Articles by TRANSCEND Media Service
We found 29282 results.
Prop 37, GMOs, Food Sovereignty, and More
Vandana Shiva and Sonali Kolhatkar, Uprising Radio – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Nov 2012
A new poll conducted by the University of Southern California and the LA Times has found that Proposition 37, the GMO labeling initiative, has slipped a whopping 17 points since the last poll in September [2012]. Now, one of the world’s most renowned scientists and environmental activists, Vandana Shiva, is speaking out. Long a thorn in the side of Monsanto, Dr. Shiva has taken on big bio-tech and agribusiness companies in her home country of India and works with farmers groups all over the world to protect their right to farm using their traditional methods and seeds.
→ read full articleSri Lanka: Militarizing the Land and Terrorizing the Minds
Nirmanusan Balasundaram – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Nov 2012
Nearly four decades of asymmetric war between the Sri Lankan state and the Tamil guerrillas ended in a bloodbath that was seen by some as “unacceptably high”. Such statements arouse a cynical curiosity as to what could be an “acceptable level of bloodbath” and confirmed that the State’s victory was achieved by massacring hundreds of thousands of Tamils.
→ read full articleIsraeli Ministry of Tourism Map Annexes Over 60% of the West Bank
Jonathan Cook – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Nov 2012
The map fails to delineate any territory identifiable as the West Bank, referring to it instead as the Biblical kingdoms of Judea and Samaria. That is also the way Israeli textbooks have presented the West Bank to generations of Israeli schoolchildren: as a single territorial unit of Greater Israel, ruled over by Israel. The Green Line was erased on Hebrew maps from the moment the occupation began. But the tourism map has been drafted not for a domestic audience but for a foreign one.
→ read full article(Castellano) Unión Europea Excluirá a Cataluña en Caso de Independizarse de España
TeleSur – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Nov 2012
El organismo explica que cuando el territorio de un Estado miembro deja de ser parte de ese Estado, los Tratados regionales no se aplican a dicho territorio, ya que “un nuevo Estado, creado como resultado de un proceso de independencia, se convertiría en un tercer país”.
→ read full articleWorld Bank Business Rankings Obscure Poverty and Corruption, Critics Argue
The Guardian – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Nov 2012
Some of the best places in the world to start and run a business have proved hugely controversial, like former Soviet satellite state Georgia and central African nation Zambia. The new boss at the World Bank, Jim Yong Kim, has pledged to review the rankings. It seems not only invidious but also farcical to say that Rwanda boasts a better infrastructure for business than Italy.
→ read full articleIstanbul: A Modest Proposal
Richard Falk – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Nov 2012
My most trusted Turkish friends felt that it grossly exaggerated Istanbul’s credentials as a possible future world capital, and in deference, I will tone down some of the language, and call attention to some problematic features of the Turkish political landscape that should not be ignored in proposing such a status for Istanbul.
→ read full articleUN Relief Agency Estimates 1.8 Million Haitians Have Been Affected By Hurricane Sandy
UN News Centre – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Nov 2012
2 November 2012 – Some 1.8 million Haitians have been affected by Hurricane Sandy, the United Nations relief agency said today after its first assessment of the situation in the region, adding that food security remains an urgent concern in the Caribbean nation.
→ read full articleJeffrey Gedmin: The Democracy-Promoting, Iraq War-Supporting, Pro-Israel Neocon Who Influenced Merkel’s EU Austerity Program
Maidhc Ó Cathail, The Passionate Attachment – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Nov 2012
In his latest New Europe column entitled “Merkel’s real agenda: mugging the poor,” David Cronin asks why the German Chancellor has cast herself as Europe’s “empress of austerity.” The answer, he believes, is to be found by looking at those who have shaped the German leader’s worldview.
→ read full articleJobless in the Crisis: Euro-Zone Unemployment Higher than Ever Before
Der Spiegel – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Nov 2012
The European debt crisis and related austerity measures continue to drive up unemployment across the euro zone. In September, according to statistics released on Wednesday [31 Oct 2012], fully 18.5 million people were without work in the common currency area, more than ever before.
→ read full article(Castellano) Evo Morales Nombra a Sean Penn “Embajador de Causas Nobles de Bolivia”
TeleSur – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Nov 2012
“El Presidente le ha pedido (…) que lleve nuestras reivindicaciones, nuestra propuesta de retorno al mar a los distintos escenarios, en los que podamos avanzar de manera significativa en el contexto internacional”, señaló el ministro de la Presidencia.
→ read full articleAppeal to Our Leaders’ and Nation’s Collective Conscience!
The People’s Movement Against Nuclear Energy – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Nov 2012
As the very last and desperate attempt at securing our independence and freedom, thwarting another spell of colonialism and foreign domination, safeguarding India’s natural resources, changing our energy policy and ensuring the well-being of our fellow citizens, we would like to appeal to your and our nation’s collective conscience to listen to us, the ordinary people of India, and not to repress us.
