Antemedius - Liberally Critical Thinking

The Death of Truth: Chris Hedges Interviews Julian Assange

admin — Sun, 12 May 2013 19:31:40 +0000

This interview is a joint project of Truthdig and The Nation magazine.

Corporate totalitarianism is spreading rapidly, and it’s not just Assange or Manning they want. It is all who dare to defy the official narrative.

London - A tiny tip of the vast subterranean network of governmental and intelligence agencies from around the world dedicated to destroying WikiLeaks and arresting its founder, Julian Assange, appears outside the red-brick building on Hans Crescent Street that houses the Ecuadorean Embassy. Assange, the world’s best-known political refugee, has been in the embassy since he was offered sanctuary there last June. British police in black Kevlar vests are perched night and day on the steps leading up to the building, and others wait in the lobby directly in front of the embassy door. An officer stands on the corner of a side street facing the iconic department store Harrods, half a block away on Brompton Road. Another officer peers out the window of a neighboring building a few feet from Assange’s bedroom at the back of the embassy. Police sit round-the-clock in a communications van topped with an array of antennas that presumably captures all electronic forms of communication from Assange’s ground-floor suite.

The Metropolitan Police Service (MPS), or Scotland Yard, said the estimated cost of surrounding the Ecuadorean Embassy from June 19, 2012, when Assange entered the building, until Jan. 31, 2013, is the equivalent of $4.5 million.

Britain has rejected an Ecuadorean request that Assange be granted safe passage to an airport. He is in limbo. It is, he said, like living in a “space station.”

Read all of this at Truthout.org

Terror in the Mirror

admin — Sun, 28 Apr 2013 18:15:58 +0000

By William Boardman, Reader Supported News, 27 April 13

Who are the terrorists, and can you know one when you see one?

How is President Obama not a terrorist, like President Bush and other presidents before him?

What does it mean to be a terrorist? Isn't someone who commits or colludes in a terrorist act quite simply a terrorist?

What is a terrorist act? Isn't a terrorist act an act of violence designed to murder, main, and terrorize civilians?

Is there a difference between a terrorist act and an act of war? Not necessarily. The bombing of London in 1941 and Hiroshima in 1945 were acts of war, and they were both terrorist acts. The former failed, the latter succeeded, and the ripples of nuclear terror continue spreading almost 70 years later.

American drones, Reapers and Predators especially, are weapons of terror. Sometimes they are aimed at specific targets, sometimes they hit those targets, and sometimes they kill indiscriminately. People on the ground can hear or see the drones, but can't know what the drones will do, and that uncertainty gives drones their power to terrorize.

Even unarmed surveillance drones terrorize populations below, who have no way of knowing if unarmed drones are armed or not.

What Terrorist Wouldn't Love to Have a Drone Fleet?

The drone is the American government's terrorist weapon of choice in recent years.

Book Review: "America's Stolen Narrative" by Robert Parry

hungeski — Sat, 13 Apr 2013 05:02:26 +0000

(From The Paragraph.)
"Nixon Camp Sabotages Viet Peace Talks" -- Had the story under that headline been published in real time, Richard Nixon might have lost the 1968 election, and the Vietnam War would likely have ended years earlier. Now, with Robert Parry's latest book, "America's Stolen Narrative," a full telling of that story has been published, and a sketchy part of America's history can be filled. The book gives up-to-date, factual, solidly-sourced stories of several important recent (and a few of the earliest) events of American history. And it points out the false narratives, as it sweeps them away. Here are some of the highlights:

Nixon's Vietnam Peace Sabotage: "Huh, no. My God, I would never do anything to encourage ... Saigon not to come to the table," said Nixon to President Lyndon Johnson. Late in the 1968 presidential election season, Johnson was close to getting both North and South Vietnam to meet for peace talks in Paris.

Drones Are a Local Issue

davidswanson — Thu, 31 Jan 2013 19:16:25 +0000

No city is an island, Entire of itself. Each is a piece of the continent, A part of the main.

I write from Charlottesville, Va., but am hopeful that this message applies to your city, town, or county as well.

In the absence of state or federal laws, localities around the United States are proceeding to put unmanned aerial vehicles in our skies as they see fit. The federal government has authorized the flight of 30,000 drones, and the use of drones up to 400 feet by police departments, at least 300 of which already have surveillance drones in operation.

States and localities can ban or regulate such actions. Or they can proceed to endanger our health and our civil rights.

In Montgomery County, Texas, the Sheriff showed off a drone to the media but crashed it into his armored vehicle (thereby, I guess, proving that he needed an armored vehicle).

When the Dept. of Homeland Security challenged the University of Texas-Austin to hack into a drone and take control of it, the response was "No problem," and it was quickly done.

Corporate Assassins Determine World Order

admin — Sat, 19 Jan 2013 20:06:41 +0000

Abby Martin interviews John Perkins, economist and author of 'Confessions of an Economic Hitman', about how corporations are determining the world order, and how assassins take out those who challenge the system.

John Perkins tells of his own inner journey from willing servant of empire to impassioned advocate for the rights of oppressed people. Covertly recruited by the United States National Security Agency and on the payroll of an international consulting firm, he traveled the world—to Indonesia, Panama, Ecuador, Colombia, Saudi Arabia, Iran and other strategically important countries.

