Articles by M
We found 36562 results.
Zupta Scandal Causes South African Government to Intervene to Save Indian Investor
Richard Smallteacher | CorpWatch – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 May 2016
The South African government has intervened to support the Indian-born Gupta brothers, owners of a sprawling conglomerate with interests from mining to media, following a scandal that suggested that the brothers had accumulated so much power that they could dictate cabinet-level decisions in the country.
→ read full article(Português) Descoberta uma Rede de Túneis com 12 Mil Anos Que Cruza Toda a Europa
Muito Fixe – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 May 2016
6 fev 2016 – Datadas de há mais de 12 mil anos, estas passagens subterrâneas ainda permanecem um verdadeiro mistério. Quem as construiu? Para quê? Como foi possível?
→ read full articleOnshore Tax Havens: American Elites Don’t Have to Go to Panama to Hide Their Money — They Can Go to Delaware
Josh Hoxie | Other Words – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 May 2016
Who needs offshore tax havens in Panama? Nearly 300,000 corporations — including some owned by Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton — are incorporated at a single Delaware address.
→ read full articleThe Chernobyl Secret Protocols: Lies in the Aftermath of Disaster
Alla Yaroshinskaya | The Right Livelihood Award Foundation - TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 May 2016
In my journalistic archives there are mountains of classified Chernobyl documents from the USSR Communist Party and Soviet government. The price paid for these archives is tens of thousands of dead emergency responders and other victims of the fallout, as well as nine million people who lost their health and quality of life and are still surviving in the affected areas.
→ read full article(Français) The Economist met en garde : “les profits sont bien trop élevés!”
Marc Vandepitte | Investig’Action – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 May 2016
Ce n’est pas nous, ni le gouvernement qui vivons au-dessus de nos moyens, ce sont les ultra-riches. Générer les méga-bénéfices des grandes entreprises n’est pas tenable, ni socialement ni économiquement. L’analyste politique Marc Vandepitte nous explique pourquoi et esquisse comment inverser la tendance.
→ read full articleMay: This Month in Nuclear Threat History
Jeffrey W. Mason | Nuclear Age Peace Foundation - TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 May 2016
May 1, 1962 – A nuclear test code-named Beryl was conducted in French-occupied Algeria. However, due to improper sealing of the underground shaft, a spectacular mushroom cloud burst through the concrete cap venting highly radioactive dust and gas into the atmosphere. The plume climbed to 8,500 feet high and radiation was detected hundreds of miles away. This was just one of 210 nuclear weapons tests conducted by the French government in north Africa and the Pacific region in the period from 1960-96.
→ read full articleCharity Justice (Haiku)
Udaya R. Tennakoon – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 May 2016
Unsold expired gifts…
→ read full articleTTIP Leaks [for Download]
Greenpeace – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 May 2016
Greenpeace Netherlands has released secret TTIP negotiation documents. We have done so to provide much needed transparency and trigger an informed debate on the treaty. This treaty is threatening to have far reaching implications for the environment and the lives of more than 800 million citizens in the EU and US. TTIP is about a huge transfer of power from people to big business.
→ read full articleDefying the Spies: Free Thought as Resistance in the Age of Surveillance
Benjamin Dangl – Toward Freedom,
9 May 2016
A brand new study from Oxford provides empirical evidence to prove that the very fact that the surveillance state exists spreads conformity and subservience. The study examines how, following whistleblower Edward Snowden’s revelations in 2013 about US government spying, there was “a 20 percent decline in page views on Wikipedia articles related to terrorism, including those that mentioned ‘al Qaeda,’ ‘car bomb’ or ‘Taliban.’”
→ read full articleThe Calm before the Coming Global Storm
Pepe Escobar | The International Reporter - TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 May 2016
6 May 2016 – They have seen what Washington does offer; endless war; the progressive smashing of the nation state; democracy blasted to smithereens; and technocratic governance by the 0.00001%. Yet all this is just the calm before the geopolitical/financial storm. Let’s review the current state of play via the dilemmas afflicting the House of Saud, the EU and BRICS members Russia, Brazil and China.
→ read full articleThe Possibilities of Anti-Austerity Politics: A Spanish Drama
Immanuel Wallerstein – Toward Freedom,
9 May 2016
Is there any way that any government is able to maintain an anti-austerity policy in the middle run, amidst the pressures that reduced government real revenues are imposing on states throughout the world? As this drama plays out in Spain, the world will be watching, reacting, and drawing lessons.
→ read full articlePalmyra Witnesses Two Cultural Events on Occasions of Martyrs’ Day in Syria and Victory Day in Russia
Syrian Arab News Agency SANA – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 May 2016
The first event has started amid large popular turnout through the concert of the Symphony Orchestra of St Petersburg’s Mariinsky Theater, headed by Maestro Valery Gergiev at Palmyra’s Roman Theater.
→ read full articleThe Brazilian Left: Business Accommodation and Social Debacle
Prof. James Petras – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 May 2016
In ‘Cardoso’s Brazil: A Land for Sale’ (2003) we described how President Cardoso had sold off the major public resources, banks, petroleum and iron resources to foreign capital for rock bottom prices. The 2002 election of President Lula Da Silva of the Workers’ Party did not reverse Cardoso’s sell-out. Indeed, Lula accepted his predecessor’s neo-liberal policies – embellished them – and set about forging an alliance between the Workers’ Party and the economic elites, replacing Cardoso’s Party!