→ read full articleSandy Caribbean Death Toll Rises
Independent, Ireland – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Nov 2012
31 Oct 2012 – The death toll in the Caribbean from Hurricane Sandy has risen and estimates of damage and destruction it caused grew larger as more complete assessments emerged from throughout the region. Two new deaths were recorded in Haiti, bringing the total for the country to 54 and for the whole of the Caribbean to 71. In Cuba, the government raised the number of homes damaged by Hurricane Sandy from 130,000 to 200,000.
→ read full articleWho and What Gains from Myanmar’s Genocide of the Rohingya and Other Muslims?
Maung Zarni – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Nov 2012
The site of massive violence and arson of Rohingya and other Muslim neighborhood in Kyauk Hpyu happened to be the site where China is planning a Special Econ and Technological Zone. Why bother with mass eviction and typical Myanmar land grab when you have locally produced Genocide against the Rohingya and other Muslim inhabitants as a tool of ‘developmental policy’?
→ read full articleGreek Editor Acquitted Over Swiss Bank List
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Nov 2012
A Greek journalist who published the names of more than 2,000 Greeks with Swiss bank accounts has been acquitted of breaking data privacy laws. Costas Vaxevanis’s acquittal on Thursday [1 Nov 2012] came hours after he went on trial in a case analysts said was a test for press freedom in Greece.
→ read full articleBeing a Poem in the Making
Anthony Judge – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Nov 2012
Produced in the light of the joint meeting of the Scientific and Medical Network and the
Society for Scientific Exploration on Mapping Time, Mind and Space (Brú na Bóinne, Ireland, 2012). Engendering a Multiverse through Musing – This is a reflection on engagement with the quantity of information, the challenge of quality and selectivity, and the consequences of ignorance and confusion as time goes by.
(Portuguese) Teste Simples Ajuda a Identificar AVC
Radioagência NP – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Nov 2012
29 out 2012 – No Dia Mundial do AVC, organizações de saúde intensificam o alerta para prevenir e identificar os primeiros sintomas da doença. Entre os principais fatores de risco estão a hipertensão, diabetes e o colesterol elevado. Uma pessoa morre a cada seis segundos no mundo devido ao Acidente Vascular Cerebral (AVC), popularmente conhecido como derrame.
→ read full article
World War III: The Unthinkable Cost of Preserving the Petrodollar (VIDEO OF THE WEEK)
CrisisHQ – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Nov 2012
If you want to understand what’s happening in the Mideast, particularly in Libya, Syria and Iran, you must first understand the main driving force behind U.S. foreign policy. The real agenda is to protect the Petrodollar system, because it is the only thing that is currently preventing the total collapse of our fiat currency.
→ read full articleMyanmar Travel Reassurances to Westerners
Maung Zarni – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
President Thein Sein himself – incidentally, a very sincere, soft-spoken and harmless personality – has assured our Ministries that you will not hear gunshot fires, nor will you see boat loads of fleeing “Kulars or niggers” – much less their social media-circulated doctored images of mutilated corpses, charred belongings, and burnt houses. (Off the record: These damn human rights activists tend to sensationalize stories and exaggerate atrocities – it’s just another case of ethnic cleansing. We have other really important business in Myanmar: BUSINESS).
→ read full articleHow to Launder Money – Swiss Style
Bruce Krasting – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
An interesting crime story has come out in France and Switzerland. It may prove to be the nail in the coffin for bank secrecy in Switzerland. The Swiss and French police arrested seventeen individuals a week ago (including an assistant Mayor in Paris). A woman (known only as “M”) is the center of attention of a drug smuggling ring. Apparently she ran a very big operation smuggling marijuana from Morocco into France.
→ read full article
‘Bailouts’ Are a Means for Total Subjugation of Nation States – Nigel Farage
Europarl – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
European Parliament, Strasbourg, 23 October 2012 – Conclusions of the European Council. UK Independence Party leader Nigel Farage speaks truth to the powers that be.
→ read full article(Castellano) Estudio Científico Responsabiliza a la ONU Por Epidemia de Colera en Haití
TeleSur – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
La investigación determinó que la cepa de cólera en Haití es una copia exacta de la cepa de cólera en Nepal. En base a ello, la fuente más probable de introducción del cólera es una persona infectada proveniente de África, asociada a la Misión de la ONU.
→ read full article(Castellano) Indigenas Brasileños Advierten Suicidio Masivo Si los Despojan de Sus Tierras
TeleSur – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
Esta semana [24 Oct 2012], un tribunal brasileño ordenó el desalojo de su granja. Sin embargo, unos 100 adultos y 70 niños amenazan con suicidarse en masa antes de salir de un territorio que ellos llaman “tekoha”, cuyo significado es “cementerio ancestral”.
→ read full articleUN Independent Expert Calls For Boycott of Businesses Profiting From Israeli Settlements
UN News Centre – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
A United Nations independent expert today [25 Oct 2012] called on the world body’s General Assembly, as well as civil society, to take action against Israeli and international businesses that are profiting from Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territory.
