May 2011
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What Manuel Zelaya's return means for Honduras |... →
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AFP: Syria decrees general amnesty, opposition... →
Slightly more on the “general amnesty” declaration from Assad:
DAMASCUS — Syrian President Bashar al-Assad Tuesday decreed a general amnesty for members of the banned Muslim Brotherhood and for political prisoners, but the opposition swiftly dismissed the measure as “too little too late.”
“President Assad has by decree issued an amnesty on all (political)...
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Afghanistan "sovereignty" - Glenn Greenwald →
They hate us for our freedom:
So we’re in Afghanistan to bring Freedom and Democracy to the Afghan People, but the President of the country has no power whatsoever to tell us to stop bombing Afghan homes. His decrees are simply requests, “merely symbolic.” Karzai, of course, is speaking not only for himself, but even more so for (and under pressure from) the Afghan People: the ones we’re...
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BBC News - Syria: Bashar al-Assad 'grants general... →
I’m not quite sure what this means yet, and I doubt it will do much to halt the calls for Assad’s ouster.
Assad “lifted emergency rule” in mid April. That was something of a cruel joke considering the repression since; we’ll see what happens.
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“Sarah Palin represents a dangerous force in American culture that is startlingly...”
– James Howard Kunstler
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Who's the Most Unpopular Governor in America? |... →
Florida’s Rick Scott and Ohio’s John Kasich are currently the leading contenders for the title of the most unpopular governor in America, according to a recent Public Policy Polling (PPP) survey. (A mere 32 percent of respondents approve of Scott, while just 33 percent support Kasich. A separate Quinnipiac poll puts Scott’s approval even lower, at 29 percent.)...
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Syed Saleem Shahzad, RIP — Registan.net →
Joshua Foust writes:
Syed Saleem Shahzad, the Pakistan Bureau Chief of the Asia Times Online, has been found dead near his car in Sarai Alamgir, about 200 kilometres from Islamabad. The body, according to reports, showed “signs of torture.”
This is a serious loss—not just for his family, which must mourn a senseless death, but for people trying to understand the inexplicable militancy in...
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Time to be honest | Red Pepper →
In a hyper-individualised society, it is no surprise that climate action has been focused up to now on personal responsibility to limit consumption. We receive typically about three thousand adverts every day to consume, so green consumption bolsters that. The mentality is that the problem is one of individual and consumer habits, and that the answer to the climate crisis is lifestyle changes....
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Officers disown Gaddafi as peace bid stalls -... →
In Rome, the eight officers, including five generals, appeared at an Italian government-arranged news conference, saying they were part of a group of up to 120 military officials and soldiers who defected from Gaddafi in recent days. The defections come two months after that of Libyan foreign minister and former espionage chief Moussa Koussa and the resignation of senior diplomat Ali...
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Yemeni jets bomb al Qaeda-held city - swissinfo →
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BBC News - Yemen forces 'kill 20 protesters' in... →
Yemen - Taiz May 30th, 2011
“They attacked, shot at people, burned their tents. The square had a big stage to make speeches and to make plays and songs, loudspeakers and this sort of thing.
“They killed them [protesters]… and at 0300 [0100 GMT], they brought bulldozers and finished it all. There is nothing there. They are even cleaning it so no-one can guess that there was...
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Germany: Nuclear power plants to close by 2022 →
The decision makes Germany the biggest industrial power to announce plans to give up nuclear energy.
Environment Minister Norbert Rottgen made the announcement following late-night talks.
Chancellor Angela Merkel set up a panel to review nuclear power following the crisis at Fukushima in Japan.
There have been mass anti-nuclear protests across Germany in the wake of March’s Fukushima crisis,...
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A Decade of Magical Tax-Cut Thinking →
GOP leaders argue that the budget deficit is the great moral issue of our day and requires great austerity.
Yet just before Memorial Day, GOP lawmakers unveiled their bold new economic program. You guessed right: more tax cuts for millionaires, billionaires, and global corporations.
The Republicans’ plan calls for reducing the top income tax rate on millionaires and big corporations from 35...
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THE GUARDIAN: Twitter unmasks anonymous British... →
joshsternberg:
This could be huge:
Twitter has been forced to hand over the personal details of a British user in a libel battle that could have huge implications for free speech on the web.
The social network has passed the name, email address and telephone number of a south Tyneside councillor accused of libelling the local authority via a series of anonymous Twitter accounts. South...
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Nasrallah calls on Syrians to support Assad -... →
Oh Hassan Nasrallah you silly, silly man:
Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Lebanon’s Hezbollah, has called on Syrians to support president Bashar al-Assad and enter into dialogue with the government to end weeks of ongoing protests across Syria.
Nasrallah, speaking via video link from an undisclosed location on Wednesday, made the remarks in an address marking the 11th anniversary of...
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“This is one of the tricks the president is using to convince the west that...”
