Why America should listen to Ahmadinejad

The Iranian president makes more sense than Bush, McCain or Obama.

Paulson bailout plan: socialism for the rich, free market for the rest

The draft Iraqi oil law: making a mockery of sovereignty

President Bush says the Iraq war is not about oil but his actions belie that claim. In the months before the March 2003 invasion, members of the U.S. State Department "Oil and Energy Working Group" met to plan how to open Iraq to international oil companies. The oil law now proposed by the Iraqi Council of Ministers is a virtual photocopy of a plan first drafted by U.S. oil industry executives and consultants in Houston long before Iraq was "liberated." . . .

The proposed oil law creates a Federal Oil and Gas Council on which would sit representatives of Exxon-Mobil, Shell, BP, etc., whose tasks include approving their own contracts.

The new scramble for Africa: Darfur deception

NEW BOOK: '9/11 Unveiled'

A challenge to those who dismiss alternative explanations of 9/11 as 'conspiracy theories'

Shortly after September 11, 2001, as I looked down on the Pentagon from a nearby hill, the first question I asked was, "Where's the plane?"

Over the next few years I was to learn that: Bin Laden is NOT wanted by the FBI for 9/11; contrary to popular reports, the FBI claims only two cell phone calls were made from all four planes responsible for the September 11 attacks; the Executive Director of the 9/11 Commission, and the principal author of the the 9/11 Commission Report had by March 2003, with the Commission's staff barely in place, prepared a detailed outline, complete with "chapter headings, subheadings, and sub-subheadings" of The 9/11 Commission Report; and this Executive Director of the 9/11 Commission -- a Commission vigorously opposed by the White House — also drafted the Bush administrations pre-emptive war doctrine.

"9/11 Unveiled" is unique in that it reduces the many, and complex reports of what happened on September 11 to short, easily read sections while placing them in historical and political context.

The facts presented in "9/11 Unveiled" will cause thinking people to question the official explanation of 9/11, and to ask why our "free press" has, uncritically, accepted the official explanation.

International poll: no consensus on who was behind 9/11

A new WorldPublicOpinion.org — A project managed by the Program on International Policy Attitudes at the University of Maryland — poll of 17 nations finds that majorities in only nine of them believe that al Qaeda was behind the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the United States.

In no country does a majority agree on another possible perpetrator, but in most countries significant minorities cite the US government itself and, in a few countries, Israel. These responses were given spontaneously to an open-ended question that did not offer response options.

September 11 seven years later — the human perspective

Less than 3.000 people were killed on that day. It was a horrific and an unspeakable tragedy for the victims and their loved ones. Bu - numerically speaking - it's a small event in today's ocean of violence against other people, other cultures and Nature. According to trustworthy statistics, the global injustice system kills about 100.000 people per day; that is thirty 9/11s per day that we could decide to prevent - if we fought a war on injustice and mal-development.

The data for losses of civilian and military lives in both Iraq and Afghanistan are disputed. But estimates of the deaths due to sanctions against Iraq are around 1 million people; some add 600.000 during the war and there are more than 4 mllion out of a population of 25 million who have left their homes.

In the U.S. alone, about 30.000 are killed annually, Americans killing other Americans and roughly 300.000 die of obesity.

Filmmaker urges international tribunal to probe 9/11

Italian film-maker Giulietto Chiesa, who was in Berlin for a screening of his documentary which questions the official US version of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, has called for an international tribunal to probe events. . . .

Chiesa, one of Italy's most respected journalists and a La Stampa foreign correspondent for more than 20 years, told his Berlin audience an 9/11 international tribunal could serve a useful purpose.

Was America attacked by Muslims on 9/11?

Much of America's foreign policy since 9/11 has been based on the assumption that it was attacked by Muslims on that day. This assumption was used, most prominently, to justify the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. It is now widely agreed that the use of 9/11 as a basis for attacking Iraq was illegitimate: none of the hijackers were Iraqis, there was no working relation between Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden, and Iraq was not behind the anthrax attacks. But it is still widely believed that the US attack on Afghanistan was justified. For example, the New York Times, while referring to the US attack on Iraq as a "war of choice," calls the battle in Afghanistan a "war of necessity." Time magazine has dubbed it "the right war." And Barack Obama says that one reason to wind down our involvement in Iraq is to have the troops and resources to "go after the people in Afghanistan who actually attacked us on 9/11." . . .