→ read full articleIsrael‘s Formula for a Starvation Diet
Jonathan Cook – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
How 400 Trucks To Feed Gaza Became Just 67 – Six and a half years go, shortly after Hamas won the Palestinian national elections and took charge of Gaza, a senior Israeli official described Israel’s planned response. “The idea,” he said, “is to put the Palestinians on a diet, but not to make them die of hunger.”
→ read full article(Italian) Premio per la Pace: Nobel o Ignobel?
Johan Galtung – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
Entrambi, naturalmente. Ben meritato per il passato e per le relazioni interne, nella tradizione dell’Occidente che premia l’Occidente. Ma i critici hanno ragione per quanto riguarda le relazioni esterne e il presente come la stretta debitoria dei cosiddetti Stati GIPSI –Grecia, Italia, Portogallo, Spagna, Irlanda- Periferia UE- verso la Germania.
→ read full articleTeflon President? Noose Tightens Around Uribe as Former Death Squad Leaders Spill the Beans
Tom Burghardt, Anti-fascist Calling – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
Recent arrests by Colombian authorities and revelations by the president’s former allies are beginning to draw a circle around Uribe and the U.S. secret state in some of the hemisphere’s worst human rights abuses of previous decades. As the net tightens, members of the president’s own family are sharply focused in the cross-hairs of investigators.
→ read full articleOf Course Monsanto Says It’s Safe
Tim Schwab, Food and Water Watch – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
Does anyone honestly think that Monsanto is going to fund research about its products that casts them in an unfavorable light, then publish these findings in a journal over which it has financial influence for all to see? The status quo of industry influence over agricultural science means that NK603 remains a pervasive ingredient in our food system – apparently unchallengeable by scientists, unexamined by journalists and unavoidable by consumers because GE foods are unlabeled.
→ read full article(Portuguese) O Maior Escândalo Financeiro da História de Portugal!
Ironia d’Estado – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
Foi a maior burla de sempre em Portugal, qualquer coisa como 9.710.539.940,09 €uros!!! Nunca antes houve um roubo desta dimensão, “tapado” por uma nacionalização que já custou 2.400 milhões de euros delapidados algures entre gestores de fortunas privadas em Gibraltar, empresas do Brasil, offshores de Porto Rico, um oportuno banco de Cabo Verde e a voracidade de uma parte da classe política portuguesa que se aproveitou desta vergonha criada por figuras importantes daquilo que foi o cavaquismo na sua fase executiva”.
→ read full articleGovernment to Argue Speedy Trial Doesn’t Apply to Bradley, Veterans to Rally in Support
Nathan Fuller – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
As Army Private First Class Bradley Manning nears 900 days in jail without trial, his lawyer moves to dismiss all charges for lack of a speedy trial. Beginning Tuesday, October 30, the government’s witnesses will try to explain away the prosecution’s extensive delays.
→ read full article
(Portuguese) Brasil: 863 Índios Se Suicidam… E Quase Ninguém Viu
Jornaldagazeta – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
Bob Fernandes reporta – Em sua carta-testamento os Kaiowá/Guarani rogam: ”Pedimos ao Governo e à Justiça Federal para não decretar a ordem de despejo/expulsão, mas decretar nossa morte coletiva e enterrar nós todos aqui. Pedimos para decretar nossa extinção/dizimação total, além de enviar vários tratores para cavar um grande buraco para jogar e enterrar nossos corpos. Este é o nosso pedido aos juízes federais”.
→ read full articleEightfold Configuration of Nested Cycles of Cognitive Transformations
Anthony Judge – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
Meta-Pattern of Connectivity through a Hypersphere? – In a preceding exercise the focus was on identifying the nature and range of cognitive transformations, of which people are commonly aware, in quest of an approach to configuring them together in a meaningful pattern (In Quest of a Dynamic Pattern of Transformations: sensing the strange attractor of an emerging Rosetta Stone, 2012). The following exploration is an effort to weave together these different “threads” using the periodic table as a valuable template.
→ read full articleAdverse Effects of Globalization
John Scales Avery – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
Today, economic globalization aims at increased trade throughout the world. At first sight, this might seem to be a benefit. However, laws preventing the exploitation of labor are not universal. The same unspeakable conditions experienced by workers in factories and mines during the early phases of the Industrial Revolution in Europe can be found today among factory workers in Indonesia, or children weaving oriental carpets in Pakistan; and it is estimated that in India alone there are 80,000,000 child laborers.
→ read full articleNew York Police Department Informant Says He Was Paid to ‘Bait’ Muslims
Dashiell Bennett, The Atlantic Wire – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
He earned as much as $1,000 a month by surveilling mosques and Islamic study groups, taking pictures and collecting names of innocent people. The 19-year-old was born in Queens to Bengali parents and said he was recruited from jail after a series of minor drug arrests.
→ read full articleEffective Sharing of World Responsibility
Charles Mercieca, Ph.D. – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
The real secret to the solution of all problems on a global scale lies in our ability to procure means that are beneficial to all people across every continent without exception. From the early days of human existence, people soon found out that they are fully interdependent for the better or the worse.
