A dispute over President George W. Bush’s politicizing of science is reverberating in a close Arizona Senate race. The Republican is highlighting a personal attack against Democratic candidate Richard Carmona that was first raised to blunt his criticism of Bush’s politicization, writes…
Category: Human Rights
Buying ‘Justice’
Powerful corporations and right-wing interest groups are taking aim at state judges around the country who have ruled the “wrong” way and who can be tossed out via elections. This new flood of campaign cash is creating a system of…
Warnings from the Cuban Missile Crisis
Special Report: Amid the trivia of American politics, voters can forget that they are entrusting the winning candidate for President with the nuclear codes, the power to annihilate all life on the planet, a reality that reporter Don North witnessed…
When ‘Lesser-Evil’ Misses the Point
The American Left is engaged in its quadrennial debate, whether to vote for “the lesser evil” Democrat or maintain political purity and either boycott the election or cast a ballot for a minor-party candidate. A similar argument in 1968 helped change the…
Thanking Europe for No World Wars
The Nobel committee’s award of the Peace Prize to the European Union may be head-scratching to some, given the continent’s angry economic divisions and NATO’s role in recent wars. But the point was to commend Europe for having avoided a repeat of the…
Treehouses Block Keystone Pipeline
Some environmentalists are living in treehouses in a last-ditch stand against building a section of the Keystone pipeline though Texas. The protest drew some attention after the arrest of actor Daryl Hannah, but has mostly been ignored by the U.S.…
Tribunal Weighs Crimes on Palestine
A “peoples” tribunal, modeled after an examination of U.S. war crimes in Vietnam, is exploring Israel’s mistreatment of the Palestinians. Meeting in New York City, the Russell Tribunal on Palestine sometimes was legalistic but addressed frequently ignored issues, says Danny…
Ryan’s Distortion of America’s Founding
Rep. Paul Ryan wraps his Ayn Randian philosophy of unrestrained selfishness in phrasing selectively lifted from the Founders, but the Republican vice presidential nominee misses the role of democracy and self-government in establishing human rights, says historian Jada Thacker.
The Backlash against Women’s Rights
Religious fundamentalism Islamic, Judaic and Christian is pushing back against progress toward equal rights for women. The fundamentalists want to restore patriarchal dominance and are gaining ground in the Muslim world, Israel and the United States inside the Republican Party,…
Silence of the Drones
Exclusive: Even as the United States has withdrawn from Iraq and has begun to wind down the Afghan War, the lethal reach of the U.S. military has been extended into other countries through Predator drones. What is less known is…