→ read full articleAn Encyclical on Nonviolence: An Anticipatory Approach
Francisco Gomes de Matos – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 May 2016
In his encyclical on Nonviolence, Pope Francis will be uniquely inspired :
examples of applications of Jesus` teachings will be required
Those Funny Anti-Semites
Uri Avnery – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 May 2016
Until world-war II, Hitler could not dream of killing the Jews en masse. He had to be satisfied with driving them out of Germany, or out of Europe, as had happened several times before – in Spain, in England and in many other places. The obvious destination was Palestine, but Palestine was ruled by Great Britain, which let only a handful of Jews in, for fear of Arab reactions. At the time another possibility gained popularity with the Nazi leadership: transport all the Jews to Madagascar, which was part of the French empire.
→ read full articleAbout the TTIP Leaks
Binoy Kampmark – Dissident Voice,
9 May 2016
6 May 2016 – The monstrous Siamese twin of the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement, known as the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), has been in a growing puddle of dispute after 248 pages of its content were leaked. The document continues to flicker, and it will take more than Gallic opposition, Germanic scepticism, and general European stubbornness, to sink it.
→ read full articleOcean’s Oxygen Starts Running Low
Niina Heikkinen | ClimateWire – Scientific American,
9 May 2016
Rising levels of CO2 are making it hard for fish to breathe in addition to exacerbating global warming and ocean acidification.
→ read full articleWhy Obama Prioritizes Ousting Assad over Defeating Syria’s Jihadists
Eric Zuesse | Washington’s Blog – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 May 2016
That report went on to document, essentially, that U.S. President Barack Obama is continuing his efforts to replace the only secular, non-sectarian government in the Middle East, that of the Ba’athist Party, which has always been the only non-religious political party in the Arabic world — everything else in Arabia has been fundamentalist-Sunni, to at least some extent (enough for even the least-fundamentalist of America’s Arab allies to cooperate with al-Nusra, which is Al Qaeda in Syria).
→ read full articleA Civic Economy of Provisions
Marvin T. Brown | The Next System Project – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 May 2016
Marvin Brown presents a model for the next system in which economic activity is based not solely on property ownership or the free market but on civic membership in a “global civil society.” He advocates a new approach to system change that would re-frame our social structures around civic relations. Oriented around families, communities, attachments, and mutual identities, this civic economy of provisions would ensure that all people have access to food, housing, health care, and education.
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Hawai’i Aloha | Song Across Hawai’i (Music Video of the Week)
Playing For Change - TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 May 2016
Apr 22, 2016 – An Epic Hawai’ian Song Straight from the Hearts of the Singers – Recorded live across 27 locations, this is Hawai’iʻs most widely known and loved song, used to close important gatherings of all sizes. It is a song of unity and Aloha ‘Aina (Aloha for one’s birthplace, land and home) and features dozens of Hawai‘i’s top artists across many genres and over 1,000 youths from 10 Hawai’ian charter schools.
→ read full articleRemembering Daniel Berrigan, with Gratitude
Ken Butigan | PeaceVoice – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 May 2016
Daniel Berrigan has died, and so we have lost our great teacher who, flinty and generous and relentlessly persistent, taught us how to live in a culture of death and madness: “Find some people you can pray with and march with.” He pronounced this simple sentence at the end of a mesmerizing three-hour conversation he and I had in his simple Manhattan apartment in 1981.
→ read full article(Português) Conheça o “Holocausto Animal”
Francisco José - ANDA Agência de Notícias de Direitos Animais,
9 May 2016
O empresário apenas mata o animal pois há demanda, isto é, há quem pague. Enquanto não mudarmos a ideia de que os animais existem no mundo como produtos para humanos, haverá produção de vestimenta de pele e de outras práticas de exploração animal. A produção animal é a principal forma de emissão de gás-estufa e do desmatamento da Amazônia, e não apenas isso, é também a pioneira em poluição de rios, mares e nascentes.
→ read full articleSolitary Confinement Is ‘No Touch’ Torture, And It Must Be Abolished
Chelsea E Manning – The Guardian,
9 May 2016
For 17 hours a day, I sat directly in front of at least two Marine Corps guards seated behind a one-way mirror. I was not allowed to lay down. I was not allowed to lean my back against the cell wall. I was not allowed to exercise. Sometimes, to keep from going crazy, I would stand up, walk around, or dance, as “dancing” was not considered exercise by the Marine Corps.
→ read full articleTTIP Leaked Documents Show Obama Demands Killing Paris Accord against Climate Change
Eric Zuesse, Zero Hedge – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 May 2016
“248 pages of leaked Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) negotiating texts” show that the American negotiating position, as Greenpeace put the matter, allows “No place for climate protection in TTIP,” and, though “We have known that the EU position was bad, now we see the US position is even worse.”
→ read full articleLiving Peace Sign Is Happening in London!
Alberto Portugheis – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
An exciting and much needed event is happening at Trafalgar Square on Saturday, 14 May 2016. Seeing Trafalgar Square full of people holding candles for peace, means that united we can send a very strong message to the world with our wish for ending all wars and conflicts.
