Tara's Blog – September 2009 Archive (33)

Who Is Recovering? Has The Economy Been Pulled Back From The Brink? Obama's Speech Raises Issues He Doesn't Really Address

by Danny Schechter

President Obama’s highly anticipated health care speech started on a totally different subject: The economy.

“When I spoke here last winter, this nation was facing the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, he told Congress and the peole at home. “We were losing an average of 700,000 jobs per month. Credit was frozen. And our financial system was on the verge of collapse.”

But,” he went on, “thanks to the bold and decisive action we… Continue

Added by Tara on September 12, 2009 at 11:57am — 2 Comments

Rolling the Dice Again

by Ralph Nader

The Wall Street gang is at it again! It's been one year since Wall Street's collapse and bailout took trillions from taxpayers and the sinking economy. The speculative instruments that pulled down the economy were those super-risky sub-prime mortgages, credit default swaps, collaterized debt obligations-you know-Las Vegas East, using other peoples' savings.

As if to elaborate their gigantic con job, the investment banks, guaranteed by you the taxpayers, are… Continue

Added by Tara on September 12, 2009 at 11:31am — No Comments

Militarizing Latin America, The "drug war"—like the "war on crime" and "the war on terror"—is pursued for reasons other than the announced goals

By Noam Chomsky

The United States was founded as an “infant empire,” in the words of George Washington. The conquest of the national territory was a grand imperial venture. From the earliest days, control over the hemisphere was a critical goal.

Latin America has retained its primacy in U.S. global planning. If the United States cannot control Latin America, it cannot expect “to achieve a successful order elsewhere in the world,” observed President Richard M. Nixon’s… Continue

Added by Tara on September 11, 2009 at 9:09am — 1 Comment

9 Sept. 2009: B'Tselem publishes complete fatality figures from Operation Cast Lead

Today (Wed. Sept 9th) Israeli human rights group B'Tselem published its findings on the number of Palestinians and Israelis killed in Operation Cast Lead in the Gaza Strip. According to B’Tselem’s research, Israeli security forces killed 1,387 Palestinians during the course of the three-week operation. Of these, 773 did not take part in the hostilities, including 320 minors and 109 women over the age of 18. Of those killed, 330 took part in the hostilities, and 248 were Palestinian police… Continue

Added by Tara on September 11, 2009 at 1:08am — No Comments

Rep. Ron Paul’s Response to President Obama’s Speech on Larry King

by: Allison Bricker

WASHINGTON D.C. – Texas’ 14th Congressional Representative, Dr. Ron Paul appeared on CNN’s “Larry King Live” shortly after the conclusion of President Obama’s health care speech before a joint-session of Congress. Dr. Paul offers his opinion on whether or not the President changed his mind regarding government intervention into the economy as an effective path to reforming the ever-escalating cost of health insurance premiums.

Mr. King also solicits the… Continue

Added by Tara on September 10, 2009 at 12:41pm — No Comments

Israeli Ads Warn Against Marrying Non-Jews, "Lost" American Youth Urged to Come to Israel

By JONATHAN COOK

Nazareth

The Israeli government has launched a television and internet advertising campaign urging Israelis to inform on Jewish friends and relatives abroad who may be in danger of marrying non-Jews.

The advertisements, employing what the Israeli media described as “scare tactics”, are designed to stop assimilation through intermarriage among young diaspora Jews by encouraging their move to Israel.

The campaign, which cost $800,000,… Continue

Added by Tara on September 9, 2009 at 9:27am — 1 Comment

Israel's laws of persecution, Israel is using the country's legal system to segregate and penalise its Palestinian citizens and prohibit Arab dissent

Two cases brought before Israeli courts last week revealed the attitude of the establishment towards Palestinian Arab citizens of the state. One shows how Palestinian citizens are treated as victims of police brutality, and the second shows how they are regularly victimised because of their opposition to injustice.

In the first, a policeman who shot and killed an Arab citizen in 2006 was sentenced to 15 months imprisonment. The unbearable leniency of the sentence is more evidence of… Continue

Added by Tara on September 8, 2009 at 11:44pm — No Comments

Ugly war should not be sanitised

By Linda S. Heard, Special to Gulf News

Published: September 07, 2009, 23:06

War is dirty, bloody and indiscriminate. It is nothing more than officially sanctioned murder perpetrated as part of a strategic end game. There is nothing uplifting about man's attempts to burn, dismember or torture his fellow kind. Can there be bravery in pressing a button at 30,000 feet in the foreknowledge that innocents - politely deemed 'collateral damage' - will die? Can the… Continue

Added by Tara on September 7, 2009 at 11:37pm — No Comments

The Arctic Sea cargo ship that disappeared for almost a month earlier this summer, was carrying weapons to Iran and was being tracked by Mossad, the Israeli security service, according to reports

Arctic Sea ghost ship 'was carrying weapons to Iran'

Mystery has surrounded the ship, officially carrying a cargo of timber worth £1.3 million from Finland to Algeria, since its crew first reported a boarding in Swedish waters on July 24 after a raid by 10 armed English-speaking men posing as anti-narcotics police officers.

It was eventually recovered off the coast of west Africa on August 17. Russia has since charged eight men from Estonia, Latvia and Russia with… Continue

Added by Tara on September 7, 2009 at 12:36pm — 2 Comments

Forced Catheterization Used In DUI Case, Still Below the Legal Limit, Charged With Obstruction

LAWRENCEBURG, Ind. -- An Indiana man has filed a lawsuit claiming that police forcibly withdrew blood and urine from his body during a drunken driving arrest, WLWT-TV reported.

According to the suit, police arrested Jamie Lockard, 53, on suspicion of drunken driving in March.

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Added by Tara on September 4, 2009 at 4:59pm — 1 Comment

CIA doctors face human experimentation claims, Medical ethics group says physicians monitored 'enhanced interrogation techniques' and studied their effectiveness

Doctors and psychologists the CIA employed to monitor its "enhanced interrogation" of terror suspects came close to, and may even have committed, unlawful human experimentation, a medical ethics watchdog has alleged.

Physicians for Human Rights (PHR), a not-for-profit group that has investigated the role of medical personnel in alleged incidents of torture at Guantánamo, Abu Ghraib, Bagram and other US detention sites, accuses doctors of being far more involved than hitherto… Continue

Added by Tara on September 3, 2009 at 9:10am — No Comments

Poll: US Opposition to Afghan War Continues to Rise, 57 Percent Now Oppose War's Continuation

by Jason Ditz, September 01, 2009

Another poll released today by CNN and Opinion Research Corporation (PDF) showed opposition to the war in Afghanistan continues to rise among Americans. Last month’s release of the same poll pointed to 54% of Americans against the war, and the number has now risen to 57%.

In spite of the opposition to the war, a majority of Americans (59%) believe that the war is still winnable, though apparently many feel the cost of the hypothetical… Continue

Added by Tara on September 2, 2009 at 12:46pm — No Comments

Go to Pittsburgh, Young Man, and Defy Your Empire

By Chris Hedges

Globalization and unfettered capitalism have been swept into the history books along with the open-market theory of the 1920s, the experiments of fascism, communism and the New Deal. It is time for a new economic and political paradigm. It is time for a new language to address our reality. The voices of change, those who speak in powerful and yet unfamiliar words, will cry out Sept. 25 and 26 in Pittsburgh when protesters from around the country gather to defy the… Continue

Added by Tara on September 1, 2009 at 11:30am — No Comments