→ read full articlePentagon Prisons Revealed: WikiLeaks Publishes Terror Detainee Manuals
Russia Today – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
Whistleblowing website WikiLeaks is releasing over 100 classified documents detailing US Department of Defense procedures for running Guantanamo Bay, Abu Ghraib, Camp Bucca and other infamous prisons where terror suspects are detained.
→ read full articleBeyond Occupy: A Campaign to Decentralize Wealth and Its Associated Power
Elizabeth Barrett – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
September 17th [2012] was the one-year anniversary of the first Occupy Wall Street protest, which was held in Zuccotti Park in the financial district of New York City. The Occupy movement grew out of the natural rage people felt about the massive transfer of wealth from the public sector to certain people in the private sector during the bailout of the financial industry. The goal should be to decentralize wealth before it is accumulated, rather than after. Contrary to the current thought that also started with Adam Smith in 1776, human beings actually are not a commodity known as “labor” – they are living, breathing people.
→ read full articleOrigin of Syrian Shells into Turkey Unclear, US General Says
Daily News – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
“We are not sure if these shells are from the Syrian army, from rebels who want to get Turkey involved in the issue or from the PKK [Kurdish Workers’ Party],” U.S. Army Europe and Seventh Army, Lt. Gen. Mark Hertling said.
→ read full articleDocumentary on Movement against Kudankulam [India] Nuclear Plant
NDTV (India) – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
Exposing the truth about the Koodunkulam [Tamil Nadu] Nuclear Power Plant with its history and the people’s continuous protests. (In English)
→ read full articleThe Right to Water
Francisco Gomes de Matos – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
To Water all human beings should have the right
but why isn´t that vital right always in sight?
Cooperatives Cushion the Blows of Hunger
Inter Press Service-IPS – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
Millions of small-scale producers, particularly in the developing world, are responding to the triple crises of climate change, food price fluctuations and market instability by organising themselves into cooperatives to join forces. The Food and Agriculture Organizaton sees cooperatives as a major way to lift small-scale farmers out of poverty and hunger, and help them to access markets to sell their products, buy inputs at better prices and obtain financial services.
→ read full articleThe Art of Dissuasion
George Monbiot – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
A letter to the editors of Media Lens. As you know, journalists whose politics are broadly in line with yours, and who are hostile to big business and the corporate domination of politics and the media, have become, following your attempts to engage with them, not your allies but your sworn enemies. I think it’s time for you to take stock and ask why this has been happening.
→ read full articleJapan Struggling To Store Radioactive Water
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
Leading nuclear worker says space is running out for contaminated water cooling the Fukushima plant.
→ read full articleRohingya Unrest Continues – 100 killed
Mabrur Ahmed, RestlessBeings – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
Burma/Myanmar – The situation in Arakan state this morning [23 Oct 2012] is dire. Renewed arson attacks took place on the villages of Minbya and Mro Haung at around 4.30pm local time. More than 100 are feared dead. Furthermore reports have come through of the rape of at least 26 young girls by security forces in the Rathadaung Township.
→ read full articleProposing a Vision of a New Earth
Rajesh Makwana, Sharing the World’s Resources – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
The earth’s ecological problems stem largely from our collective failure to share. That might seem like an overly simplistic statement, but it is now increasingly evident that only by sharing the world’s resources more equitably and sustainably will we be able to address both the ecological and social crisis we face as a global community.
→ read full articlePreparing for COP III
Vithal Rajan – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Oct 2012
If scam-ridden governments of third world countries, like India, continue their environmentally destructive polices in the real interests of their own ruling elites, the leaders of the West, and their corporate movers and shakers deliberately collude in the process of creating regional instability and concomitant dependency on themselves.
→ read full article(Italian) Guerre Balcaniche a 100: Quattro Strade Per Un Buon Vicinato
Johan Galtung – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
Discorso programmatico, Istanbul, Università di Hacettepe, 4 ottobre 2012 – Gli imperi vanno e vengono. L’Impero musulmano Ottomano fu fra i migliori mentre quello cattolico iberico e quello protestante europeo furono fra i peggiori.
→ read full articleFlaws in the Concept of Nuclear Deterrence
John Scales Avery – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
Before discussing other defects in the concept of deterrence, it must be said very clearly that the idea of “massive nuclear retaliation” is completely unacceptable from an ethical point of view. The doctrine of retaliation, performed on a massive scale, violates not only the principles of common human decency and common sense, but also the ethical principles of every major religion.
→ read full article
Gaza-Bound Ship ‘Attacked By Israel Forces’ (VIDEO OF THE WEEK)
Al Jazeera – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
20 Oct 2012 – Mikael Löfgren, media coordinator spokesman for the Estelle, spoke to Al Jazeera.
→ read full articleMahatma Gandhi Speaks to the Australian Prime Minister?