→ read full articleIt Is Still 3 Minutes to Midnight
Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
The Doomsday Clock is an internationally recognized design that conveys how close we are to destroying our civilization with dangerous technologies of our own making. First and foremost among these are nuclear weapons, but the dangers include climate-changing technologies, emerging biotechnologies, and cybertechnology that could inflict irrevocable harm, whether by intention, miscalculation, or by accident, to our way of life and to the planet.
→ read full articleUS Army’s Depleted Uranium Licencing Saga Highlights Post-Conflict Contradictions
International Coalition to Ban Uranium Weapons – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
The saga of the M101 contamination should serve as a reminder of the contradictory and often hypocritical approach taken by the states that employ DU weapons – and of the challenge that the use of DU weapons poses to fundamental international radiation protection norms.
→ read full article(Italiano) Far prevalere il Vangelo della nonviolenza nel pensiero e nell’azione della Chiesa
Jean-Marie Muller – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
Ciò che è notevole, e probabilmente decisivo, è che i partecipanti non si contentano di aggiungere un paragrafo sulla nonviolenza nella dottrina della violenza legittima e della guerra giusta, ma mettono in discussione questa dottrina in nome dell’esigenza di nonviolenza. «Quelli tra noi – afferma il documento – che si pongono nella tradizione cristiana sono chiamati a riconoscere il carattere centrale della nonviolenza attiva nella visione e nel messaggio di Gesù.
→ read full articleOn Israel’s Recent Threats of “Civil Assassinations” of BDS Activists
Omar Barghouti, BDS South Africa – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
18 Apr 2016 – Some, including journalists, have written to me inquiring about or voicing their concern at the recent Israeli government minister’s threat of “civil targeted killing” against BDS “leaders” and activists. Moshe Dayan once said that “Israel must be like a mad dog, too dangerous to bother.” The current Israeli regime is scrupulously heeding Dayan’s advice. But “mad dogs” can be stopped. Indeed, mad dogs must be stopped, as there is no telling whom they may bite next.
→ read full articleDuty to Warn – Bad Science? Or Willful Ignorance at the CDC?
Gary G. Kohls, MD – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
And why It Has Lost Its Trustworthiness when It Comes to Vaccine Policy
→ read full articleDaniel J. Berrigan, Defiant Priest Who Preached Pacifism, Dies at 94
Daniel Lewis – International New York Times,
2 May 2016
The Rev. Daniel J. Berrigan, a Jesuit priest and poet whose defiant protests helped shape the tactics of opposition to the Vietnam War and landed him in prison, died on Saturday [30 Apr] in New York City. He was 94. The United States was tearing itself apart over civil rights and the war in Southeast Asia when Father Berrigan emerged in the 1960s as an intellectual star of the Roman Catholic “new left,” articulating a view that racism and poverty, militarism and capitalist greed were interconnected pieces of the same big problem: an unjust society.
→ read full articleThe Unbearable Lightness of [Canada’s Minister of Foreign Affairs] Stéphane Dion
Matthew Behrens, Rabble – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
On May 26, a man responsible for complicity in horrific war crimes, Henry Kissinger, will arrive in Toronto, along with another similarly shady character, Shimon Peres, to speak at the incredibly named Spirit of Hope gathering. Meanwhile, CANSEC16, the annual gathering of Canada’s war industry, along with companies that profit from mass surveillance, border control, militarization of police forces, and refugee interdiction, will take place at Ottawa’s EY Centre on May 25 and 26. It expects over 11,000 visitors and 61 international delegations.
→ read full articleSolar Impulse Pilot: ‘I Flew Over Plastic Waste As Big As a Continent’
Lorraine Chow, EcoWatch - TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
As the Solar Impulse 2 made its historic 62-hour flight from Hawaii to California without fuel, pilot Bertrand Piccard personally saw the horrific amount of plastic in our oceans.While flying above the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, Piccard sent out a tweet to Boyan Slat, the 21-year-old founder and CEO of The Ocean Cleanup.
→ read full articleSanctions and Defiance in North Korea
Mel Gurtov, PeaceVoice – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
When all is said and done, the most likely scenario is that the new round of sanctions will produce no better results than previous rounds. This is so not only because North Korea has many ways to procure items needed for its military purposes, and plenty of willing private sellers.
→ read full article
11-Year-Old Twins Mack and Colby – Amazing Family Brass Band (Music Video of the Week)
Little Big Shots – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
Mar 20, 2016 – Twins Mack and Colby are only 11, but that doesn’t stop them from going on stage and giving a terrific musical performance, playing one of Louis Armstrong’s greatest jazz hits. Enjoy as the New Orleans-style Dixieland child band Pelican 212 plays Armstrong’s ‘When the Saints Go Marching In’.
→ read full articleAustria Abolishes Right to Asylum
Markus Salzmann, WSWS – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
The Austrian People’s Party (ÖVP)/Social Democrat (SPÖ) far-right coalition rushed a law through parliament on Wednesday [27 Apr] that practically abolishes the right to asylum.
