Articles by Common Dreams
We found 277 results.
(Português) Em sua primeira aparição ao vivo desde as delações, Snowden faz um “chamado às armas”
Lauren McCauley, Common Dreams – TRANSCEND Media Service,
24 Mar 2014
De acordo com a programação do evento, a plataforma serve para “encorajar os empreendedores, inovadores, fabricantes, hackers, nerds, fundadores, investidores e pensadores que estejam assistindo à videoconferência do SXSW para construir sistemas mais eficientes na proteção da privacidade do usuário”.
→ read full articleUS to UN: We Can Disregard Int’l Human Rights Treaty
Andrea Germanos – Common Dreams,
17 Mar 2014
US tells human rights panel that treaty that bans torture, arbitrary killings and detention doesn’t apply to its military operations. The grilling happened Thursday [13 Mar 2014] in Geneva during the first of a two-day session held by the 18-member UN Human Rights Committee.
→ read full articleResearchers Confirm: When NSA Watches Your Metadata, It Is Watching You
Sarah Lazare – Common Dreams,
17 Mar 2014
Stanford University researchers have confirmed what civil liberties advocates have warned since the NSA scandal broke: metadata surveillance is a window to highly sensitive personal information, including medical issues, financial history, and even marijuana cultivation.
→ read full articleVoices Blast Dow Chemical’s ‘Agent Orange’ Seed Warfare
Lauren McCauley – Common Dreams,
17 Mar 2014
Pending approval of the GE Seeds, Dow prepares to roll out seed-herbicide combination package, spelling ‘catastrophe’ for farms and farmers.
→ read full articleAs TPP Opposition Soars, Corporate Media Blackout Deafening
Jon Queally – Common Dreams,
10 Feb 2014
Opposition to the Trans-Pacific Partnership—dubbed ‘NAFTA on steroids’—is receiving unprecedented popular opposition and nearly no news coverage by major outlets.
→ read full articleDavos’ Elite Message Deserves ‘Fierce Resistance’ Not Applause
Jon Queally – Common Dreams,
27 Jan 2014
As the World Economic Forum kicks off its global summit in Davos, Switzerland on Wednesday [22 Jan 2014], critics of the annual gathering are eager to show that the well-polished public image of the event should not be allowed to eclipse the nefarious and destructive role played by the many corporate elites that sponsor it.
→ read full articleTPP: Poison for Local Community Resilience
Richard Heinberg – Common Dreams,
20 Jan 2014
If a city, county, or state were to ban fracking within its jurisdiction, oil companies could overturn the ban and sue for millions of dollars in lost profits. Want to label GM foods? Sorry, that’s a barrier to trade. Want local schools to buy healthy food from local farmers? Nope, that might violate the rights of Big Ag. Want to protect a forest? Stand aside, you’re in the way of profits.
→ read full articleAfter 20 Years of NAFTA Poverty, Lawmakers Move to Fast-Track TPP
Sarah Lazare – Common Dreams,
13 Jan 2014
On the heels of NAFTA’s “20 years of regret” anniversary, U.S. lawmakers are aggressively pushing legislation to fast-track what has been called NAFTA on steroids: the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).
→ read full articleNation’s Libraries Warn of NSA’s ‘Ravenous Hunger’ for Data
Andrea Germanos – Common Dreams,
9 Dec 2013
“We don’t want [library patrons] being surveilled because that will inhibit learning, and reading, and creativity.” The world’s largest library association is warning against the NSA’s “ravenous hunger” for information and is urging the passage of legislation to rein in the agency’s vast surveillance powers.
→ read full articleIn Afghanistan, ‘Security Deal’ Means US Occupation Forever
Sarah Lazare – Common Dreams,
25 Nov 2013
In addition to immunity, US demands right to enter Afghan homes in ‘bi-lateral security agreement.’ If you reduce the amount of occupation forces but keep them there forever, then the occupation continues and the war on people’s everyday lives is not actually over — no matter what the US government or mainstream media tells us.
→ read full articleDump It in the Ocean: TEPCO’s Plan for Radioactive Fukushima Water
Andrea Germanos – Common Dreams,
25 Nov 2013
‘There’s no risk to public health and safety,’ pronounces consultant working for the nuclear plant’s owner.