People’s Movement Against Nuclear Energy – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
The People’s Movement Against Nuclear Energy as well as our sympathizers all over India would like to apologize to Ms. Julia Gillard, the Honorable Prime Minister of Australia, for the dangerous fall she suffered at the Raj Ghat. Madam Prime Minister, this whole Raj Ghat episode reflects the authorities’ utter lack of safety precautions and emergency preparedness. And your government is seriously considering selling Uranium to these folks. Maybe, Madam Prime Minister, Mahatma Gandhi, the Father of our Nation, is trying to say something to you and please listen to him.
→ read full articleTurkey’s Conflict Trinity
Ali E. Erol – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
A recent piece written by Johan Galtung for TRANSCEND Media Service-TMS (2012) titled Turkey-Cyprus -Kurds -Armenia -SYRIA is an important representation of the close inspection Turkey is going though in this process of international recognition. My aim in this piece is to focus on Galtung’s article and talk about Turkey’s conflict trinity using some of the claims and suggestions he puts forth.
→ read full article‘Recipe for Disaster’: Group Says No Financialization of Nature!
Common Dreams – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
Friends of the Earth International warns against corporate approach as UN biodiversity conference meets. The “financialization of nature” is a flawed approach to saving biodiversity, an environmental group warns as representatives from over 170 countries meet at a United Nations biodiversity conference.
→ read full articleWhy Is NATO Supporting This Syrian War?
Robin Edward Poulton, Ph.D. – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
No one has been able – or willing – to explain to me why the US administration and its NATO allies are supporting the Sunni destruction of Syria. The people we decry as ‘Terrorists’ and ‘Al Qaeda’ are in fact the very same Sunni Muslim Extremists – supported by Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States – whom we are apparently funding and arming in Syria. Why?
→ read full article(Italian) Turchia-Cipro-Kurdi-Armenia-SIRIA*
Johan Galtung – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
Questo non vuol dire affatto che la Turchia sia scevra di problemi; nessun paese lo è. Il punto focale qui è su quattro problemi che coinvolgono altre nazioni: i greci, i kurdi, gli armeni e le molte nazioni presenti in Siria. Una politica come al solito in paesi omogenei, senza soluzioni contemplanti le nazionalità, equivale a corteggiare il disastro. Va su una minoranza, conquista nicchie economiche-culturali e le maggioranze la metteranno a tacere con mezzi politico-militari; come gli armeni in Turchia, gli ebrei in Germania, i cinesi nel SudEst asiatico; Tutsi-Hutu.
→ read full articleOn The Dignity of Being Forgetful
Francisco Gomes de Matos – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
Rhymed Reflection
→ read full article(Italian) Guida ai musei della Resistenza e della lotta di Liberazione in Italia
Silvia Berruto, antifascista – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
La memoria di compagne e compagni che ricordano, con una perseveranza e con una pazienza speciali, a futura e imperitura memoria, di aver lottato per tutte e per tutti.
→ read full articleAnother Numerologist Gets the Idiot Award
Ed Burgos, The Dollar Vigilante – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
On the Nobel Prize in “economics.”
→ read full articleThe Lexicon of Madness
Anthony J. Marsella, Ph.D. – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
My purpose in writing this commentary is to call attention to the perils of language use and abuse that characterize the “mental” health professions and the public. As the introduction of the DSM V approaches, it is essential we understand the many underlying issues that exist at this time regarding the terms professionals and the public use when referring to “mental” health problems, especially with regard to their denotative and connotative meanings.
→ read full article(Italian) Intervista a Leonardo Boff
Altramente – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
La Teologia é seria quando si prende sul serio la testimonianza degli invisibili, dei disprezzati, di quelli che non contano niente. Ogni persona è unica al mondo, ha qualcosa da dire, da mostrare. Ignorante é quello che pensa che il popolo é ignorante.
→ read full articleUp To 100 Norwegians Join Syrian War
The Norway Post – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
Around 100 young men with Norwegian citizenship have travelled to Syria to participate in the civil war, NRK reports, quoting Muslim sources. They have estimated that more than 20 radical Norwegian Islamists are in Syria at this time, and that at least seven of them are fighting on the side of Al Qaida.
→ read full articlePrivatization Pushback: Civil Society Slams Water Privatization Conditions for EU Bailouts
Common Dreams – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
Civil society groups Wednesday [17 Oct 2012] are slamming the European Commission’s continued insistence that privatization of municipal water systems be a condition for receiving rescue funds, a plan the groups describe as “economically, socially and democratically flawed.”
→ read full articleRussia to Spend Over 100 Billion Rubles on Nuclear Weapons
Pravda – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
Russia plans to spend 101.15 billion rubles on nuclear weapons in 2013-2015, the head of the Defense Committee of the State Duma Vladimir Komoyedov said.
→ read full articleIs This What It Takes?
Tom Greening – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
Is this what it takes—
flaming, crumbling tombs on Wall Street,
a burning Pentagon?
London: Parasites’ Paradise (Or the Best Criminal Sanctuary Money Can Buy)
Prof. James Petras – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
Whenever financial swindlers prosper at the expense of investors or a bank jiggers interest rates to bugger their competitors or tax evaders flee fiscal crises or rent gouging petrol monarchies recycle profits or oligarchs pillage economies and drive millions to drink, drugs and destitution they find a suitable secure sanctuary in London.