– Amin Al Himyari, a Yemen analyst, dismissed reports that al-Qaeda had occupied Zanjibar. Yemeni gunmen alleged to be al-Qaeda fighters have reportedly taken control of the capital of the southern Abyan province. A resident said around 300 fighters entered the southern coastal town of Zinjibar on...
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Syrian tanks attack two central towns - Middle... →
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Pope’s Pedophilia Adviser’s Priest Arrested For... →
Here’s some sweet talk from the shaman himself:
Seppia asked a Moroccan drug dealer to arrange sexual encounters with young and vulnerable boys. “I do not want 16-year-old boys but younger. Fourteen-year-olds are O.K. Look for needy boys who have family issues.”
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“The real mass media are basically trying to divert people. “Let them do...”
– Noam Chomsky (via noleadersplease)
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ShortFormBlog: Hosni Mubarak has to pay huge fine... →
shortformblog:
$90 million the amount Hosni Mubarak and other Egyptian leaders were fined for their role in shutting down Internet and mobile phone service for five days
$34 million the size of the fine Mubarak has to pay personally, an amount that has to be paid immediately to the country’s national treasury source
» A fine still owed, appeal or not? The fine, which the judge ordered must be...
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Bahrain: High court to review death penalty cases... →
Bahrain’s state news agency says military prosecutors have asked the country’s highest court to review two death penalty sentences linked to anti-government protests.
A special security court issued the sentences last month for four people convicted of killing two policemen during the unrest. Two of the sentences were reduced to life in prison and two death sentences were upheld.
Bahrain’s...
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John Boehner's Pathetic 10-Page Jobs Plan | Mother... →
Reading the “House Republican Plan for America’s Job Creators” (PDF) is an exercise in wonderment: you wonder what the GOPers actually propose. Several of the “Republican Solutions” are a bit vague. “After a systematic review of our visa system, the Congress should undertake prudent reforms,” reads one “solution.” Another “solution”: “We will work to control the federal deficit to assure...
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Questions about Ratko Mladic - Glenn Greenwald →
I asked myself the same questions upon hearing the news of Mladic’s capture and imminent trial:
The NYT says that, for Europe, Mladic’s arrest ”has a resonance on the magnitude of the killing of Osama bin Laden for Americans.” That’s understandable, as the crimes of which Mladic is accused are at least as grave and serious as those bin Laden allegedly committed. Mladic is almost...
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Federal judge strikes down ban on corporate giving... →
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“The idea that churches can tackle national poverty, take care of those who are...”
– “Let the Churches Do It” Is a Deceptive Myth
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A Good Week for Bibi, a Bad Week for Barack, an... →
After reading the typical nonsense from Charles Krauthammer this morning, this analysis from Rashid Khalidi is a breath of fresh air.
While this was not a good week for Barack Obama, and was a very good one for Binyamin Netanyahu, it also can be a salutary occasion for Palestinians and Arabs. It should finally cure those still infected with the diseased notion that they have anything to gain...
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Bin Laden Considered Cutting a Deal for Pakistani... →
In a visit to Pakistan today to reset strained U.S.-Pakistani relations in the wake of Osama bin Laden’s death, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton reiterated that the U.S. has no evidence that any senior Pakistani officials knew bin Laden was hiding in the country. But, according a New York Times report this morning,U.S. officials have uncovered evidence that bin Laden considered cutting a deal...
Wikileaks Cables Show Speculators Behind Oil... →
Matt Taibbi:
All of this is significant because both the Bush administration and the Obama administration have denied this narrative to various degrees. The CFTC only recently admitted that speculation played a role in the 2008 mess, having originally (and stubbornly) blamed supply and demand issues. Subsequent analyses have shown that the Saudi position, that worldwide demand for oil never...
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Yemen edges closer to civil war as tribal leader... →
“What we’re witnessing now is a battle between the two most powerful families in Yemen, a conflict that has been brewing for several years which because of Saleh’s stubbornness has come to its head,” said Abdullah al-Faqah, professor of politics at Sana’a University. “This was a foolish fight for him [Saleh] to pick.”
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Three Days in Yemeni History | Waq al-Waq | Big... →
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The Right's Top 5 EPA Conspiracy Theories | Mother... →
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Syrian student tells of torture ordeal in mass... →
“Then they would choose certain detainees randomly and drag them a bit away from the others so that they have enough space to beat them hard. One came to me as I was sitting on my knees, placed his shoe on my head and forced it down until my face touched the floor. He asked me: ‘Who is your master?’ I said: ‘Bashar al-Assad.’ He left me. The same thing happened to my friend, but the soldier...
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The G-8’s Self-Serving Math - NYTimes.com →
From Jeff Sachs:
The final communiqués haven’t been written. But the word on the street is that when leaders of the Group of 8 industrialized countries meet in France this week, they will claim that wealthy countries have come close to fulfilling their 2005 promise to boost annual development aid by $50 billion by 2010. They are not even in the ballpark.