→ read full articleMillions against Monsanto: Five Lessons from the Battle against GMOs
Ronnie Cummins – Common Dreams,
4 Nov 2013
The rapidly growing anti-GMO Movement illustrates the powerful synergy that can develop from the combined use of social media, marketplace pressure and political action. Out-of-control corporations, media, politicians and the proverbial “one percent” can be outsmarted and outmaneuvered. And quite possibly defeated.
→ read full articleToxic Overflow of Thousands of Fukushima Tanks Following Heavy Rains
Lauren McCauley – Common Dreams,
28 Oct 2013
Highly radioactive water crested the walls of some 1,000 storage tanks at Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power facility after plant officials underestimated the amount of rainfall Sunday [20 Oct 2013].
→ read full articlePepsi, Nestlé, Coca Cola Revealed as Big Money behind GMO Labeling Fight
Jacob Chamberlain – Common Dreams,
28 Oct 2013
In Washington state battle, pro-GMO lobbyists forced to expose illegally hidden donors.
→ read full articleHere Comes the 2013 Nobel Peace Prize, Dragging a Broken Moral Compass
Norman Solomon – Common Dreams,
7 Oct 2013
Despite all its claims of independence, the Oslo-based Nobel Committee is enmeshed in Norwegian politics. The global prestige of the Nobel Peace Prize has obscured the reality that its selection committee is chosen by leaders of Norway’s main political parties—and, as a member of NATO, Norway is deeply entangled in the military alliance.
→ read full articleCrisis at Fukushima Continues to Spiral with Hole in Radiation Barrier
Andrea Germanos – Common Dreams,
30 Sep 2013
In the latest in a series of mishaps to hit the crisis-stricken Fukushima nuclear power plant, a radiation-stopping “fence” around the reactors has developed a hole, plant operator TEPCO admitted on Thursday [26 Sep 2013]. Fences made of earth and sand sit in the harbor next to the plant and were erected to help contain radioactive material from flowing into the ocean.
→ read full articleTaking Exception to Exceptionalism
Bernard Weisberger – Common Dreams,
23 Sep 2013
The unchecked violence of our times must be reduced before it destroys any hopes of a decent future for humanity. If the US would take an active role as a partner in the process, rather than an armed dictator of terms from a lofty perch of morality, it would go far towards restoring the admiration the world long felt for us when our military establishment was tiny and our practice of democracy was robust.
→ read full articleEgypt Joins Israel as Gaza’s Jailer
Medea Benjamin and Pam Bailey – Common Dreams,
23 Sep 2013
As the military and other opponents of ousted President Mohamed Morsi the interim government of Egypt has increasingly allied itself with Israel in strategy and actions – becoming just as much Gazans’ jailer as its neighbor to the east.
→ read full articleIn ‘Chilling’ Ruling, Chevron Granted Access to Activists’ Private Internet Data
Lauren McCauley - Common Dreams,
15 Jul 2013
A federal [US] judge has ruled to allow Chevron, through Microsoft, to collect the IP records and identity email accounts from over 100 environmental activists, journalists and attorneys. The oil giant alleges having being victim of a conspiracy in the $18.2 billion judgment against it for dumping 18.5 billion gallons of oil waste in the Ecuadorean Amazon, causing untold damage to the rainforest.
→ read full articlePeople Get Ready: ‘Unprecedented’ Weather Glimpses Century Ahead
Jon Queally – Common Dreams,
8 Jul 2013
Latest Report from the World Meteorological Organization Says First Decade of Century Was Hottest, Wettest On Record with More to Come – “Carbon-dioxide concentration […] reached an average global value of 389 parts per million by the end of the decade, the highest value recorded for at least the past 10,000 years.”
→ read full articleNaomi Klein: ‘Anti-Shock Doctrines’ Show the Way to Resist
Andrea Germanos – Common Dreams,
10 Jun 2013
“Only when the alternatives look tangible, look real, look credible and inspiring will the fear of saying no, of standing up to the troika begin to fade.” We need to have our ideas ready to move forward in a new way, she said. It’s time to build.