→ read full articleNothing Is Real: “It’s All Being Played to Keep People Believing the System Is Working”
Tyler Durden, Zero Hedge – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
The entire system is built upon a fraud. The losses have been hidden and papered over with trillion dollar cash infusions by governments and central banks around the world. Every single asset now… I don’t care what asset… you want to look at currency, debt, housing, metals, the stock market… pick an asset… there’s no price discovery mechanism behind it whatsoever… it’s all fake… it’s all being distorted. It’s time to prepare for a collapse of a magnitude never before witnessed.
→ read full article“Us” and “Them”
Uri Avnery – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
NO. It’s not “us” and “them”. Not “us” – the good ones, the moral ones, the righteous ones. Or, to put it bluntly, the magnificent ones. The Jews. And not “them” – the bad ones, the evil ones. To put it bluntly again: the despicable ones. Yes, the Arabs. We, who were chosen by God, because we are so special…. “Arab lovers”? Yes. “Jew lovers”? Sure. But above all life-lovers, peace-lovers, lovers of this country.
→ read full article19th World Congress of the International Association of Educators for World Peace
Surya Nath Prasad, Ph. D. - TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
The Conference Organizing Committee invites members from Academia, Administration, Research and Corporate Fraternity to participate in the deliberations by submitting research papers, articles, review studies, case studies on the themes/sub-themes of “Peace Education for Good Governance and Non-Violence” from 24 to 26 October, 2016.
→ read full articleHow Can We Keep Press Freedom from Withering Away?
Farhana Haque Rahman – Inter Press Service-IPS,
2 May 2016
While a free press means that a journalist has rights, it does not mean that she or he is right.
→ read full articleWashington Launches Its Attack against BRICS
Paul Craig Roberts – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
26 Apr 2016 – Having removed the reformist President of Argentina, Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, Washington is now disposing of the reformist President of Brazil, Dilma Rousseff.
→ read full article(Italiano) La ricerca della Buona Città
Johan Galtung – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
Una semplice teoria: se una città ti fa sentire bene, a tuo agio – “E’ così piacevole vivere qui”, dicono in molti – allora qualcosa penetra in te e ti rende nonviolento. Se la città, il luogo in cui vivi, un contesto fondamentale nella tua vita, ti urta in malo modo, allora scende in te un atteggiamento aggressivo, può arrivare alla violenza, e spesso si accompagna a conflitti razziali o etnici.
→ read full articleValeant CEO to Tell Senate He’s Really, Really Sorry for Raising the Price of Life-Saving Heart Drugs 700 Percent
Claire Landsbaum – New York Magazine,
2 May 2016
As head of Valeant, Pearson made enormous profits through a combination of corporate inversion, swindling investors, and jacking up the prices of decades-old drugs in such a way that forced insurance companies to foot the bill.
→ read full articleFrom Just War to Just Peace
Bernt Jonsson – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
As to the issues of war and peace there is a new focus. Now it can be stated and said firmly: The calling and the task of the church is to be a peace church. That is nothing less than a basic paradigm shift in theology and Christian ethic.
→ read full articleCelebrating Mother Jones and Labor on May Day
Rivera Sun, PeaceVoice – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
While Mother Jones sometimes used violent rhetoric in her inflammatory speeches, the actions she organized were nonviolent actions – boycotts, strikes, marches, walk-outs, work stoppages, rallies, speeches, and picketing. When she was denounced on the floor of the US Senate as the “grandmother of all agitators,” she replied: “I hope to live long enough to be the great-grandmother of all agitators.”
→ read full articleCan Responsibility to Protect (R2P) Preserve Our Cultural Heritage in Syria?
Franklin Lamb – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
This month’s Trafalgar Square exhibition in London of a digitally modeled replica of Syria’s 2000-year-old Roman Triumphal Arch at Palmyra, which was destroyed by ISIS in Oct 2015, is sparking yet further discussion about the rights and wrongs of restoration at ancient sites. Approximately two thirds the size of the original, the replica arch was created through the efforts of Oxford University’s Institute of Digital Archeology.
→ read full article(Português) Prêmio Nobel da Paz Adolfo Pérez Esquivel traz apoio do Papa a Dilma
Leonardo Boff – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
29 de Abril de 2016 – O vencedor do prêmio Nobel da Paz em 1980, o argentino Adolfo Pérez Esquivel revelou, em entrevista ao jornalista Darío Pignotti, do jornal Página 12, que levou à presidente Dilma Rousseff o apoio do Papa Francisco. O pontífice é também argentino e mantém estreita ligação com movimentos de defesa dos direitos humanos na América Latina.
→ read full articleDeath from the Sky: Searching for Ground Truth in the Kunduz Hospital Bombing
May Jeong – The Intercept,
2 May 2016
While patients and more than 100 employees and caretakers slept in the Kunduz Trauma Center, an American AC-130 gunship prepared to strike. The 211 shells fired at a Médecins Sans Frontières hospital in Afghanistan one night last October were felt by the 42 men, women, and children killed, victims of incompetence or prejudice or both. Someone along the US military chain of command gave the order.
→ read full articleTouring Tragedy: A Day of Disaster Porn in Chernobyl
Hilmar Schmundt and Phil Thoma - Der Spiegel,
2 May 2016
It is the site of the most devastating nuclear disaster in history, but the Chernobyl exclusion zone has also become a magnet for tourists seeking a thrill. Join us for a tour.
