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Last Updated: Oct 30th, 2006 - 02:18:15 |
Commentary
Skilling: An epitaph
By Jerry Mazza
Jeffrey Skilling, 52,
former CEO of Enron, now faces 24 years plus four months in prison for fraud,
conspiracy and insider trading. This as a decade ago he transformed an unknown
pipeline company into an energy-trading tsunami, driven by the accounting
scheme he signed off on hiding huge debt and cash flow problems. And then the
wave hit the wall.
Oct 30, 2006, 01:02
Commentary
The politics of delusion and crisis denial
By Rodrigue Tremblay
On May 1, 2003, President George W. Bush stood on an
aircraft carrier off the coast near San Diego, California. In order to take
full advantage of the plethora of TV crews present (even the education network
PBS was there), his propaganda machine had erected a large sign behind him that
said "Mission Accomplished." Bush II had decided that the "major
combat operations in Iraq are over.'' The American politician had invaded
another country illegally, and used military force at
his own discretion, with the potential of hundreds of thousands of deaths,
and he was crowing about it. In fact, even though Bush did not realize it at
the time, Iraq could turn out to be to the United States what Afghanistan was
to the Soviet Union, from 1979 to
1988, i.e. a colossal failure.
Oct 30, 2006, 00:55
Commentary
American voters must not reward failure
By Ramzy Baroud
How critical is the
situation in Iraq? It depends on who you ask and when. Common sense tells us
that the situation there has always been critical. In fact, one could dare
claim that the country has been stricken with political and social upheaval
since the early 1990s, when the US led its �coalition of the willing� to
liberate Kuwait.
Oct 30, 2006, 00:49
Commentary
Foreclosure USA
By Joel S. Hirschhorn
We the people once owned our democracy. We elected
�representatives� to run it for US. Have you noticed that somewhere along the
way we lost our democracy?
Oct 27, 2006, 00:49
Commentary
Degradation of democracy
By Frank Scott
The usual low November turnout will see some driven to
vote by hysteria over a sex scandal, a kangaroo court decision on Saddam, or a
North Korean nuclear test. We're lucky that Kim Jong didn't send sexy emails to
teenagers, or Armageddon might have arrived even sooner than ruling fanatics
imagined.
Oct 27, 2006, 00:43
Commentary
Will Rogers delivers the Gettysburg Address
By Budd Saunders
I don't mind receiving mail from those who disagree
with me, but it would be nice if they had the strength of character to sign
their letters. The most recent started, "Like a babbling brook you make a
continuous noise, saying the same thing over and over but not making
sense." The writer then brings up the usual tired accusation: blaming
Clinton for everything corrupt Repubs got caught doing. These accusations are
offered whenever the Repubs get caught with their turpitudes hanging out and
dragging them down from their self-described "moral high ground."
Oct 27, 2006, 00:41
Commentary
Chickenhawks in chief
By Ashu M. G. Solo
President George W. Bush�s military record is a
shameful display of draft evasion, criminal conduct, and eventually desertion
while using his father�s connections to unethically gain advantage over other
people and escape criminal prosecution. Vice President Dick Cheney used every
trick he could to evade the draft and military service altogether. Their
evasion of service has significant ramifications in their execution of the Iraq
War. Americans should demand more in their president and vice president.
Oct 26, 2006, 00:55
Commentary
Charnel house
By Mike Whitney
There are three
things wrong with the current policy in Iraq: Occupation, occupation and
occupation.
Oct 26, 2006, 00:51
Commentary
Selling Satan: Iraqi war dead and the collateral damage to America's soul
By Phil Rockstroh
All human beings have a talent for the denial of
the more unpalatable aspects of ourselves, but we Americans have turned denial
into a form of collective genius. There is no need to burn books, if the public
is too ignorant to know they exist -- or too benumbed to resonate with their content.
Oct 26, 2006, 00:46
Commentary
What arrogance and stupidity?
By Linda S. Heard
What could US State
Department official Alberto Fernandez possibly have meant when he blamed his
own government for "arrogance" and "stupidity" in Iraq? The
White House is so overcome with disbelief that its spokesmen are claiming
Fernandez's words were lost in translation as he was, after all, speaking in
Arabic for the benefit of Al Jazeera's viewers.