→ read full article(Português) Limpeza de Fukushima Vai Demorar Mais de 40 Anos, Diz Agência Nuclear
Common Dreams – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Apr 2013
Após vazamentos e invasão de ratos, a Agência Internacional de Energia Atômica pediu para a empresa administradora de Fukushima “melhorar a confiabilidade de sistemas essenciais”, crucial para “a integridade estrutural das instalações do local” e “para melhorar a proteção contra perigos externos”.
→ read full articleLet George W. Bush Discuss His Legacy However He Likes… from The Hague
Jodie Evans and Charles Davis – Common Dreams,
29 Apr 2013
Kill a few, they call you a murderer. Kill tens of thousands, they give you $500 million for a granite vanity project and a glossy 30-page supplement in the local paper.
→ read full articleHerbicides for GMOs Driving Monarch Butterfly Populations to ‘Ominous’ Brink
Lauren McCauley – Common Dreams,
18 Mar 2013
Released by the Mexican government along with the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), a recent survey found a 59% decrease in the area occupied by monarch colonies wintering in the forests of central Mexico, the Los Angeles Times reports. Scientists are attributing the decline of this essential pollinating population to the ongoing drought and the “explosive” increase in the use of genetically modified crops in the American corn belt.
→ read full articleNow Six – Not One – Hanford Tanks Leaking Radioactive Waste
Craig Brown – Common Dreams,
4 Mar 2013
Six aging, single-walled underground storage tanks are leaking radioactive waste, threatening groundwater below the Hanford nuclear site, Washington state Governor Jay Inslee announced on Friday [22 Feb, 2013] afternoon.
→ read full articleParallelism: What If the Chinese Killed the Dalai Lama with a Drone Strike?
Tom Gallagher – Common Dreams,
25 Feb 2013
It might be absurd to consider the hypothetical, but then again, what has become the reality of US policy, like the extrajudicial killing a US teenager, would have also once been decried as absurd. We know that the Dalai Lama isn’t guilty of terrorism, but then by now we also know that some of America’s drone strike victims weren’t either.
→ read full articleBolivia Nationalizes Electricity Companies in Hopes of Improving Rural Access
Jacob Chamberlain – Common Dreams,
7 Jan 2013
Bolivia President Evo Morales has nationalized two electricity distribution companies owned by Spanish utility company Iberdrola in the latest of several industry nationalizations since Morales took office, which has included oil, mining, telecommunications, and energy generation companies.
→ 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 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 articleRethinking Columbus: Towards a True People’s History
Bill Bigelow – Common Dreams,
15 Oct 2012
In more than 30 years of teaching U.S. history and guest-teaching in others’ classes, I’ve never had a single student say, “Taínos.” So I ask them to think about that fact. “How do we explain that? We all know the name of the man who came here from Europe, but none of us knows the name of the people who were here first—and there were hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of them. Why haven’t you heard of them?” This ignorance is an artifact of historical silencing—rendering invisible the lives and stories of entire peoples.
→ read full articleAt Milestone, US Military Deaths Dwarfed by Afghans Killed
Common Dreams – TRANSCEND Media Service,
1 Oct 2012
As 2,000th American soldier killed in Afghanistan makes headlines, estimates put Afghan civilian dead at over 20,000.
→ read full articleScientists: No to Genetically Modified Crops, Yes to Paradigm Shift
Common Dreams – TRANSCEND Media Service,
1 Oct 2012
A group of scientists said that ecological farming and a shift towards a holistic paradigm, not genetically modified (GM) crops, are the answer for India’s future agricultural needs. The scientists made their statements in New Delhi at a media briefing organized by Aruna Rodrigues, lead petitioner in a public interest litigation seeking a moratorium on GM testing in India, the Times of India reports.
→ read full articleFrance Says No to Genetically Modified Crops, No to Fracking
Common Dreams – TRANSCEND Media Service,
24 Sep 2012
France will maintain its ban on genetically modified crops [GMOs] and will ban fracking, politicians announced during an environmental conference held in Paris Friday and Saturday [Sep 14-15, 2012].