→ read full articleIf Obama Visits Hiroshima
Richard Falk – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
As the global approach to nuclear weapons, climate change, and neoliberal globalization should make clear, we are not likely to survive as a species very much longer if we continue to base world order on a blend of state-centric national interests and dominant actor geopolitics. Obama has this rare opportunity to choose the road not often traveled upon, and there is no better place to start such a voyage than at Hiroshima.
→ read full articleNuclear Emergencies and the Masters of Improvisation
Sonja Schmid – Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists,
2 May 2016
April 26 marks the 30th anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster, and those old enough to remember the event can recall the explosion, the evacuation, and the dread. But they rarely remember an immense milestone in the response to the disaster: the completion in November 1986 of a concrete encasement of Chernobyl’s reactor number four. Workers drawn from all across the Soviet Union built this “sarcophagus” under extreme radiological conditions, on the ruins of the destroyed reactor.
→ read full articleUS Military Whitewashes Attack on Afghan Hospital
Peter Symonds, WSWS – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
30 Apr 2016 – The Pentagon’s final report into last October’s deadly US airstrike on a Doctors Without Borders (MSF) hospital in northern Afghanistan is a brazen whitewash. General Joseph Votel, commander of US Central Command, told a press conference yesterday that the attack was not a war crime because it had not been intentional. He claimed that neither the gunship crew members nor the Special Forces on the ground directing the attack “knew they were striking a medical facility.”
→ read full articleKenya Burns Huge Pile of Ivory Tusks to Protest Poaching
Tom Odula, Associated Press – Reader Supported News,
2 May 2016
Kenya’s president set fire Saturday [30 Apr 2016] to 105 tons of elephant ivory and more than 1 ton of rhino horn in a dramatic statement against the trade in ivory and products from endangered species. Kenya decided to destroy the ivory instead of selling it for an estimated $150 million. Pres. Kenyatta said that Kenya wants to make the point that ivory should not have any commercial value.
→ read full articleCall of the Forests – Seeking Joy and Peace
Dr Ravi P Bhatia – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
Forests are symbols of life. If we did not have forests on the planet Earth it would be difficult to visualise what type of life could be present. But life as we know it would not exist. How is this so? The world celebrates Earth Day on 22nd April. It would be wonderful if we also started celebrating World Forest Day.
→ read full articleIn Israel, an Ugly Tide Sweeps Over Palestinians
Jonathan Cook – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
The trigger-happy soldier Elor Azaria and the peace camp leader Isaac Herzog have more in common than either might wish to admit. In their different ways, both have helped to turn all Palestinians into outcasts – and crush any hope of concessions from Israel to peace.
→ read full articleObama’s War Summit in Europe
Bill Van Auken, WSWS – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
President Barack Obama ended his six-day trip through Saudi Arabia, Britain and Germany Monday [25 Apr 2016] with what amounted to a mini-war summit. The American president’s message to his European counterparts was that they must stop being “complacent” and work to build up their own military forces for interventions in the Middle East, North Africa and against Russia to the east. Obama’s host, Chancellor Merkel, proudly declared, “We are ready and willing to be militarily engaged,” citing the German military’s participation in ongoing interventions in Afghanistan, Iraq and Mali.
→ read full articleDebacle at Doha: The Collapse of the Old Oil Order
Michael T. Klare - TomDispatch,
2 May 2016
For a country that more than any other has rested its claim to wealth and power on the production and sale of petroleum, this is a revolutionary statement. If Saudi Arabia says it is ready to begin a move away from reliance on petroleum, we are indeed entering a new world in which, among other things, the titans of oil production will no longer hold sway over our lives as they have in the past.
→ read full article2016 World Press Freedom Index: Leaders Paranoid about Journalists
Reporters Without Borders – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
20 Apr 2016 – Most of the movement in the World Press Freedom Index unveiled today by Reporters Without Borders is indicative of a climate of fear and tension combined with increasing control over newsrooms by governments and private-sector interests. 180 Countries Ranked According to Freedom Allowed to Journalists
→ read full articleYou’re More Likely to See an Oil Industry Ad than a Climate Report on CNN
Xian Chiang-Waren, Grist – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
Planet Earth is shattering climate records left and right. But don’t expect CNN viewers to know that. Over two recent weeks, the network aired more oil industry advertising than climate change coverage — nearly five times more.
→ read full articleAmy Goodman: How the Media Ruins Elections
Al Jazeera - TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
Amy Goodman, of Democracy NOW!, tells us about Trump-land and how the media is ruining this election.
→ read full articleMorbid Insecurity
M. Wuerker – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
A Psychiatric Condition
→ read full articleDilemma for [Nobel Peace Laureate] Suu Kyi in Push for Peace Process in Burma/Myanmar
Nirmal Ghosh – The Straits Times,
2 May 2016
29 Apr 2016 – Myanmar’s de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi has called for a major peace conference with ethnic minorities – a chance again for Myanmar to progress towards the federal state the minorities have fought for decades. Tough task ahead despite public support as backing of military is needed, say observers.
→ read full articleCan We Feel the Heat?
