Reading

Created
Tue, 12/12/2023 - 04:57
Some years ago I reached the conclusion, reluctantly, that there was no longer a realistic prospect of achieving a two state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Since the 1930s, among outsiders, two state solution proposals have been relatively logical, intellectually neat and tidy, morally defensible, politically appealing notions that appear to present answers to the Continue reading »
Created
Tue, 12/12/2023 - 04:56
This is a direct quote from a banner that was paraded in Tel Aviv in 2016 in support of the Israeli soldier, Elor Azaria who shot, at point blank range, a Palestinian teenager, Abdel Fattah al-Sharif two years earlier. No matter how many Palestinians the Israeli Occupation Forces kill, the cry will always be ‘Kill Continue reading »
Created
Tue, 12/12/2023 - 04:55
On the eve of International Human Rights Day when invited to support the existing international rules-based order the United States’ leadership failed. Not only did their veto prevent a cease-fire in Gaza, but this powerful nation could not even offer an alternative path to protect humanity. Does the United Nations matter to the Australian Government? Continue reading »
Created
Tue, 12/12/2023 - 04:54
There is never a bottom to Labor ministerial cowardice and incompetence when manipulated mob fury is at its height. On immigration policy, Labor has surrendered, and is dancing to Dutton’s tune. Labor has won one federal election from opposition, and almost another, by bowing to a coalition narrative about the menace of refugee boat people Continue reading »
Created
Tue, 12/12/2023 - 04:52
There is a clear need to explain to outsiders what is going on in the Jewish community in Australia. There is all-too-common assumption that there is one Jewish voice on this tragedy and this is something projected by the ‘official’ organisations. In fact, the published views of people such as Louise Adler or Jenna Price Continue reading »
Created
Tue, 12/12/2023 - 04:51
A recent submission to a Senate inquiry by the Centre for Public Integrity claimed that in the decade to 2023 companies making political donations “were 2.49 times more likely to win procurement contracts than non-donors”, and that the value of contracts won by donor companies was on average 4.4 times the value of contracts won Continue reading »
Created
Tue, 12/12/2023 - 04:50
The Biden administration has spent most of its diplomatic energy since the February 24, 2022, [on the] Russian invasion of Ukraine marshalling the world to punish the Russian Federation, to boycott its petroleum and gas, to seize assets even of private citizens in Europe and North America, and to make Russia a pariah. Russia certainly Continue reading »
Created
Tue, 12/12/2023 - 04:47

A massacre of protesters during the 2014 Maidan coup set the stage for the ouster of Ukraine’s elected president, Viktor Yanukovych. Now, an explosive trial in Kiev has produced evidence the killings were a false flag designed to trigger regime change. Two police officers charged with the mass shooting of opposition protesters in Kiev’s Maidan Square in 2014 have been released after a Ukrainian court determined the fatal shots in the infamous massacre were fired from an opposition-controlled building. On […]

The post Ukrainian trial demonstrates 2014 Maidan massacre was false flag  first appeared on The Grayzone.

The post Ukrainian trial demonstrates 2014 Maidan massacre was false flag  appeared first on The Grayzone.

Created
Tue, 12/12/2023 - 04:42

My journey with Benjamin Zephaniah began in the vibrant cauldron of ideologies that was Handsworth in the mid-1980s. As a member of the Sheffield Asian Youth Movement, I found myself immersed in the Black revolutionary politics that defined this hub, attracting artists, activists, and academics. It was here that I first encountered the magnetic presence […]

Created
Tue, 12/12/2023 - 04:00
The media finally caught on to his plans U.S. Presidents have been accused by their political rivals of wanting to be kings or dictators ever since the very beginning of the Republic. It’s even a charge that’s had some merit from time to time. In 1800 Thomas Jefferson charged John Adams with acting like a king when he expanded federal power and passed the Alien and Sedition Acts, which basically made it a crime to criticize the government. But Adams lost his re-election and gracefully conceded, establishing the tradition of the peaceful transfer of power that until very recently was observed by every president. Then there was Andrew Jackson whom his critics assailed as a would-be king for wielding his veto pen for political purposes and challenging the primacy of the Supreme Court to decide constitutional matters, among other things. But he too left peacefully after eight years. Abraham Lincoln was repeatedly accused of being a dictator during the Civil War for implementing numerous extreme measures including the suspension of habeas corpus and the jailing of journalists.
Created
Tue, 12/12/2023 - 03:00

To help celebrate our twenty-fifth year of being on the information superhighway, we have reached out to some of our former columnists for check-ins and updates. Today’s columnist, Ali Fitzgerald, won our Column Contest in 2013 with her comic “Hungover Bear and Friends,” which ran on our site for over three years. We’re happy to have Ali back with a brand-new installment.

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Created
Tue, 12/12/2023 - 02:30
Anything but “violent insurrection” Let’s begin with this clip from “The Daily Show”: The clip illustrates how the GOP is dedicated heart and soul(?) to fitting its square-peg worldview into an other-shaped hole. Speaker Mike Johnson, Brian Beutler offers, is dispersing “unreleased Capitol security footage from January 6 (to help pro-Trump propagandists lie about the insurrection) but not before he blurs the faces of the rioters (because the raw footage would make it easier for these lawless, often violent Trump supporters to face justice).” Johnson wants to both protect MAGA footsoldiers while aiding the right’s efforts to rewrite the history we saw with our very lyin’ eyes. That’s a rather delicate maneuver (subscription req’d): [I]t’s a policy manifestation of the MAGA code, wherein January 6 can be anything BUT a violent insurrection orchestrated and encouraged by Donald Trump. It can be Antifa, or a false flag, or tourism, or a Patriotic Protest or any combination thereof. But not what it actually was. Call if Big Lie 2 Electric Boogaloo.
Created
Tue, 12/12/2023 - 01:32
The Immigration Exemption to data protection is STILL unlawful as Courts tell Home Office again that they cannot sidestep Parliament when using personal data to profile migrants. The Court of Appeal found today that the Immigration Exemption in the Data Protection Act 2018 is unlawful. The Home Office uses the exemption to deny migrants access […]
Created
Tue, 12/12/2023 - 01:30
Russia Is An Imperial State While America Is A Plutocratic Oligarchy

An oligarchy, as we use the word today (the dictionary definition is different) is rule by the rich, because they are rich. (A feudal king may be rich, but his power is not primarily a result of his wealth, but rather his wealth is primarily a result of his power.)

As I have written a number of times before, Russia is NOT a plutocratic oligarchy. America, on the other hand, is. What wealthy American elites want is what they get, and what ordinary people want they don’t get: this was shown clearly by the Princeton Oligarchy Study.

When Putin took control of Russia he broke the oligarchs.

Created
Tue, 12/12/2023 - 01:00
Economic theory vs. economic reality Reaganism was the Grinch that stole Christmases for decades. The rich got the elevator and the rest got the shaft. The chart above from Forbes is illustrative (although out of date). George Packer reflects on several books on the era for The Atlantic. One, “Ours Was the Shining Future: The Story of the American Dream” by David Leonhardt of the New York Times I finished recently. It examines the economic and working class realignment away from Democrats since the early 1970s. Leonhardt notes the red-shift, and that Reaganism was part of it, but sees broader trends. A more technocractic turn among Democrats took their focus off the working class and neoliberal economics ascendant under Reagan undermined labor. Leonhardt “shows that the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act, which liberal politicians sold as nondiscriminatory but still restrictive, opened the gates to mass immigration. The result put downward pressure on wages at the lower end of the economy.