→ read full article‘Planetary Emergency’: New Data Elevates Climate Change Alarm
Common Dreams – TRANSCEND Media Service,
24 Sep 2012
Drawing on new data on the rate of melting arctic ice released Wednesday [19 Sep 2012] by the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC), leading scientific experts and environmental campaigners upped the level of alarm and issued a renewed call to action by calling the growing reality of climate change a “planetary emergency”.
→ read full articleIn Quebec It’s Official: Mass Movement Leads to Victory for Students
Common Dreams – TRANSCEND Media Service,
24 Sep 2012
Naomi Klein: ‘This is why radical movements are mercilessly mocked. They can win.’
→ read full articleWe Eat by the Grace of Nature, Not by the Grace of Monsanto
Jennifer Browdy de Hernandez – Common Dreams,
10 Sep 2012
“Organic, schmorganic,” fumes New York Times columnist Roger Cohen sarcastically in an article entitled “The Organic Fable.” He bases his sweeping dismissal of the organic foods movement on a new Stanford University study claiming that “fruits and vegetables labeled organic are, on average, no more nutritious than their cheaper conventional counterparts.”
→ read full articleRemembering Sister Anne Montgomery
Rev. John Dear – Common Dreams,
3 Sep 2012
One of the legends in the U.S. peace movement, Sister Anne Montgomery, died this week [31 Aug 2012] in California. A member of the Religious of the Sacred Heart, she spent over three years in prison for many civil disobedience actions against war, including seven plowshares anti-nuclear disarmament actions; many years teaching in Harlem, and many years living with the Christian Peacemaker Team in Hebron, Palestine-Israel.
→ read full articleWall Street Tightens Grip on Public Water as Local Residents Suffer
Common Dreams – TRANSCEND Media Service,
27 Aug 2012
Vulture capitalists are increasingly facilitating the privatization of public infrastructure, taking control of public utilities while skimping on services and causing steep price hikes — all the while making massive profits. According to the report, private equity firms show up to hurting municipalities as hired financial advisers and subsequently push through privatization deals. Massive profits are made in the process, as such advisers stand to make great financial gains through these deals.
→ read full articleNobel Peace Laureates Call on NBC to Cancel New Show: ‘War Isn’t Entertainment’
Common Dreams - TRANSCEND Media Service,
20 Aug 2012
Critics say show promotes an “inglorious tradition of glorifying war and armed violence.” Nine Nobel Peace Laureates on Monday [13 Aug 2012] joined a growing chorus of critics calling on NBC entertainment to cancel the new “reality” show—“Stars Earn Stripes”—saying that “war isn’t entertainment.”
→ read full articleGates Foundation Pours $10 Million into Genetically Modified Crops
Common Dreams staff – TRANSCEND Media Service,
23 Jul 2012
Vandana Shiva: Bill Gates “is so totally wrong on this assumption that genetically modified seeds produce more.” In a decision outraging campaigners for food sovereignty and agroecological approaches, the Gates Foundation has awarded a $10 million grant to develop genetically modified (GM) crops for use in sub-Saharan Africa.
→ read full articleBrazil Set to Unleash Genetically Modified Mosquitoes
Common Dreams staff - TRANSCEND Media Service,
16 Jul 2012
Oxitec continues “dangerously misguided” plan to combat dengue fever. Brazil is readying a plan to unleash large numbers of genetically modified (GM) mosquitoes in an effort to combat dengue fever, a plan that environmentalists have previously called “dangerously misguided.”
→ read full articleFukushima Radiation at Record High
Common Dreams staff – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 Jul 2012
Levels of radiation at Fukushima’s reactor number 1 were at record levels on Wednesday [27 Jun 2012], Agence France-Presse reports. The lethal levels — 10,300 millisieverts an hour — were 10 times higher than the levels at Fukushima’s numbers two and three reactors. “Workers cannot enter the site and we must use robots for the demolition,” said TEPCO.
→ read full articleKiller Insect Virus Helping to Decimate World’s Bee Population
Common Dreams staff - TRANSCEND Media Service,
11 Jun 2012
A new study published in the journal Science has revealed that, in addition to the destruction of natural habitats and the widespread use of industrial chemical pesticides, the global bee die-off witnessed in recent years is also caused by a deadly virus carried by bloodsucking parasitic mites.
→ read full articleImmemorial Day – No Peace for Militarized U.S.