His job was to implement policies that promoted the interests of the U.S. corporatocracy (a coalition of government, banks, and corporations) while professing to alleviate poverty—policies that alienated many nations and ultimately led to September 11 and growing anti-Americanism. Within a few weeks of its release , Confessions of an Economic Hit Man landed on The New York Times Bestseller List, then 19 other bestseller lists including the Los Angeles Times, San Francisco Chronicle, USA Today, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post.

The author has been interviewed repeatedly on national radio and television shows, including Amy Goodman's Democracy Now, CSPAN's Book TV, and PBS' Now with David Brancaccio. And now the book is being published in 9 languages around the world. According to John Perkins, "It is accomplishing an important objective in inspiring people to think and talk and to know that we can change the world."

The Day They Levitated The Pentagon

Nadine Bloch — Tue, 01 Jan 2013 19:11:38 +0000

Mother Nature Belongs at the Bargaining Table

Jill Stein — Thu, 06 Dec 2012 21:30:04 +0000

As the highly scripted stagecraft of the presidential campaign fades from the headlines, there's a new show in Washington. ”Fiscal Cliff” stars President Barack Obama, who urges Republicans and Democrats to agree on a ”grand bargain” that would soften the economic shock of the impending across-the-board tax and spending cuts. But that bipartisan handshake would be nothing to celebrate.

Here's why: Both parties are intent on imposing an austerity budget bloated with military spending and private-industry health insurance waste. That would be a raw deal for the American people.

It's a sign of Washington's rightward drift that a Democratic president has offered to put Social Security on the chopping block, even though it hasn't contributed one dime to the deficit. And Obama has offered to cut Medicare rather than pursue an improved ”Medicare for All” insurance system that could save trillions over the next decade by eliminating the wasteful bureaucracy and medical inflation inherent in our private health insurance system.

Equally troubling, both parties are ignoring another problem that's truly critical: the climate cliff.

Our planet is rapidly approaching a geophysical tipping point at which the consequences of climate change, such as the disappearance of polar ice caps and the melting of frozen methane deposits, trigger an unstoppable acceleration of warming. Once that happens, it will render our climate incompatible with civilization as we know it.

U.N. Environment Programme's Chief Scientist Warns: Emissions Targets Won’t Halt Planet’s Warming

admin — Tue, 27 Nov 2012 03:31:26 +0000

From DemocracyNow.org, November 26, 2012:

The U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change pledged to cap global temperature rises at 2 degrees Celsius at the 2010 summit in Cancun, but new figures show greenhouse gas emissions hit a record high last year. According to the United Nations, the world is now on pace for a global temperature rise of between 3 and 5 degrees. Unveiling the latest findings, the chief scientist of the U.N. Environment Programme, Joe Alcamo, warned that current emissions standards will be insufficient to stop devastating climate change.

Joe Alcamo: "Over 45 scientists from around the world, came to the conclusion that by 2020, if we just complied with current pledges that the countries have made to reduce emissions, global emissions will not be low enough to be on track to meet the 2-degree climate target. So in other words, we cannot wait until 2020 to have stringent reductions. We know what the challenge is. It’s a question now of taking action. Between now and 2020, through the negotiations, we can tighten up the rules for complying with pledges, that would lead to a reduction in emissions."

Gaza Death Toll Passes 100 As Israel Attacks Civilians and Media Centers

admin — Mon, 19 Nov 2012 22:05:28 +0000

alJazeera reports...

Israeli raids on the Gaza Strip have continued for a sixth day, despite calls for a truce, with the overall death toll reaching 110, according to medical sources.

A media centre was targeted for a second time on Monday when Israeli fighter jets hit the Shuruq tower in Gaza City. The building houses Palestinian and international media outlets, including Britain's Sky News, Saudi-owned Al Arabiya and the official Hamas broadcaster, Al Aqsa TV.

One person was killed in the building. The Islamic Jihad group identified the victim as Ramez Harb and said he was a senior commander in its armed wing, the al-Quds Brigades.

On Sunday, the health ministry said eight journalists were injured when the Shuruq tower and another media building, used by local al-Quds TV, were hit.

more...

A 'Grand Bargain' or a Grand Uprising?

admin — Thu, 15 Nov 2012 11:35:16 +0000

By Carl Gibson, Reader Supported News

Do you like word games? Here's one: in the next paragraph, replace the word "Greek" with "American."

In the Greek economy, international banks own the debt-based currency and most of the debt, which means endless bailouts from the government to prop up those banks whenever they piss away the last bailout. To pay for the bailout, the Greek government demands endless cuts from Greek public services. This can only lead to thousands of Greeks out of work, putting thousands of Greeks into the streets. This could all be avoided if the Greeks simply controlled their currency, punished the bankers, and drafted a new constitution that establishes Greek sovereignty over banks.

Right now in America, the Federal Reserve is buying up $40 billion a month in worthless mortgage-backed securities during what is known as QE3. In layman's terms, this means that a private banking cartel that owns our currency, unaccountable to any government agency, is forking over $40 billion a month to the same Wall Street bankers that wrecked our economy with risky bets on imaginary financial instruments.

While this great robbery is happening, President Obama and Congress are preparing to sell us a "Grand Bargain" in January that will ask us to give up more of our already meager Social Security and Medicare benefits, to avoid a manufactured "fiscal cliff" that doesn't even really exist in the first place. The only difference between Americans and Greeks right now is that the Greeks have turned their streets into war zones to protest the aforementioned injustices, while we're all watching the NFL.