Dissent Mag

Entries from April 2008

Consider the Consequences of Bombing Iran’s Nuclear Power Plants, and Pray

April 30, 2008 · No Comments

by Floyd Rudmin

Global Research, April 29, 2008

The US government has recently increased the belligerence of its tone towards Iran.

A string of reports in a variety of newspapers suggest war is on the way: the Mail & Guardian April 1, the Rutland Herald April 4, the Telegraph April 7, the International Herald Tribune April 11, the Washington Post April 12, the Washington Times April 16, the Progressive April 24, the Santa Monica Mirror April 24, Asia Times April 25, the International Herald Tribune April 25, the Toronto Star April 25, the Christian Science Monitor April 25, the Washington Post April 26, the Washington Times April 26, First Post April 26, Los Angeles Times April 26, the Washington Times April 26, and the Telegraph April 26.

Note video - “Nuclear Bunker Buster for War in Iran and Fallout” below the article

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Categories: Bush · Environmental Destruction · Human Rights · Iran · Israel · MidEast · Militarism · Neocons · Nuclear · US Military · US Policy · Video · War Crimes

Poison Ice is Seeping Into the Arctic Food Web

April 30, 2008 · No Comments

As the sea ice melts, a toxic stew of mercury and synthetic chemicals is seeping into the Arctic food web, harming the area’s people. We may be next.

By Elizabeth Grossman

April 30, 2008 | ARCTIC OCEAN — Over 300 miles north of the Arctic Circle, in the polar dark of a December morning, University of Manitoba Ph.D. student Jesse Carrie is out on the frozen Beaufort Sea, collecting ice samples to measure for mercury and pesticides. Lowered by crane from the deck of the icebreaking research vessel the CCGS Amundsen, and accompanied by a rifle bearer who keeps watch for polar bears, Carrie extracts ice cores and vials of frigid water. Carrie is part of a $40 million International Polar Year scientific expedition, the first ever to spend the winter moving through sea ice north of the Arctic Circle. The expedition’s labor-intensive work is essential to understanding the impacts of global warming.

Note video - “Global Heating & Climate Change: Melting of Polar Ice Caps” below the article

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Categories: Climate Change · Corporations · Environmental Destruction · Video

Ominous Signs That White House Advisers Want More Wars

April 30, 2008 · No Comments

Submitted by davidswanson on Tue, 2008-04-29 15:20.

* Media

By Jim Lobe, IPS News

Are the latest accusations and tough language leveled against Iran, Syria, and North Korea evidence of a resurgence by the remaining hawks in the administration of President George W. Bush hoping for a final confrontation against one or more members of the revised ‘axis of evil’ before his term next January?

Note video - “USA PREPARES TO ATTACK IRAN due to IRAN-PAK-INDIA GAS LINE!” below the article

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Categories: Bush · CIA · Conspiracies · Iran · Iraq War · Israel · MidEast · Militarism · Neocons · US Military · US Policy · Video

Military or Market-Driven Empire Building: 1950-2008

April 30, 2008 · No Comments

by Prof. James Petras

Global Research, April 29, 2008

Introduction

From the middle of the 19th century but especially after the Second World War, two models of empire building competed on a world scale: One predominantly based on military conquests, involving direct invasions, proxy invading armies and subsidized separatist military forces; and the other predominantly based on large-scale, long-term economic penetration via a combination of investments, loans, credits and trade in which ‘market’ power and the superiority (greater productivity) in the means of production led to the construction of a virtual empire.

Note video - “911 interview with Ralph Schoenman WBAI” and “Iraq perpetual war interview Ralph Schoenman WBAI” below the article

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Categories: Asia · Bush · CIA · Conspiracies · Corporations · Democracy · Dollar · Environmental Destruction · Human Rights · MidEast · Militarism · US Military · US Policy · Video · War Crimes

The RAND Corporation: America’s University of Imperialism

April 30, 2008 · No Comments

By Chalmers Johnson, Tomdispatch.com.

Posted April 30, 2008.

For decades these self-professed saviors of the Western world helped precipitate U.S. foreign policy disasters like the Vietnam War.

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Categories: Democracy · Iraq War · MidEast · Militarism · US Military · US Policy

The Politics of Radical Religion, Oil, and Borrowed Money in the 21st century

April 30, 2008 · No Comments

American Theocracy
the peril and politics of radical religion, oil, and borrowed money in the 21st century
by Kevin Phillips
Penguin Books, 2006, paperback

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… the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections marked the transformation of the GOP into the first religious party in US. history

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Today’s United States … has organized much of its overseas military posture around petroleum - a new emphasis on protecting oilfields, pipelines, and sea lanes.

Note video - “Blood and Oil - A Declaration of Dependence” below the article

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Categories: Asia · Bush · Corporations · Economy · Iran · Iraq War · MidEast · Militarism · Peak Oil · Russia · US Military · US Policy · Video

War Propaganda: Disneyland Goes to War-torn Iraq

April 29, 2008 · No Comments

by Michel Chossudovsky

Global Research, April 28, 2008

Disneyland goes to war-torn Iraq, with a multi-million dollar entertainment complex, to be built on a 50 acre lot adjacent to the Green Zone.

The American-style amusement park will feature a skateboard park, rides, a concert theatre and a museum.

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Categories: Bush · Corporations · Iraq War · MidEast · US Military · US Policy

Food Crisis And The Failure Of The Capitalist Model

April 29, 2008 · 1 Comment

By Ian Angus

29 April, 2008
Countercurrents.org

“If the government cannot lower the cost of living it simply has to leave. If the police and UN troops want to shoot at us, that’s OK, because in the end, if we are not killed by bullets, we’ll die of hunger.”
– A demonstrator in Port-au-Prince, Haiti

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Categories: Climate Change · Corporations · Dollar · Economy · Environmental Destruction · Peak Oil · Poverty · US Policy