Bill Quigley - Common Dreams,
28 May 2012
Peace today is a nearly impossible challenge for the United States. The U.S. is far and away the most militarized country in the world and the most aggressive. Unless the U.S. dramatically reduces its emphasis on global military action, there will be many, many more families grieving on future Memorial days.
→ read full articlePlastic in ‘Great Pacific Garbage Patch’ Has Increased 100-Fold
Common Dreams staff - TRANSCEND Media Service,
21 May 2012
Plastic garbage in the ocean has increased 100-fold in the past 40 years and could have ecosystem-wide impacts, according to a study released Tuesday [8 May 2012].
→ read full articleJeremy Scahill: US Has Become ‘Nation of Assassins’
Common Dreams staff – TRANSCEND Media Servivce,
7 May 2012
US Peace Conference Puts Face to Drone Victims – International law experts, peace activists, journalists and human rights advocates from around the world gathered in Washington, DC over the weekend [29 Apr 2012] to inform the American public about US drone policy and the impact it is having on human populations throughout the world.
→ read full articleIndia: Undermining Human Rights in the Name of Development
Bianca Jagger – Common Dreams,
16 Apr 2012
When I arrived at Biju Patnaik Airport, Bhubaneswar, Orissa, I was struck by a billboard above the luggage carousel: “Mining happiness for the people of Orissa – Vedanta.” What cruel irony. The poster should have read instead, “Undermining happiness for the people of Orissa.” The opening of an aluminum refinery in Lanjigarh, in south-west Orissa in eastern India, by the Vedanta Aluminum Limited (VAL), a subsidiary of British based mining group, Vedanta Resources plc, has brought nothing but misery, disease and impoverishment to the Kondh communities of the area.
→ read full articleEnviro Groups Fear “Dangerously Misguided” Plan to Unleash Genetically Modified Mosquitoes
Common Dreams staff – TRANSCEND Media Service,
19 Mar 2012
Eric Hoffman of Friends of the Earth U.S. said: “The fact that Oxitec is hiding data from the public has undermined its credibility. Oxitec’s assertions cannot be trusted. Trials of its mosquitoes must not move forward in the absence of comprehensive and impartial reviews of the environmental, human health and ethical risks. Such trials must also await the establishment of a clear and well designed regulatory framework, which does not yet exist.”
→ read full articleFrance to EU: Stop Monsanto’s Corn
Common Dreams staff – TRANSCEND Media Service,
27 Feb 2012
France has asked the European regulators to suspend the authorization to plant Monsanto’s genetically modified (GM) MON810 corn. France’s ecology minister says the decision is based on studies showing GM crops “pose significant risks for the environment.”
→ read full articleWikiLeaks Banned From UN Conference on WikiLeaks
Common Dreams staff – TRANSCEND Media Service,
20 Feb 2012
WikiLeaks has lodged a strong protest with the UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) for “banning’’ it from an international conference it is hosting at its headquarters in Paris on the impact of the whistle-blower website’s activities. It said the U.S. organizers of the two-day conference, which opened on Thursday [16 Feb 2012], had “stacked’’ it with WikiLeaks’ opponents and “blocked all speakers from WikiLeaks, stating that the decision to censor WikiLeaks representation was an exercise in ‘freedom of expression… our right to give voice to speakers of our choice’’.”
→ read full article‘Global Square’: WikiLeaks-Backed Activist Platform Launching in March
Common Dreams staff – TRANSCEND Media Service,
20 Feb 2012
WikiLeaks Central announced a “Call to Coders” Tuesday [14 Feb 2012] as they prepare for the March launch of the “first massive decentralized social network in the history of the Internet.” The goal of the Global Square is to perpetuate and spread the creative and cooperative spirit of the occupations and transform this into lasting forms of social organization, at the global as well as the local level.
→ read full articleNobel Peace Prize Jury under Investigation
Common Dreams staff – TRANSCEND Media Service,
6 Feb 2012
Probe: Has Nobel Peace Prize Lost Its Way?