Is it conceivable that this assumption might be false? Insofar as Americans and Canadians would say "No," they would express their belief that this assumption is not merely an "assumption" but is instead based on strong evidence. When actually examined, however, the proffered evidence turns out to be remarkably weak. . . .

Experts to debate 9-11 on Russian TV on Friday, September 12

Leading 9/11 experts have completed taping a television debate which will be telecast on Russian state television this coming Friday, September 12.

In India, outcry over U.S. letter

A day after a secret letter from the U.S. State Department to Congress about the controversial nuclear energy deal with India was made public, Indian opposition figures cried foul, accusing Prime Minister Manmohan Singh of willfully misleading the nation about restrictive aspects of the deal.

Republican jitters over Palin

A fast trickle of details have been coming to light that are worrying the Republicans . . .

These include news that Todd Palin belonged to the radical Alaska Nationalist Party, that the Governor hired a lawyer to defend her in an ethics inquiry ordered by the state legislature and that, as mayor of Wasilla, she hired a lobbyist in Washington to steer so-called "earmarks"—gifts of federal money—to her town, a practice especially favoured by Alaskans that has been derided by Mr McCain.

John McCain and the Telecoms

It’s no secret that John McCain has been a longtime friend of the telecom industry. Indeed, the Arizona Senator has had important historic ties to big corporations like AT&T, MCI and Qualcomm. In return for their financial contributions, McCain, who partly oversees the telecommunication industry in the Senate, has acted to protect and look out for the political and economic interests of the telecoms on Capitol Hill.

Why Iraqi 'client' blocked US long-term presence

Maliki declared Aug. 25 that the U.S. had agreed that "no foreign soldiers will be in Iraq after 2011." A Shi'ite legislator and Maliki ally, Ali al-Adeeb, told the Washington Post that only the Iraqi government had the authority under the agreement to decide whether conditions were conducive to a complete withdrawal. He added that the Iraqi government "could ask the Americans to withdraw before 2011 if we wish."

A secondary role for U.S. in India's nuclear future

France and Russia "come at the head of the queue for business contracts from the nuclear deal now," Das said. "But let us not forget it is a very, very long line behind. And Americans and others are the long line behind."

Live, from Golden, Colo., it's Al-Jazeera

Zionist nationalist myth of enforced exile

An Israeli historian suggests the diaspora was the consequence, not of the expulsion of the Hebrews from Palestine, but of proselytising across north Africa, southern Europe and the Middle East

US arms to India extend NATO ties

The Government unveiled India’s new defence procurement policy on the same day that the nuclear deal with the United States sailed through the International Atomic Energy Agency. The policy throws wide open the field for “private players” from abroad. . . .

The deal provides the political-strategic ambience for the US President to selectively effect waivers on the embargo of transfer of military technology to India. Large scale US participation in the great Indian arms bazaar — reputed to be gearing up for business worth $40 billion — now becomes possible. . . .

Commercial considerations apart, it ensures “interoperability” between the US and Indian armed forces and, in turn, facilitates Indian participation in the operations under the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation [NATO].

Muslim charities negotiate a minefield

In the months following the terrorist attacks of Sep. 11, 2001, the US government launched its "global war on terror" by rounding up thousands of "Middle Eastern-looking" men and women, jailing them without charges or access to lawyers, but accusing none of them of terror-related crimes, convicting no one, and ending up deporting some for non-criminal immigration violations.

At about the same time, the government opened up a second front against charitable organizations it suspected of providing financial or other material assistance to groups the government designates as "terrorist." While the campaign applies to all domestic nonprofit organizations, the lion's share of scrutiny, suspicion, and preemptive action has fallen on groups that support Muslim causes.