→ read full articleRule by the Rich
Jerry Mander, New Left Project – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
In an extract from his upcoming book The Capitalism Papers, influential activist Jerry Mander describes the sheer scale of the rich’s control of the global economy and how they are seeking new territory in which to invest their wealth.
→ read full articleDefective Spiritual Guidance in America
Charles Mercieca, Ph.D. – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
In virtually every religion, people tend to look at the spiritual leaders of their community for inner guidance. Deep inside they all tend to be good to the best of their ability in spite of their human frailties. In a number of instances, a variety of viewpoints tend to create unnecessary contradictions.
→ read full articleMyanmar’s Rohingyas: No Help, Please, We’re Buddhists
The Economist – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
When Offending the Muslim World Seems a Small Price to Pay – The only thing that might sway Burmese opinion in favour of the [Muslim] Rohingyas, some say, would be the staunch support of Myanmar’s most famous and revered politician, the opposition leader, Aung San Suu Kyi. But she has been largely silent on their plight.
→ read full articleRate-Fixing Bankers to Face Jail Under New EU Rules
Benjamin Fox, EUobserver – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
Bankers caught manipulating the Libor exchange rate could face a minimum five-year jail term under new EU legislation. The provisions included in the proposed market abuse law were adopted by 39 votes to 0 with a single abstention in a vote by the parliament’s economic and monetary affairs committee on Monday (9 October 2012).
→ read full articleBeyond Language: Reflections on the Arakan Tragedy
Richard Falk – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
Yesterday [14 Oct 2012] I listened to the wife of the Prime Minister, Emine Erdogan, speak about her recent harrowing visit to the Rohingya people in the federal state of Arakan ( mainly known in the West as Rakhine) who are located in northwestern Myanmar (aka Burma). The Rohingya are a Muslim minority numbering over one million, long victimized locally and nationally in Burma and on several occasions over the years their people have been brutally massacred and their villages burned.
→ read full articleToward Barbarism: US Imperialism Unleashed
Ben Schreiner, Working Left – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
With signs of a global economic downturn mounting, US aggression across the Middle East and North Africa ratchets up. According to the IMF’s World Economic Outlook report released last week [October 2012], the “risks for a serious global slowdown are alarmingly high.” According to the New York Times, the Pentagon is readying military strikes in Libya in retaliation for the September attack on the US compound in Benghazi in addition to the deployment of troops along the Jordan-Syria border, CIA operatives are presently active along the Syria-Turkey border, facilitating the flow of arms to rebel forces.
→ read full articleHistoric Philippines Peace Agreement – Why This One Is Different
Timmon Wallis, Nonviolent Peaceforce – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
Peace Agreements are a dime a dozen these days. With an average of 25 wars going on around the world at any given time, there are peace agreements about to be signed almost every other week. No wonder the world ceases to take much interest anymore! Another Peace Agreement is signed in the Philippines yesterday – yawn.
→ read full articleThe Facts Are In: Nonviolent Resistance Works
John Dear S.J., National Catholic Reporter – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
“Nonviolence is fine as long as it works,” Malcolm X once said. Recently, Columbia University Press published an extraordinary scholarly book that proves how nonviolence works far better as a method for social change than violence. This breakthrough book demonstrates that Gandhi was right, that the method of nonviolent resistance as a way to social change usually leads to a more lasting peace while violence usually fails.
→ read full articleIt’s Time to Prioritise the Global Sharing Economy
Rajesh Makwana and Adam Parsons – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Oct 2012
As the widespread mobilisation of people power in 2011 demonstrated, only a united people’s voice is stronger than the private interests that obstruct progressive change from taking place. The responsibility for change rests with us – ordinary, engaged citizens – to forge a worldwide popular movement that upholds and strengthens the sharing economy in all its forms.
→ read full articleThe Peace Prize: Nobel or Ignoble?
Johan Galtung, 18 Oct 2012 - TRANSCEND Media Service,
18 Oct 2012
Both, of course. Well deserved for EU’s past and for relations within, in the tradition of West rewarding West. But critics are right about relations without and the present; like debt bondage of GIPSI–Greece-Italy-Portugal-Spain-Ireland/EU periphery–to Germany.
→ read full articleHope, Wisdom, Law, Ethics, and Spirituality in Relation to Killing and Dying: Persisting Syrian Dilemmas
Richard Falk – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
In appraising political developments most of us rely on trusted sources, our overall political orientation, what we have learned from past experience, and our personal hierarchy of hopes and fears. No matter how careful, and judicious, we are still reaching conclusions in settings of radical uncertainty, which incline our judgments to reflect a priori and interpretative biases.