→ read full articleACTA: The International Treaty You’ve Never Heard of That Could Affect Internet Freedom
Common Dreams staff – TRANSCEND Media Service,
30 Jan 2012
US among countries that have already signed ACTA. Under this new treaty, Internet Service Providers will police all data passing through them, making them legally responsible for what their users do online. And should you do something considered “breach of copyright” like, for instance, getting a tattoo of a brand logo, taking a photo and posting it somewhere, you may be disconnected from the Internet, fined or even jailed.
→ read full articleThe Delusional Assumptions of Capitalism
Doug Harvey – Common Dreams,
9 Jan 2012
One of the more delusional aspects of capitalism is the idea that if one pursues the acquisition of private wealth with abandon, that this is somehow automatically “good” for human society. The pursuit of resources and markets to feed a system that MUST grow to survive has made the planet and all of its inhabitants commodities. In capitalist mythology, EVERYTHING has a monetary value, including and perhaps especially, people. Ultimately, our “house” is the planet – there is NO getting around this fact. For some time now we have had pictures of Planet Earth taken from space. The empirical evidence is clear: we are a very small household in a vast sea of time and space. We MUST cooperate or perish.
→ read full articleThrowing out the Master’s Tools and Building a Better House
Rebecca Solnit – Common Dreams,
21 Nov 2011
Thoughts on the Importance of Nonviolence in the Occupy Revolution – Violence is what the police use. It’s what the state uses. If we want a revolution, it’s because we want a better world, because we think we have a bigger imagination, a more beautiful vision. So we’re not violent; we’re not like them in crucial ways.
→ read full articlePFC Bradley Manning: Conscience and Agency
Ethan McCord – Common Dreams,
18 Jul 2011
The following is a response to last week’s New York Magazine article, Bradley Manning’s Army of One. Serving with my unit 2nd battalion 16th infantry in New Baghdad Iraq, I vividly remember the moment in 2007, when our Battalion Commander walked into the room and announced our new rules of engagement: “Listen up, new battalion SOP (standing operating procedure) from now on: Anytime your convoy gets hit by an IED, I want 360 degree rotational fire. You kill every [expletive] in the street!”
→ read full articleMonsanto in Haiti
Beverly Bell – Common Dreams,
4 Jul 2011
Last spring, in violation of Haitian law, the Minister of Agriculture gave the agribusiness giant Monsanto permission to “donate” 505 tons of seeds to Haiti. The first shipment of 60 tons, reportedly of maize and vegetable seeds, arrived in May 2010. Some of the seeds were coated with a chemical (Thiram) so toxic that the EPA forbids its sale to home gardeners in the U.S.. Monsanto announced its $4 million gift was “to support the reconstruction effort” in Haiti.
→ read full article“Don’t Look Away—The Siege of Gaza Must End”
Kathy Kelly – Common Dreams,
20 Jun 2011
In late June 2011, I’m going to be a passenger on “The Audacity of Hope,” the USA boat in this summer’s international flotilla to break the illegal and deadly Israeli siege of Gaza. Organizers, supporters and passengers aim to nonviolently end the brutal collective punishment imposed on Gazan residents since 2006 when the Israeli government began a stringent air, naval and land blockade of the Gaza Strip explicitly to punish Gaza’s residents for choosing the Hamas government in a democratic election.
→ read full articleCamp Sol: Spain’s “Indignant” Give Lessons in True Democracy
María Carrión – Common Dreams,
6 Jun 2011
The seeds sown by Camp Sol are the assemblies and open mike sessions that have spread to hundreds of neighborhoods, towns and villages across Spain. Although there is a prevalence of young people, the movement is increasingly attracting older folks ranging from families with children to middle-aged professionals and retirees — all deeply affected by the deep economic crisis and the government’s austerity measures. Young “Indignants” in other cities such as Paris, Athens, Buenos Aires, Bogotá and Brussels have supported the movement with protests of their own.
→ read full articleIs Fukushima Now Ten Chernobyls into the Sea?
Harvey Wasserman – Common Dreams,
30 May 2011
New readings show levels of radioisotopes found up to 30 kilometers offshore from the on-going crisis at Fukushima are ten times higher than those measured in the Baltic and Black Seas during Chernobyl. Fukushima’s owner, the Tokyo Electric Power Company, has confirmed that fuel at Unit One melted BEFORE the arrival of the March 11 tsunami. This critical revelation confirms that the early stages of that melt-down were set in motion by the earthquake that sent tremors into Japan from a relatively far distance out to sea.