Cathy Breen, PeaceVoice – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
27 Apr 2016 – I am travelling as a peace witness in Iraqi Kurdistan. We visited a sheikh whom I had met in Fallujah in 2012. He and his family were forced to flee to Kurdistan about two years ago. Fallujah is being held by ISIS. None of the residents is allowed to leave. People are dying of starvation.
→ read full articleThis Week in History
Satoshi Ashikaga - TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
May 2–8 ~ QUOTE OF THE WEEK: “All violence consists in some people forcing others, under threat of suffering or death, to do what they do not want to do.” – Leo Tolstoy
→ read full articleAmid Media Megamergers, a Mosaic of Community Media Thrives
Amy Goodman and Denis Moyhihan – Democracy NOW!,
2 May 2016
Even in this high-tech digital age, all we get is static: that veil of distortion, lies, misrepresentations and half-truths that obscure reality. We need the media to give us the dictionary definition of static: Criticism. Opposition. Unwanted interference. We need a media that covers power, not covers for power. We need a media that is the Fourth Estate, not for the state. And we need a media that covers the movements that create static and make history. That is the power of independent media.
→ read full articleContributing to the Catholic Church’s Understanding of and Commitment to Nonviolence
Mairead Maguire, Nobel Peace Laureate – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
Presentation to the International Conference on Nonviolence and Just Peace – Rome, April 11-13 2016 – I would like to see Pope Francis and the Catholic Church call for the total abolition of militarism (an aberration/dysfunction in human history.) Also For Pope Francis and the Church to renounce war and develop a ‘Theology of Nonkilling and Nonviolence’ rejecting the ‘Just War’ theology, which continues to lead people to an acceptance of militarism and war as alleged legitimate ways of solving conflict.
→ read full articleAny Way to Halt Extremism?
Baher Kamal – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
“While it may be inevitable to draw on examples, such as Da’esh [also known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, or ISIL] or Boko Haram, the phenomenon of violent extremism conducive to terrorism is not rooted or confined to any religion, region, nationality or ethnic group. Let us also recognize that today, the vast majority of victims worldwide are Muslims,” — UN chief Ban Ki-moon
→ read full articleI Lost My Childhood
José María Lopera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
I lost my childhood
at seven years old I was a man
a man of war and of death
a man of a weapon that whistles
and the bomb that explodes in surprise
Happiness Inequality Is a Better Measure of Well-Being than Income Inequality
Kira M. Newman, The Greater Good Science Center, UC Berkeley– TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
Why Does Happiness Inequality Matter? According to a new report, income inequality isn’t the only thing we should be concerned about. Happiness reveals more about human welfare than standard indicators like wealth, education, health, or good government.
→ read full articleThe Battle over the Word ‘Rohingya’ [in Burma aka Myanmar]
Adam Taylor – The Washington Post,
2 May 2016
Hundreds of people gathered outside the U.S. Embassy in Rangoon, Burma, on Thursday [28 Apr] with a demand: The United States must stop using the word “Rohingya.” To most of the world, the Rohingya are a Bengali-speaking Muslim minority in Buddhist-majority Burma, also known as Myanmar. More than 1 million Rohingya are thought to live in Burma, the majority of them in Rakhine state. Despite the size and long-standing presence of this community, the government does not consider its members Burmese citizens.
→ read full articleLearning from Nuclear Accidents, Expanding Nuclear Energy
Augustin Simo – Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists,
2 May 2016
The Chernobyl disaster of 1986 was caused by factors including a flawed reactor design, insufficient training of plant operators, and a lack of nuclear safety culture.
→ read full articleThe Story behind Prince’s Low-Profile Generosity to Green Causes
Katie Herzog, Grist – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
“Prince heard me in the media and sent a $50,000 check to support the work I was doing. But he did all his giving completely anonymously, so I sent the check back. You never know when someone is trying to set you up — it could have been from Chevron or from a drug dealer or whatever. So then he sent the check back and I sent it back again, and then he sent it back and then I sent it back, until finally a representative called and said, ‘Will you please accept this check? I won’t tell you who it is from, but the guy’s favorite color is purple.’
→ read full articleRefugee Crisis: When Is a Tragedy a Massacre?
Richard Seymour – Al Jazeera,
2 May 2016
The EU is simply determined not to be a destination for refugees. With illegal pushbacks, brutal detainment, and harassment at sea, the options for refugees are increasingly severe.
→ read full articleThe Return of the Coup in Latin America
Manuel E. Yepe - CounterPunch,
2 May 2016
Venezuela and Brazil are the scenes of a new form of coup d’état that would set the continent’s political calendar back to its worst times. What has been shown so far in Argentina is no less cruel, in terms of contempt for the masses, than the coups carried out by the bloodthirsty dictatorships that sprouted in time of Operation Condor.
→ read full articleThe Evolution of Union Co-ops and the Historical Development of Workplace Democracy
James Anderson, Toward Freedom – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
“Every worker has an equal, democratic vote at weekly meetings that decide all matters of the organization. And we are all members of the Industrial Workers of the World to protect that process so that it can’t be hijacked.”