→ read full articleNonviolence is the Response to Hate Cartoons
Dr. Abbas Aroua – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
In the last weeks we have seen a resurgence of Islamic-Western tensions around the seeming opposition between freedom of expression and respect for religious symbols. The attitudes and behaviors in the West vis-à-vis Islam which are perceived negatively in the Muslim world may be classified into seven categories:
→ read full articleThe Prospects of Intercultural Humanism in the 21st Century
Klaudius Cansczyk, et al. – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
The values that the Jewish physicist Albert Einstein and the Christian physicist, philosopher, and peace researcher Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker attribute to the Hindu politician Mahatma Gandhi, point towards an intercultural humanism which we regard as part of a worldwide array of religions and perspectives of the world which could and should survive as an orientation for the 21st century.
→ read full articleI Do Not Support the Nobel Peace Prize 2012 to the European Union
Mairead Corrigan Maguire, Nobel Peace Laureate (1976) – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
Whilst the EU imposes severe austerity measures upon many EU countries, it simultaneously supports the growing militarisation of Europe through support for US/NATO (guilty of war crimes in Iraq, Afghanistan, etc.), continues to support American nuclear weapons deployed to six EU States, supports arms sales from European States (UK, Germany, etc.) to countries around the world. The EU, instead of upholding human rights for countries such as Palestine, has rewarded Israel with a special trading status and huge grants for its military research and weapons thus enabling it to continue its illegal policies of occupation and Apartheid in Palestine.
→ read full articleOne Step Backward Taken
John Scales Avery – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
On his poem, “One step Backward Taken,” Robert Frost tells us that we can often save ourselves by taking a step backwards, by looking carefully at what has been happening and by avoiding going over the edge.
→ read full articleHow to Avoid Genetically Modified Food
Robin Mather, Mother Earth News – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
The only way to avoid GM food is to know which ingredients are likely to be genetically modified and read labels carefully, or to always choose organic foods, which are certified GM-free. Below are estimates of the percentages of GM foods found on store shelves. To learn more about this issue, see The Threats From Genetically Modified Foods.
→ read full article
Weathergirl Goes Rogue
Deep Rogue Ram - TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
Arctic ice cover just reached its lowest point in recorded history. Pippa goes off script and drops some science.
→ read full articleLexicon of War
Anthony J. Marsella, Ph.D. – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
Overwhelmed by the endless violence and wars in our world, I wrote an email to a number of listservs where I listed a number of different adjectives preceding the word “war.” And I added a request to readers to make any additions they felt were appropriate. The email brought many replies that both suggested additions and that acknowledged the implications of the emerging “lexicon of wars.” Thus I share with you an updated and more comprehensive lexicon of wars, with a figure (in the end) that suggests a socialization process for wars.
→ read full articleIs a Nuclear Deal With Iran Possible?
Pat Buchanan, Creators – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
In diplomacy, always leave your adversary an honorable avenue of retreat. Fifty years ago this October, to resolve a Cuban missile crisis that had brought us to the brink of nuclear war, John F. Kennedy did that. He conveyed to Nikita Khrushchev, secretly, that if the Soviet Union pulled its nuclear missiles out of Cuba, the United States would soon after pull its Jupiter missiles out of Italy and Turkey.
→ read full article(French) Face aux Caricatures de la Haine, la Non-Violence s’Impose
Abbas Aroua – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
Les dernières semaines ont connu la résurgence des tensions occidento-islamiques autour de l’opposition apparente entre la liberté d’expression et le respect des symboles religieux. On peut classer les attitudes et les comportements en Occident vis-à-vis de l’Islam qui sont perçus négativement dans le monde musulman en sept catégories:
→ read full article(Portuguese) Paz, Direitos Humanos e Desenvolvimento num Mundo Multi-Polar em Evolução
Johan Galtung, Forum Abel Varzim – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
Palestra proferida no Conselho do Forum Social dos Direitos Humanos em Nova Iorque – 1 de outubro de 2012. O foco está no desenvolvimento centrado nas pessoas – em vez de no crescimento económico centrado no sistema.
→ read full articleEmpire and Its Consequences
Robert Koehler – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
This is the morality of empire, the morality of domination. We didn’t invent it; we just carry on the tradition, which goes back through colonialism and slavery to the Inquisition (“kill them all, let God sort them out”) to Rome (“they create a wasteland and call it peace”) and beyond, to the dawn of civilization. I think the consequences have finally caught up with us.
→ read full article(Castellano) Miles de Indignados Colombianos Reclaman Su Participación en Diálogos de Paz
TeleSur – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
Miles de colombianos desean participar en las negociaciones entre el Gobierno nacional y las FARC, para discutir “una agenda de contenido político y económico que compete a las grandes mayorías desfavorecidas y marginadas”.
→ read full articleUNHCR Issues Guidelines on Protection of Male Rape Victims
UN Refugee Agency – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
The UN refugee agency has for the first time issued guidelines for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees staff and other aid workers on how to identify and support male victims of rape and other sexual violence in conflict and displacement situations. Access the guidelines: Working with men and boy survivors of sexual and Gender-based violence in forced displacement.