→ read full articlePalestinian Unity and the New Middle East
Ramzy Baroud – Common Dreams,
9 May 2011
But frankly, at this juncture of Middle East history, Israel is almost negligible. It no longer has a transformative influence in the region. When the Arab people began revolting, a new dimension to the Arab-Israeli conflict emerged. As the chants in Cairo’s Tahrir Square began to adopt a pan-Arab and pro-Palestinian language, it became obvious that Egypt would soon venture outside the political confines of Washington’s patronizing labels, which divide the Arabs into moderates (good) and radicals (bad).
→ read full articleWar Hawk or Deficit Hawk? You Cannot Be Both
Michael True – Common Dreams,
9 May 2011
Must we, as a people, squander our wealth and our young people in wars of conquest and intervention, financing 1,000 military bases around the world, funding corrupt dictatorships, and imposing “democracy” on countries whether they want it or not? Going along to get along, Democrats and Republicans support policies that justify torture, undermine the right of habeas corpus, destabilize unions, abandon our once-admired educational system, and neglect our own people.
→ read full articleNonviolence: The Unconquerable Authority
Winslow Myers – Common Dreams,
7 Mar 2011
The subversive and hopeful message of Egypt’s Tahrir Square is that change does not have to come by violence, just as the message from Tripoli—or Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iraq—is that violence only cycles into worse violence. If unarmed citizens in Tahrir Square can create positive change, why can’t the most powerful democracy on earth choose to bring about change not with military violence, but with magnanimous humanitarian aid and adherence to international laws and institutions?
→ read full articleDon’t Just Close Guantánamo, Return It
César Chelala – Common Dreams,
10 Jan 2011
To restore good relations with Latin America and the Caribbean, damaged by several years of neglect, is one of many difficult tasks facing the Obama administration. A measure that could have far-reaching consequences and notably improve the U.S.’ battered image in the continent would be to return Guantánamo to the Cuban people.
→ read full article“Coexistence” with Monsanto: Hell No!
Ronnie Cummins – Common Dreams,
27 Dec 2010
After 16 years of non-stop biotech bullying and force-feeding Genetically Engineered or Modified (GE or GM) crops to farm animals and “Frankenfoods” to unwitting consumers, Monsanto has a big problem, or rather several big problems. A growing number of published scientific studies indicate that GE foods pose serious human health threats.
→ read full article“Miami Rice”: The Business of Disaster in Haiti
Beverly Bell and Tory Field – Common Dreams,
13 Dec 2010
What is at stake in Haiti? What interests underlie the grab for power in the country? One answer is the large amount of aid and development dollars that are circulating. Among those benefiting handsomely from the disaster aid are U.S. corporations who have accessed U.S. government contracts. Below is the tale of one U.S. corporation and its subsidiaries, who have received contracts which involve both a conflict of interest and harm to one of Haiti’s largest and most vulnerable social sectors, small farmers.
→ read full articleWhy WikiLeaks is Good for Democracy
Prof. Bill Quigley – Common Dreams,
6 Dec 2010
Information is the currency of democracy. –Thomas Jefferson. By labeling tens of millions of documents secret, the US government has created a huge vacuum of information…. Wikileaks has the potential to make transparency and accountability more robust in the US. That is good for democracy.
→ read full articleCitizen Protests, Government Repression Mount in Haiti
Beverly Bell – Common Dreams,
25 Oct 2010
Activists interviewed say their call for MINUSTAH’s departure is based on the force’s violence, its ineffectiveness in accomplishing its mission, the waste of money, and the undemocratic and colonial nature of the operation in a sovereign nation. The actions have been convened by a coalition including a media network, human rights and housing rights groups, and committees from various camps. Asked what she and others in Haiti’s social movement want, Jetty Jenet said, “We’re calling out for help to make the authorities hear us. We’re all dying.” For nine months, Jetty has had no income and has lived with her children under a plastic tarp in Cité Soleil. “But we’re people, too.”