Oct 25, 2006, 00:34
Commentary
Hitchens hitches his future to the Death Star
By Jerry Mazza
Ian Parker�s recent New Yorker Profile of Christopher
Hitchens, �He Knew He Was Right,� aptly subtitled �How a former socialist
became the Iraq war�s fiercest defender� is the fastidiously told tale of
Christopher Hitchens hitching himself to the Death Star of the administration
and its preemptive, unilateral, war on Iraq. May the force wake him up!
Oct 25, 2006, 00:27
Commentary
Political prestidigitation: The Illusion of a two-party system
By Ben Tanosborn
There appears to be a
political pearl of wisdom, one of considerable luster, adorning the forthcoming
election. Something like: �If after the non-stop self-flagellation, led by
their Dodo-In-Chief, the inept Republicans don�t lose control of Congress -- at
the very least the House -- then, the wimpy Democrats, after being comatose for
12 years, will be formally declared a party brain-dead.�
Oct 25, 2006, 00:21
Commentary
The woman who would be speaker says, "Impeachment is off the table"
By Bev Conover
How does Rep. Nancy Pelosi, who may become Speaker of
the House of Representatives if the Democrats win control on Nov. 7, propose
the US regain any standing in the world, much less any honor, if George W. Bush
and his whole administration are allowed to skate on their criminality?
Oct 24, 2006, 01:02
Commentary
Putin gets mugged in Finland
By Mike Whitney
Most people didn't
pay any attention to last week�s energy summit in Lahti, Finland, but they
should have. It was particularly instructive for anyone who is interested in
the latest developments in the global resource war.
Oct 24, 2006, 00:51
Commentary
Israel, Palestine and Canada
By John Chuckman
Canada's 30 Percent
Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, just made a speech at a B'nai Brith banquet.
Normally, there would be nothing notable in this, but his words this time
reinforced controversial statements he made while Israel savagely bombed
Lebanon. He also continued driving an ugly new Republican-style wedge into
Canada's national politics after calling Liberal leadership candidates
"anti-Israel."
Oct 24, 2006, 00:49
Commentary
Godzilla vs. the Condoleezzard (Celebrating Halloween in the United States of Anxiety)
By Mickey Z.
Halloween is an odd
holiday. The ostensible concept, as it has evolved to become, is to shock,
startle, frighten, petrify, horrify, and/or terrify . . . all while consuming
enough high fructose corn syrup to keep the American Dental Association content
for another century or two.
Oct 24, 2006, 00:46
Commentary
America is no longer free
By Paul Lehto
Habeas corpus
-- it's your most fundamental legal
right, your right to go to a court and get an order requiring the
government to
prove that it is holding you in prison with proper legal authority to
do so.
Without that right, one necessarily lives in a dictatorship. President
Bush on Tuesday, October 17, 2006, signed a bill repealing that law,
meaning that the
administration need not comply or show compliance with law any more
with regard
to who goes to prison or Gitmo.
Oct 23, 2006, 00:54
Commentary
The nuclear arms race and national sovereignty
By Rodrigue Tremblay
Are we moving towards a lawless world in which only
countries with second-strike nuclear capability will have real national
sovereignty? Some countries seem to think that the only way a country can be
protected from the actions of international (nuclear) bullies is to acquire the
deterrence
that having nuclear weapons offers.
Oct 23, 2006, 00:44
Commentary
One crime too many
By Mike Whitney
Iraq is the great
tragedy of our generation. Every day men and women are brazenly killed in their
own homes or cities by foreign troops who occupy the country without justification.
Oct 23, 2006, 00:40
Commentary
Iraq's Orwellian calamity
By Abbas J. Ali
Whether one views the recently reported Iraqi
death count statistics (650,000 dead) as shocking or predictable, the fact
remains that the unfolding events are indeed dark. For those who are intimately
familiar with the neoconservatives� design for Iraq and the region, the scope
of the Iraqi deaths and the depth of inflicted tragedies are just an early
outcome of the initial implementation of a well-orchestrated plan. What might
come, in latter stages, could be even more distressing.
Oct 19, 2006, 00:40
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