→ read full articleEscalating U.S. Air Strikes Kill Hundreds of Civilians in Mosul, Iraq
Nicolas J S Davies, PeaceVoice – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2016
The war commander, Lt Gen McFarland, now orders air strikes that are expected to kill up to 10 civilians without prior approval from U.S. Central Command, and U.S. officials acknowledge that air strikes are killing more civilians under the new rules. The fundamental contradiction of the militarized “war on terror” is that U.S. aggression and other war crimes only reinforce the narratives of jihadis who see themselves as a bulwark against foreign aggression and neocolonialism in the Muslim world.
→ read full articlePalestine and Zionism: The Whole Truth
Alan Hart – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2016
Brainwashed and idiotic Zionists in Sardinia tried and failed to have some of my lectures and debates cancelled by accusing me of being an anti-Semite who is inciting anti-Semitism. They knew nothing about my book and its contents and were reading from Zionism’s script. Their efforts resulted in increased sales of my book!
→ read full articleDon’t Heed the Haters: Albert Einstein’s Wonderful Letter of Support to Marie Curie in the Midst of Scandal
Maria Popova, Brain Pickings – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2016
“If the rabble continues to occupy itself with you, then simply don’t read that hogwash, but rather leave it to the reptile for whom it has been fabricated.”
→ read full article(Italiano) Lettura collettiva dei primi 12 articoli della Costituzione italiana. Aosta. Biblioteca regionale sezione ragazzi
Silvia Berruto – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2016
« Se voi volete andare in pellegrinaggio nel luogo dove è nata la nostra Costituzione, andate nelle montagne dove caddero i partigiani, nelle carceri dove furono imprigionati, nei campi dove furono impiccati. Dovunque è morto un italiano per riscattare la libertà e la dignità, andate lì, o giovani, col pensiero, perché lì è nata la nostra Costituzione. »
→ read full articleClimate Change: Will the Middle East Become ‘Uninhabitable’? (I)
Baher Kamal – Inter Press Service-IPS,
25 Apr 2016
This is the first of a two-part series of reports focusing on the impact of climate change on the Middle East & North of Africa region, ahead of the signing ceremony of the Paris climate agreement, on 22 April 2016 in New York.
→ read full articleOn the Coming Decline and Fall of the US Empire
Johan Galtung – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2016
An empire is a transborder Center-Periphery system, in macro-space and in macro-time, with a culture legitimizing a structure of unequal exchange between center and periphery:
• economically, between exploiters and exploited, as inequity;
• militarily, between killers and victims, as enforcement;
• politically, between dominators and dominated, as repression;
• culturally, between alienators and alienated, as conditioning.
Climate Change and the Middle East: No Water in the Kingdom of the Two Seas—Nor Elsewhere (II)
Baher Kamal – Inter Press Service-IPS,
25 Apr 2016
This is part II of a two-part series of reports focusing on the impact of climate change on the Middle East & North of Africa region, ahead of the signing ceremony of the Paris climate agreement, on 22 April 2016 in New York.
→ read full articleUNOPS Becomes Third UN Agency in Jordan to Drop G4S Following Campaign
BDS Movement – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2016
18 Apr 2016 – The United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS) in Jordan has not renewed its contract with security company G4S following a campaign over the firm’s role in Israeli human rights abuses.
→ read full articleThe Rwanda Genocide: The Israeli Connection
Gilad Atzmon – Dissident Voice,
25 Apr 2016
16 Apr 2016 – It would be encouraging to imagine a genocide that is totally free of any Jewish involvement. Sadly, the Rwanda genocide doesn’t fit into this mythical category. Haaretz reported last week that the Israeli Supreme Court decided to uphold the denial of a Freedom of Information request to make public documents about Israeli ‘defense’ exports to Rwanda at the time of the 1994 genocide in that country.
→ read full articleThis Week in History
Satoshi Ashikaga - TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2016
Apr 25–May 1 QUOTE OF THE WEEK: “Ask yourself this: If I could have everything I wanted, would I want this, or continue to do that?” – Nancy Garen
→ read full articlePeople Still Don’t Get the Link between Meat Consumption and Climate Change
Annick de Witt – Scientific American,
25 Apr 2016
A new kind of messaging could make it easier to appreciate the enormous benefits of moving away from a meat-heavy diet. Considering that climate change is one of the greatest challenges of our time, wouldn’t we want people to know the power of a simple solution that is in their own hands?
→ read full articleChernobyl, and Cesium, at 30
John LaForge, PeaceVoice – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2016
April 26 is the 30th anniversary of the reactor meltdown and radiation disaster at Chernobyl in Ukraine, which brings to mind cesium. Thirty years is how long it takes for half a given amount of cesium-137 — dispersed in huge quantities from Chernobyl (and Fukushima) — to decay into radioactive barium.
→ read full articleThe Seas Will Save Us: How an Army of Ocean Farmers Is Starting an Economic Revolution
Bren Smith - YES! Magazine,
25 Apr 2016
I’m a fisherman who dropped out of high school in 1986 at the age of 14. Over my lifetime, I’ve spent many nights in jail. I’m an epileptic. I’m asthmatic. I don’t even know how to swim. This is my story. It’s a story of ecological redemption. Ocean farming isn’t just about food, it’s about transforming a workforce and restoring the sea.
→ read full articleCan Lemon Water Detox Your Body?