→ read full articleHonduras: Crisis and Progress
Bill Quigley and Laura Raymond – Common Dreams,
25 Oct 2010
Today, October 21, the democratic resistance in Honduras will celebrate Artists in Resistance Day. This event contrasts directly with today’s official recognition of Honduras Armed Forces day. The resistance, which is working for a truly democratic Honduras, renamed the day and created an alternative celebration because of a brutal police attack on musicians and others last month that left one dead and scores injured.
→ read full articleEconomics: Doing Business As If People Mattered
Robert Jensen – Common Dreams,
11 Oct 2010
When politicians talk economics these days, they argue a lot about the budget deficit. That’s crucial to our economic future, but in the contemporary workplace there’s an equally threatening problem — the democracy deficit.
→ read full articleSouth of the Border: Oliver Stone Does Chavez
Prairie Miller – Common Dreams,
28 Jun 2010
Cuban leader Fidel Castro was interrogated some years ago by the New York Times, demanding to know why freedom of the press is not allowed in Cuba. Meaning, of course, beyond buzzwords, the inclusion of pro-capitalist reporting. To which Fidel’s checkmate reply was something like, we’ll allow that to happen when you allow a communist reporter on the staff of the New York Times.
→ read full articleIs Blackwater’s Erik Prince Moving to the United Arab Emirates?
Jeremy Scahill – Common Dreams,
21 Jun 2010
With Blackwater’s top deputies indicted on federal charges and the company up for sale, rumors are swirling that Prince is preparing to bolt to a country with no extradition treaty with the US.
→ read full articleNo Nukes/No Empire: The Abolition of Nuclear Weapons Requires the End of the U.S. Empire
Robert Jensen – Common Dreams,
21 Jun 2010
[A version of this essay was delivered to the “Think outside the Bomb” event in Austin, TX, on June 14, 2010.] If we are serious about the abolition of nuclear weapons, we have to place the abolition of the U.S. empire at the center of our politics.
→ read full articleTale of Two Nuclear Whistleblowers
David Krieger – Common Dreams,
21 Jun 2010
What are we to learn from this tale of two whistleblowers, one fictitious, one real? One important lesson is the danger of nuclear double standards. We cannot be content to make a hero of a fictional Iranian nuclear whistleblower, while turning a blind eye to the treatment of a real-life Israeli nuclear whistleblower and to the Israeli nuclear arsenal.
→ read full articleProtecting the Perpetrators – Pedophiles and Popes: Doing the Vatican Shuffle
Michael Parenti – Common Dreams,
17 May 2010
The church seems determined to learn nothing from its transgressions, preoccupied as it is with avoiding lawsuits and bad publicity. Really Not All that Serious. First, pedophilia is not that serious if it involves only a few isolated and passing incidents. Second, an even more creepy way of downplaying the problem: child molestation is not all that damaging or that important. At worst, it is regrettable and unfortunate; it might greatly upset the child, but it certainly is not significant enough to cause unnecessary scandal and ruin the career of an otherwise splendid padre…. The damage done to sexual victims continues to go unnoticed: the ensuing years of depression, drug addiction, alcoholism, panic attacks, sexual dysfunction, and even mental breakdown and suicide-all these terrible aftereffects of child rape seem to leave popes and bishops more or less unruffled.
→ read full articleWHAT DO EMPIRES DO?
Prof. Michael Parenti – Common Dreams,
14 Feb 2010
When I wrote my book Against Empire in 1995, as might be expected, some of my U.S. compatriots thought it was wrong of me to call the United States an empire. It was widely believed that U.S. rulers did not pursue empire; they intervened abroad only out of self-defense or for humanitarian rescue operations or […]
→ read full articleISRAEL AND EGYPT CONTINUE TO SQUEEZE THE LIFEBLOOD OUT OF THE PEOPLE OF GAZA
Ann Wright – Common Dreams,
18 Jan 2010
Israeli Airstrikes and Tank Shelling and Egyptian Underground Walls and Maritime Blockade Two weeks ago, almost 2,000 internationals came to Egypt and Gaza in a massive show of civil society support for the people of Gaza. 1,362 persons representing 44 countries in the Gaza Freedom March and over 500 persons with the Viva Palestina Convoy […]
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