New York Times photo from UCLA 

Over the last several days, the battle in California has escalated over the “budget crisis” and the massive cuts, layoffs, and fee increases in the university system - the largest university system in the world. At UCLA, over a thousand studen… Read full post »

Attorney General Eric Holder, on Wednesday, November 18, 2009 in testimony before the US Senate:

“At the end of the day, it was clear to me that the venue in which we are most likely to obtain justice for the American people is in federal court. By bringing prosecutions in… Read full post »

On Meet the Press the Sunday after 9/11, Vice-President Cheney famously stated:

“We also have to work, though, sort of the dark side, if you will. We’ve got to spend time in the shadows in the intelligence world. A lot of what needs to be done here will have to be done… Read full post »

Note: As those of us know who have been watching with increasing alarm the repressive, inflamed, violent, and fascistic atmosphere that was whipped up during the unlawful tenure of Bush in the White House, and that has escalated since Obama's taking the presidency, emanating from the/… Read full post »

In a breaking story that only CNN in US media appears to be carrying at this point, but numerous other foreign news services such as BBC are carrying: an Italian court has found twenty-two Americans guilty of kidnapping and torture of a cleric. 

CBC News today, November 4, 2009, is/… Read full post »

A powerful and moving story from Consortium News that everyone should read, told by the former British Ambassador to Uzbekistan, who, upon learning of the torture being carried out there on behalf of the CIA, felt impelled to speak out. As a result, his career was ruined.

As Max Weber, the exper/… Read full post »

[This is a slightly edited version of a talk I gave at a Fundraiser for Iraqi Orphans held on October 17, 2009 in Costa Mesa.]

I want to thank the organizers of this important event. [Sound of plane rumbling overhead]. When I fly out of and back into LA, I… Read full post »

"Wedding Party Anti-War Action at Grand Central Station, October 7, 2009.

(Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images)

More photos such as these from the Wall Street Journal here. 

By Dennis Loo 

October 6, 2009

consortiumnews.com 

Editor’s Note: At the… Read full post »

Bombs and troops?  Or righteous resistance? 

Stephanie Smith, Photo by Ben Garvin, NY Times 

Mad Cow Disease isn’t the only problem.

In the Sunday October 4, 2009 New York Times, a horror story about hazardous hamburger is told by Michael Moss in “Trail of E. Coli Shows Flaws in Inspection of Ground Beef.&… Read full post »

The United States Must Withdraw from Afghanistan 

By Kenneth J. Theisen

Thursday October 01, 2009 

Berkeley Daily Planet 

On Oct. 7, 2001 the United States. launched a war of terror against Afghanistan. U.S. leaders are still debating how best to achi… Read full post »

On Wednesday the Justice Department announced Obama's plans for continuing indefinite detentions of individuals deemed “dangerous” by the government. Note that this is a designation rather than an adjudicated fact because those who are being indefinitely detained in this way are… Read full post »

In the September 19, 2009 Washington Post we learn that the DOJ’s investigation of torture by US personnel will be even narrower than originally proposed by Eric Holder.

“The Justice Department's review of detainee abuse by the CIA will focus on a very small number of cases, inc… Read full post »

 By Debra Sweet (first posted at World Can't Wait)

Muntader al-Zaidi, who spent nine months in jail for hurling his shoes at President George W. Bush – and instantly became a hero to people throughout the world - was released from prison recently, and ad/… Read full post »

The notion that the people get the leaders (and system) they deserve is a common, oft-repeated one. It’s really a restatement of what some scholars call the democracy-at-work thesis: the people collectively and democratically decide who will lead them. Hence, the leaders at any given point in t… Read full post »

CNN Reports today, September 5, 2009: 

"Could George W. Bush or some of his top aides end up behind bars?

"George W. Bush could be investigated for the steps taken after 9/11. It's extremely unlikely, but the Obama administration is taking its first steps along a path that could lead… Read full post »

 Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times / August 29, 2009 

The sign for infinity in the Station Fire in L.A.

We hope that the fires won't last quite that long.  

Update:

From the Pasadena Star-News:

“Unauthorized, improvised, inhumane, and undocumented”

Says the Inspector General’s Report

“Unauthorized, improvised, inhumane, and undocumented”

“Unauthorized?”

Not!

The acts described in the IG report

We… Read full post »

If Holder and Obama succeed in confining the investigation and prosecution to only those who “went beyond” the stated policies for torture under the Bush Regime, then under the signboard of opposing torture, they will have further legitimated and institutionalized the crimes aga/… Read full post »

"Barack Obama ran the best-organized and best-framed presidential campaign in history. How is it possible that the same people who did so well in the campaign have done so badly on health care?"

So asks George Lakoff in today's Truthout.org article: "The Policy-Speak Disaster for Health Care."&n… Read full post »

Expanded (8/18/09):

The Town Hall brawls are the latest, and some of the most dramatic evidence, of the fascist remaking of the U.S. (For more documentation on this see the addendum herein). 

Previously sacrosanct arenas have been invaded and bright lines crossed: an assassin… Read full post »

In today’s New York Times (August 13, 2009), Paul Krugman (“Republican Death Trip”) writes about the brawl over health care:

“[Quoting Obama] ’I am in this race because I don’t want to see us spend the next year re-fighting the Washington battles of the 1990s. I… Read full post »

By now we have nearly all heard about the raucous town hall meetings over health care. In today's Washington Post (August 11, 2009), for example, Sen. Arlen Specter, meeting with the public in a Lebanon, Pennsylvania town hall meeting, reproducing a similar scene that greeted him&nbs… Read full post »