Inauguration 2017 Special Coverage w/ Angela Davis, Naomi Klein, Ralph Nader & More
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Special coverage in the Trump Era
From Public Citizen's Corporate Presidency site: "44 Trump administration officials have close ties to the Koch brothers and their network of political groups, particularly Vice President Mike Pence, White House Legislative Affairs Director Marc Short, EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt and White House budget director Mick Mulvaney."
Dark Money author Jane Mayer on The Dangers of President Pence, New Yorker, Oct. 23 issue on-line
Can Time Inc. Survive the Kochs? November 28, 2017 By Jane Mayer
..."This year, among the Kochs’ aims is to spend a projected four hundred million dollars in contributions from themselves and a small group of allied conservative donors they have assembled, to insure Republican victories in the 2018 midterm elections. Ordinarily, political reporters for Time magazine would chronicle this blatant attempt by the Kochs and their allies to buy political influence in the coming election cycle. Will they feel as free to do so now?"...
"Democracy in Chains: The Deep History of the Radical Right’s Stealth Plan for America" see: our site, and George Monbiot's essay on this key book by historian Nancy MacLean.
Full interview with The New Yorker’s Jane Mayer March 29, 2017, Democracy Now! about her article, "The Reclusive Hedge-Fund Tycoon Behind the Trump Presidency: How Robert Mercer Exploited America’s Populist Insurgency."
Democracy Now! Special Broadcast from the Women's March on Washington
The Economics of Happiness -- shorter version
Local Futures offers a free 19-minute abridged version of its award-winning documentary film The Economics of Happiness. It "brings us voices of hope of in a time of crisis." www.localfutures.org.
What's New?
July 07, 2016
The peace movement was right: "Damning Chilcot Report Confirms Iraq Invasion Was Bush/Blair's War of Choice"
Published on Wednesday, July 06, 2016 by Common Dreams
Damning Chilcot Report Confirms Iraq Invasion Was Bush/Blair's War of Choice
by Lauren McCauley, staff writer
"I will be with you, whatever," former British Prime Minister Tony Blair pledged to U.S. President George Bush on July 28, 2002. That vow was made public Tuesday in the damning Chilcot Inquiry, underscoring the investigation's conclusion: The invasion of Iraq was decided on well before all peaceful resolutions were exhausted, proving—as critics have long-contended—that the disastrous intervention was a war of choice.
"In 2003, for the first time since the Second World War, the United Kingdom took part in an invasion and full-scale occupation of a sovereign State. That was a decision of the utmost gravity," said Sir John Chilcot, in a statement Tuesday presenting the findings of the 7-year inquiry, which was established in 2009 by then-Prime Minister Gordon Brown to address the failures of the Iraq War.
"We have concluded," Chilcot continued, "that the UK chose to join the invasion of Iraq before the peaceful options for disarmament had been exhausted. Military action at that time was not a last resort."
Lindsey German, convenor of the UK-based Stop the War Coalition, which led the popular movement against the Iraq invasion, said the group "welcome[s] the fact that this report is so damning but for us this is not the end but the beginning. There must be legal sanctions against Tony Blair and he should no longer be considered fit for any office."
A War of Choice
Among the report's findings is that Blair ignored warnings over the gross consequences of such action and deliberately overstated the "severity of the threat posed by Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction (WMD)," which was largely used to justify the intervention." ...
Read full article here