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The number of civilians killed in U.S. Special Operations Forces (SOF) raids in Afghanistan last year was probably several times higher than the figure of 80 people cited in the U.N. report published last week, an IPS investigation has revealed.
As Americans turn to their news media to make sense of the upheavals in the Middle East, it’s worth remembering that the bias of the mainstream U.S. press corps is most powerful when covering a Washington-designated villain, especially if he happens to be Muslim.
Although people can be educated in a variety of ways, experience is a particularly effective teacher. Consider the Japanese who today are certainly learning how dangerous nuclear power can be.
The United States government, in violation of international human rights treaties, is trying to prevent the return to Haiti of twice-elected President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, who was deposed in a U.S.-backed coup d’etat in 2004.
When I arrived in the capital of Qatar, as one of the guest participants in the 6th annual Al Jazeera Forum focused on the Arab world in transition, it was clear the mood had changed.
A number of years back, Pauline Kael took Steven Spielberg to task for his depiction of rural Georgia circa 1909 in his movie, “The Color Purple,” averring that Spielberg's only field of reference seemed to be images culled from cinematic history, rendering his movie tone deaf regarding the rhythms and cadences of life during the era.
Read on.The hideous King of Bahrain has called in troops from Saudi Arabia, UAE and Kuwait to attack pro-democracy protesters in Bahrain.
George Orwell argued that controlling language offered the ultimate tool for getting people to accept the unacceptable – such as the catastrophic risks of operating nuclear power plants.
It appears the most serious offense you can commit in Washington these days is telling the truth. You get a pass on torture, aggressive war, killing civilians, lying, destroying evidence and such, but don’t dare give honest information to the American people.
The ecological crisis posed by the exploding and leaking nuclear power plants in Japan following the massive earthquake and tsunami there presents an opportunity for Americans to rethink nuclear power.
I live in a university town just west of the city of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Both the town and the university share the same name, hence West Chester University. WCU is a publicly owned institution and part of the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education (PASSHE).
Today’s American political crisis has many facets, but a key one is narrative – how the history and ideals of the United States are understood by the public. The strategic importance of narrative is why the Right has invested so much in building media to redirect and control the national storylines.
