Americans are taught the myth that their democracy is safeguarded by an independent press. But the government and other powerful entities have long mastered the art of manipulating the major media, even to the point of bluntly telling reporters the…
Author: Consortiumnews.com
No War Over Rocks
U.S. foreign policy remains captive to unipolar hubris, enforced by neocon pundits who demand military interventions to solve the world’s problems. But this kneejerk response is particularly crazy when applied to Asian disputes over rocks far at sea, says Independent Institute’s…
Falling Short on ‘Challenge Grant’
From Editor Robert Parry: We’re in danger of falling short on our $10,000 “challenge grant” which we hoped would go a long way toward meeting our end-of-year fundraising goal. So, if you can help with a tax-deductible donation to Consortiumnews.com…
Judge Leon’s Dirty Climb to the Bench
Exclusive: Civil libertarians are cheering federal judge Richard Leon for his ruling against the NSA’s massive surveillance program and that’s all to the good but Leon’s route to the bench followed a twisted course of partisan investigations and one historic…
Playing Deadly Games with ‘Gun Rights’
Pro-gun extremists routinely edit out of the Second Amendment its stated purpose of having “a well-regulated militia” maintain state “security.” The tampering lets them pretend the Founders would be okay with slaughters like the Newtown massacre, as Bill Moyers and Michael Winship…
The Blacklisting of Noam Chomsky
An odd aspect of modern American life is that even with 24-hour news and its roster of blathering pundits, many creative thinkers with valuable insights are blacklisted from mainstream media, perhaps most notably Noam Chomsky who turned 85 on Dec. 7,…
Latin America Finds Its Footing
Exclusive: While the U.S. and Spain have wallowed in the Great Recession swamp, Latin America has begun breaking free of the old order that bogged down progress. Now, the region is restructuring relations with its old international masters, as Andrés Cala explains.
Wisdom in Restraint on Syria
The neocons are still beating the drums for U.S. military intervention in Syria, now supposedly for humanitarian reasons. But as horrific as the Syrian violence is it’s clear that President Obama’s restraint last summer averted making the mess even worse, says…
What Mandela Did and Didn’t Do
While an inspiring tale of resilience and reconciliation, Nelson Mandela’s saga also marked a failure of black South Africans to transform their hard-won political power into economic equality, as domestic and foreign whites retained the reins of money, as Danny…
The Real Existential Threat
Most people on Earth everyone born after World War II have lived their entire lives under the threat of nuclear annihilation. But just because an existential threat has always been there doesn’t mean it won’t be activated, as Ira Helfand and…