Dr. Edward Group, Global Healing Center – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2016
Adding a little lemon to your water is a great way to add flavor and experience the benefits offered by lemons. It’ll also help cleanse your body of toxins and waste. The American Cancer Society recommends hot lemon water for alleviating constipation and clearing the bowels. [4] Let’s look at four more benefits of lemon water.
→ read full article(Français) « L’ambassade des USA au Brésil ressemble à celle aux temps d’Allende au Chili »
Carlos Aznarez et Tarik Bouafia, Investig’Action – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2016
21 avril 2016 – Après plus de quinze ans de progressisme et d’avancées sociales, l’Amérique Latine est en pleine recomposition. De l’Argentine au Venezuela en passant par le Brésil, la contre-offensive de la droite est en marche. Dans un contexte marqué par une forte crise économique et des tensions politiques, les Etats-Unis tentent de reconquérir leur ancien « pré-carré ».
→ read full articleIt’s Way Past Time to Stop Mistreating Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar
Syed Hamid Albar – Los Angeles Times,
25 Apr 2016
The Rohingya are the indigenous people of southwestern Myanmar, or so-called Rakhine State. For years now, they have taken to overcrowded and leaky boats on the open sea, submitted to dangerous human trafficking networks, and seen their families split apart in a desperate bid to find safety somewhere, anywhere. Like many of the world’s refugees, they are Muslim.
→ read full articleGlyphosate Found in Popular Breakfast Foods
Alliance for Natural Health – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2016
“Glyphosate has been linked to increases in levels of breast, thyroid, kidney, pancreatic, liver and bladder cancers and is being served for breakfast, lunch and dinner around the world. The fact that it is showing up in foods like eggs and coffee creamer, which don’t directly contact the herbicide, shows that it’s being passed on by animals who ingest it in their feed. This is contrary to everything that regulators and industry scientists have been telling the public.”
→ read full article(Italiano) Mediazione da parte di giudici, della polizia
Johan Galtung – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2016
Polizia? I giudici hanno uno status sociale più alto ma la polizia conosce meglio la situazione locale ed eventuali trasgressori.
→ read full articleCatching-Up with Cynthia McKinney… And Looking (Worriedly) Ahead
Gary S. Corseri – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2016
“Parrhesia” is a type of leadership that involves a special type of speech–it is a leadership that has the authority to speak and that uses that authority to speak what we would call “truth to power” and that does so despite the imminent and immanent risk posed to the speaker. Foucault explains Parrhesia in a lecture that he gave at the University of California at Berkeley and it is in that sense that I use the word.
→ read full articleThe Church’s Turn toward Nonviolence
Fr. John Dear, PeaceVoice – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2016
For the last 1700 years, as we all know, Christians have waged war, led crusades, burned women at the stake, systematically persecuted Jews and Muslims, kept millions of people as slaves, ran concentration camps, blessed conquest, prayed for successful bombing raids, and built and used nuclear weapons. Throughout Catholic history, Jesus’ teachings of nonviolence were rarely discussed, much less implemented.
→ read full articleAn Anecdote about Fascism
Richard Falk – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2016
I tried to engage her in conversation about evolving Israeli attitudes toward the Palestinians and the related failed diplomacy, but she seemed rather uninformed and perhaps even disinterested as if the peace agenda was not really present in her active consciousness. Then all at once she said something that surprised me. “I am not looking forward to returning to Israel, it is becoming a fascist state.”
→ read full articleAP Investigation: Are Slaves Catching the Fish You Buy?
Robin Mcdowell, Margie Mason and Martha Mendoza, AP –TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2016
Update: On 18 Apr 2016 the all-woman Associated Press team won the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service for this investigation [published on TMS in 30 Mar 2015].
25 Mar 2015 – The men the AP interviewed on Benjina were mostly from Myanmar, also known as Burma, one of the poorest countries in the world. They were brought to Indonesia through Thailand and forced to fish. Their catch was then shipped back to Thailand, where it entered the global stream of commerce.
DNA Instrument of Life – Phonon Beholds Life Consciousness: New Hypothesis
Prof. Chandra Prakash Trivedi – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2016
The Phonon is earliest. It has activated the dark matter with resonance. The phonon and photon manifested with blast and light as dualistic complimentary force of vital energy. The phonon stimulates the event to happen and photon under go synthesis and degradation with time Einstein’s equation E=Mc².
→ read full articleTough Questions about Haiti for Hillary Clinton
Mark Schuller - CounterPunch,
25 Apr 2016
Obviously Haitian people must hold their government accountable, and are, but one must pause to ask why Clinton intervened in this election. And why the so-called international community looked the other way while four years of elections did not occur. And why the U.S. government pre-empted Haiti’s independent electoral commission investigating massive fraud.
→ read full articleOxfam: US Corporate Tax Cheats Hiding $1.4 Trillion in Profits in Offshore Accounts
Patrick Martin, WSWS – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2016
The biggest tax dodger is technology giant Apple, with $181 billion held offshore. General Electric had the second-largest stash, at $119 billion, enough to repay four times over the $28 billion GE received in federal guarantees during the 2008 Wall Street crash. Microsoft had $108 billion in overseas accounts, with companies like Exxon Mobil, Pfizer, IBM, Cisco Systems, Google, Merck, and Johnson & Johnson rounding out the top ten.
→ read full article