→ read full articleWhite House Widening Covert War in North Africa
Associated Press, Military News – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
Small teams of special operations forces arrived at American embassies throughout North Africa in the months before militants launched the fiery attack that killed the U.S. ambassador in Libya. The soldiers’ mission: Set up a network that could quickly strike a terrorist target or rescue a hostage. But the teams had yet to do much counterterrorism work in Libya, though the White House signed off a year ago on the plan to build the new military task force in the region and the advance teams had been there for six months, according to three U.S. counterterror officials and a former intelligence official.
→ read full articleFreedom Flotilla Sets Off To Gaza
AFP, Gulf News – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
A Swedish ship with rights activists from several countries aboard has sailed from Naples in the latest bid to break Israel’s blockade against Gaza. A crowd of well-wishers saw off the sailing vessel Estelle on Saturday [6 Oct 2012] as it left the Italian port as part of the “Freedom Flotilla” movement. The Estelle is carrying humanitarian aid and expected to reach Gaza in two weeks.
→ read full articleAmerica’s Moral Degeneracy
Paul Craig Roberts – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
Once upon a time, the Turks were a fierce people. Today they are Washington’s puppets. We have witnessed this during the past week. The Turkish government is permitting the Islamists from outside Syria, organized by the CIA and Israel, to attack Syria from Turkish territory… Muslim countries are incapable of supporting one another. Instead of supporting one another, Muslim governments accept payoffs to support instead the Christian/Zionist forces of the Western bloc.
→ read full articleThe ABC of Harmony
Dr. Bishnu Pathak* - TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
This is the first exclusive book to deal scientifically on harmony, harmonious civilization, harmonic education, and cross-cultural dialogues across the world at local, regional, national, and international levels.
→ read full articleThe Big Burst
Udaya R. Tennakoon – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
Like a ball sinking in water
Life is flowing
The Empire Strikes Back
George Monbiot – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
Imperialism did almost as much harm to the ruling nations as it did to their subject peoples. Over the gates of Auschwitz were the words “Work Makes You Free”. Over the gates of the Solovetsky camp in Lenin’s gulag: “Through Labour – Freedom!”. Over the gates of the Ngenya detention camp, run by the British in Kenya: “Labour and Freedom”. Dehumanisation appears to follow an almost inexorable course.
→ read full articleStay Out of the Syrian Maelstrom
Patrick J. Buchanan – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
Last year, U.S. planes scrambled to defend Benghazi against the “tanks, helicopters and fighter jets” of Col. Gadhafi. Now we are investigating the murders of our ambassador and three Americans in the city we saved. To bring down helicopters and fighter jets would require U.S. F-16s over Syria or putting surface-to-air missiles in rebel hands. Do we really want to be passing Stingers around a no man’s land where al-Qaida agents could buy up a few to bring down U.S. airliners?
→ read full articleFormer UN Envoy Jean Ziegler on Third World Hunger: “We Let Them Starve”
Thomas M Blaser, Africa is a Country – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
‘According to the UN World Food Programme, there is enough food in the world for 12 billion people. If today people are still starving, then this is organized crime, mass murder. Every five seconds, one child under the age of ten dies, one billion people are permanently and heavily undernourished.’ Quote from Jean Ziegler, who was (2000-2008) the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food and subsequently a member of the Advisory Committee to the UN Human Rights Council.
→ read full article
Howard Zinn on Columbus, Mark Twain – Honesty in History (VIDEO OF THE WEEK)
Amy Goodman – Democracy NOW! – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
Segment from Democracy NOW! aired May 13, 2009 featuring the great late historian Howard Zinn.
→ read full articleDignity in Charity
Francisco Gomes de Matos – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
When, in the media, people boast of their charity
Doesn´t that behavior violate humanitarian dignity?
(Italian) Sociocidio, Israele e Palestina
Johan Galtung – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
Testimonianza per il Tribunale Russell sulla Palestine – NewYork City, 7 ottobre 2012 – Sociocidio è un nuovo concetto che non ha trovato posto nel diritto internazionale positivo. Come Genocidio e Ecocidio, il Sociocidio, l’eliminazione della capacità di una società di sopravvivere e riprodursi, dovrebbe ugualmente diventare un delitto preminente contro l’umanità. La Palestina è dunque vittima di sociocidio da parte di Israele? Decisamente!
→ read full articleWas It Wrong to Support the Iranian Revolution in 1978 (Because It Turned Out Badly)?
Richard Falk – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
As with the days of the Shah, Iran urgently requires an emancipatory politics that liberates from within, and regenerates the hopes of the Iranian people. What Iran does not need is an Israeli-American military strike or destabilization moves funded and promoted from without. Intervention by way of military attack, or even in the form of strong economic sanctions (as present), stabilize the regime in Tehran and impose added hardships on the Iranian people.
→ read full articleGenetical Engineering’s Dirty Little Secret
Marcia Ishii-Eiteman, Pesticide Action Network – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Oct 2012
As a scientist at Pesticide Action Network, I am frequently asked these days to explain what genetically engineered (GE) crops have to do with pesticides. When I answer that GE crops both contain and drive up pesticide use, I am often met with earnest incredulity. We seem to need to believe that GE technology is the best thing since sliced bread.
→ read full article