a loser! Don’t go there!

Hey, readers might say, “Obama is much better than…” Of course, Democrats appoint better judges and heads of agencies, offer slightly more equitable tax structures and more spending on social issues. But they won’t touch the deep crises in health, education and infrastructure. They can’t spend what the Pentagon already spends. Everyone knows national priorities: waste money on the military first, social spending later. The Pentagon budget nears $600 billion, not counting nuclear weapons or “intelligence”—at a time when no nation threatens and demand for social spending becomes desperate.

George Carlin might have referred to the “celebrated military” as heroes who specialize in destroying, killing, and shattering the US reputation. Then, they send home the useless crippled young people and psychic wrecks. “Be all you can be and a lot less.” 

Since 1945, the fabled Armed Forces didn’t win in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq or Afghanistan. They do well when no one fights back – Grenada, Panama, and Gulf War I, a technological massacre.

What quicker way to piss away tens of billions than awarding it to the CIA and other lettered agencies whose combined work yielded no help before 9/11 and little afterward? Nothing succeeds like failure. Look at our President! Each year, spooks get fat budgets for failing, while failing schools cut bus services and academic schedules to four-day weeks. The National School Boards Association reports that “at least 86 school districts are on four-day weeks.” In 2005, Webster County, Kentucky, by cutting off one day, saved “the district more than $400,000 so far.” School busses in Ohio stopped picking up kids living less than 2 miles from school. (Gwen Purdom, USA Today July 14, 2008)

Barack might change the priorities. Fund education and health, repair the infrastructure and cut the military budget; scrapping the drug war and relocate a stripped down CIA to the Library of Congress. My bookie offered me 100 to one against it.

Saul Landau is an Institute for Policy Studies fellow, author of A BUSH AND BOTOX WORLD (A/K-Counterpunch). Dvds of his films from http://roundworldproductions.com

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